“Camp Zion is apparently a series of tunnels that have been dug into the mountains,” he continued. “That’s why we haven’t been able to find the camp by satellite. But now we have it.” He chuckled to himself, rubbing his hands together. “At last! The end is in sight.”
“If you know where Camp Zion is, why do you need me?” I asked.
“Your father has a very strong affinity for you,” he said. “He could run, but he won’t. He feels a strong need to rescue you. But