by Jacob Gowans
Sammy took a step toward the window and threw the board as hard as he could with his left hand. The glass shattered, allowing the wind to howl and swirl around the room.
“What are you doing?” the fox asked. “You won’t survive that jump. You know that.”
“Tell Katie that the next time I see her, she will die.”
The fox put up his hands as Sammy walked backward to the large window. “Don’t do this, Sammy. Don’t go. You belong here with me bettering the world. Out there you’ll be on the losing side. You’ll waste your life and all your gifts.”
“It’s too late,” Sammy said. “I’d rather take my chances jumping than stay in this room another minute. Be seeing you.”
He jumped out the window as the fox shouted after him. He only fell about twenty meters before a looming black shape greeted him. Using landing blasts, Sammy came to a gentle stop atop the cruiser. The side door opened, and Sammy swung himself inside. Ludwig was at the controls directing the cruiser out of the city. Sammy took a seat in the co-pilots chair.
Before he’d even counted, he knew some people were missing.
“Antonio, Kobe, and Kaden,” Li told him when he asked. “All dead.”
Each name punched Sammy in the gut. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“Your parents weren’t even there, were they?”
“No.”
Li smacked his arm rest with his fist. “What a joke! This whole thing was a joke!”
“It’s much worse now,” Sammy said. “They—the CAG—the Thirteens attacked Beta headquarters. Alpha headquarters. The Elite. Everything. They attacked everywhere. I saw footage of it. It’s a warzone. We can’t go back.”
“How do you know that wasn’t another trick?” Li asked.
“I—I don’t know for sure. But one of the buildings they destroyed was the Beta building. The news showed multiple strike zones. It looked legit.”
“Where else can we go?” Ludwig asked.
Sammy had no idea. “Commander Byron is probably dead. Al, my Squadron, Tawhiri, Psion Command, all of them. . . . ” His own words overwhelmed him to the point of hopelessness. Life without Byron seemed unthinkable. The commander’s family had only recently been reunited with his parents. It wasn’t fair.
Glasgow, a voice said to him. He said the name aloud to Ludwig.
“What? Glasgow? What’s that? Where’s that?”
“I don’t know. Put it into the computer. Glasgow. It’s the only place I can think of where we might be safe.”
Sammy got up from his seat.
“What are you doing?” Ludwig asked.
“I’m going to check on Jeffie.”
“We still have questions,” Li said.
“They can wait.”
Kawai and Brickert were in the back tending to Jeffie.
“She’s in a lot of pain,” Kawai said. “I haven’t done much first aid training yet.”
“We did what we could for her,” Brickert added, “which was really only giving her blood and putting the orange stuff on . . . and a bandage.”
Sammy asked them to move to the front so he had room to work. Then he pulled out a curtain that acted as a partition between the medic area and the rest of the cruiser. Sammy took the bandages off to examine her wounds. As he pulled off the tape, Jeffie winced and opened her eyes. She didn’t speak, but watched his face while he searched through the medical kit for the supplies he wanted. He injected her thigh with an anesthetic and then gave her an antibiotic. She didn’t react at all to the shots. With a long metal instrument, Sammy dug into the wound and removed the bullet. It missed her femoral artery. Thank you, God. Jeffie still watched him while he worked, tears leaking from her eyes.
“You shouldn’t be feeling any pain now,” he told her. “Where does it hurt?”
She tapped her chest with a finger. Sammy indicated that he understood. He put the extracted bullet into her hand, and she closed her fist around it. After rinsing the wound, he injected more orange goo into her flesh and compressed it for several seconds. Finally, satisfied that he’d done the best he could, Sammy put new bandaging on and covered her leg.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“I’m sorry about Kobe,” he told her as he brushed her hair back from her face. “I know what you’re feeling right now.”
“I know you do.”
For the first time in his life, Sammy felt a small measure of gratitude for all the horrors he’d witnessed. “Do you want to be alone?” he asked. Her eyes slowly moved from the floor to Sammy’s face.
“No,” she mouthed.
Sammy knelt next to her and held her hand. They didn’t speak. Sammy sensed that she appreciated him knowing exactly what she was going through. He had experienced so much loss already. And while he felt terrible guilt for the deaths of his friends, he was also strangely comforted knowing that Jeffie understood him better.
“It’s not your fault,” she whispered. “If what you say is true—if you hadn’t let us come with you. . . . ”
“It doesn’t make me feel better,” he said. “I don’t know why, but it doesn’t.”
“What else is it?” she asked in the same weak voice. “There’s something more, isn’t there?” Sammy brushed her hair out of her face and kissed her forehead. Jeffie slipped her hand into his. “Tell me.”
“I will,” he promised, “but not right now. Soon, though, okay?”
She blinked at him. “Sammy—the Thirteens in the garage—they all looked like you.”
“Like me?”
“Not exactly. They all looked the same, and I could see your face in theirs.”
He squeezed her hand tightly and felt her return the pressure. When she fell asleep, he returned to the cockpit with Ludwig and Li. Li told Sammy about the battle in the garage, how Antonio had lost his cool, and how Kobe and Kaden had died. Sammy took in all the details, especially the ones about the Hybrids the fox had mentioned.
“They really did look like you, Sammy,” Li said. “Not perfect clones or anything, but like they could be your brother or something.”
“What about you, Ludwig?” Sammy asked.
“We waited on the roof of the tower across the street. We had one pair of binoculars on the garage waiting for Li and everyone to come back out. The other pair was on that window. I watched you the whole time.”
“It’s my fault,” Sammy groaned. “It’s all my fault.”
“No, man,” Ludwig said. “If what you said is true, we all owe you a huge thanks that we’re still alive.”
Sammy heard the words, but it still did not make him feel better. They flew in silence for a long while. The stealth cruiser had to fly at low speeds to not be spotted. It was still dark when they landed outside the town of Glasgow. Ludwig set the ship down in a field of tall grass that Sammy thought might have once been a baseball field.
“I don’t think we’re in the right place,” Miguel said. “You sure about this?”
“No, I’m not,” Sammy said. “I’ve never been here.”
Li opened the door and got out with his gun in his right hand.
“Drop the weapon!” an unseen voice called out. “Drop it now!”
Li’s hand jerked skyward. “Okay! Don’t shoot! I’m putting it down now.”
“Your cruiser is surrounded. Each of you get out of the vehicle, turn around, and get on your knees!”
Sammy still couldn’t see the source of the voice. Suddenly it seemed very possible that the CAG had discovered the resistance in the last several weeks and set up traps to catch more people sympathetic to the cause. He climbed out of the cruiser on the other side. Keeping his hands raised high above his head, he stepped forward.
“We’re looking for Thomas and Lara Byron. We are friends of the resistance. My name is Samuel Berhane.”
About ten people emerged from the grass, all holding assault rifles. “Yes, I remember you,” one man said, “from the meeting in Wichita.”
Another man behind the f
irst asked, “You escaped all that madness on Capitol Island? The bombings over there and whatnot, did you?”
Sammy could see the other Psions looking at him. “No, we weren’t involved with that. But we can’t go back there, either. Can we meet with Thomas and Lara?”
In minutes, three cars came to pick up the Betas. Sammy carried Jeffie and laid her gently inside the same one he rode in. Their small caravan drove down into dark underground roads until the small town of Glasgow was above them. They pulled into a small cave where several more cars were parked. The drivers of the cars led them upstairs into the kitchen of a small home, a sharp contrast from the magnificent museum where the Byrons used to live. Lara and Thomas came into the room as soon as the door opened. Lara threw herself onto Sammy.
“You’re alive!” she cried, petting Sammy on the back of the head like he was her own grandson. “I can’t believe it. You are a miracle, Sammy.” The strain was visible in her voice and on Thomas’ face. Sammy knew what they were thinking.
“We haven’t heard anything yet from Walter or Al,” he told Sammy. “But we’re optimistic.” He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “Everything’s going to be fine.”
“Everyone needs to come inside now,” Lara said. “We’ll figure out what to do and where to sort you so you can get rest.”
All eleven of them headed into the modest living room, Sammy again carrying Jeffie. His body was exhausted, but he refused to let anyone else do it for him. The house was small, but cozy and clean. Some sat on furniture, others on the floor, while Thomas began making calls to arrange places for the Psions to sleep. Lara prepared hot drinks and snacks and carried them out on a giant tray. Everyone accepted her offerings gratefully.
About ten minutes later, Thomas finished his calls. “We heard about everything minutes after it happened—before the news even picked it up. We get a few illegal NWG channels, but so far we aren’t hearing anything we haven’t learned from the CAG reporters.”
Sammy looked at Jeffie sipping her cup of cocoa with large, blank eyes. He noticed Lara watching him, and she gave him a sad smile.
“I’m sure the commander’s going to be okay,” he told Lara quietly. She responded by patting his hand and kissing it tenderly.
Around the room, several of the Psions were beginning to doze off. Natalia’s head rested on Brickert’s chest while his head bobbed on top of hers. Parley was already asleep, and Rosa and Miguel were nodding off. Everyone else seemed wide-awake, but no one knew what to say.
“You are all welcome to sit here as long as you want,” Thomas said. “When you’re ready for a comfortable bed, let me know and I’ll show you to one. And don’t feel like you have to talk, either. There’ll be time enough for that later.”
“Oh, Thomas, look!” Lara said, pointing at the screen.
Appearing on the holo-screen was the NWG President. Sammy hadn’t paid much attention to him before, but he did now. He was an older man, his skin very dark and his hair very white. In the deep lines of his face, Sammy saw the same weight and sadness that he, too, carried at that moment. The president stood in a small room flanked by a NWG flag on his right and his wife on his left. Sammy guessed the president was probably in a makeshift conference room in the War Offices deep under the earth. There was no podium in front of him, no seal, just him, his wife, and a flag. He wore a suit that didn’t quite fit him. He had deep bags under his eyes and no smile.
When he stared at the camera, his eyes were filled with emotion, and Sammy felt as if they were talking face to face. Thomas quickly turned up the sound and everyone in the room woke.
“My fellow citizens of the New World Government. Today we suffered the greatest tragedy in the history of our young nation. American forces invaded our lands and attacked our soil. The losses we have suffered are limited almost exclusively to our nation’s military and government, but each of those lives represents a father, a mother, a husband, a wife, a son, a daughter, a sister, a brother, or a friend. We have confirmed the deaths of over four thousand lives, and, sadly, that number continues to climb. We honor those who have fallen for they gave their lives for our cause of freedom.
“In the next days, I will address this situation in greater detail. I will also give more plans for action, but today—right now—I have only one desire, and that is to put down the rumors that I am considering a surrender to the Continental American Government. Nothing could be further from the truth! This is not the time for cowardice or negotiations. This is not the time to wave white flags. As long as I am your president, I will fight to the last man. To do anything else would be a terrible waste of those lives lost today. I pray that we are united in this goal. We fight on for our families, for our liberties, and for our lives.
“I call upon every able man and woman to take up our cause. I do not know what lies ahead in these troublesome times, but I do know they will be dark, perhaps our darkest and most difficult. I also know that they will be followed by our brightest days. I know whatever challenges we face we can overcome if that is the will of our people. Our will must be stronger than any power that can be thrown against us. I plead with you to stand against our enemies with me. Fight our enemies with me. Ours is the cause of justice. Ours is the cause of right. We will press onward with faith in a power greater than any one man or any one army. God bless this nation—a family of nations—and each of you in this great struggle. Good night.”
THE END
AFTERWORD
To my Fellow Bookworms,
Thank you for sticking with the Psion series through three books. When I first self-published Psion Beta, I had high hopes, but low expectations. The success the books have earned so far has been wonderful. I owe many thanks to you for your kind reviews, word-of-mouth-marketing, and continued enthusiasm. I have received hundreds of emails, Facebook messages, positive reviews, and other tokens of appreciation for the books, and that has made all the headache of self-publication worthwhile.
There are two more books to come in this series: Psion Alpha and Psion Omega. I will be working on those books soon (if I’m not already when you read this). For those of you who just can’t wait to read more, I would recommend that you try a new series I launched this summer: The Storyteller’s Tale. The first volume is called Flight from Blithmore. It is a departure from the genre in which I normally write. No magic, no sci-fi, but it is a fun, epic adventure series which I know you’ll enjoy.
Please take a chance on it and visit www.blithmore.com.
Of course, writing two series will probably add some delays to my publication schedule, but I’m optimistic that the books will be worth the work and worth your wait. And don’t worry, the Psion books are still my top priority. Feel free to contact me via my new website: www.jacobgowans.com, like me on Facebook, or follow me on Twitter. I look forward to hearing from you, and I always try to respond, even to those who try to tell me what to write next.
Best wishes to you,
Jacob Gowans
P.S. Long Live Sammy!
www.jacobgowans.com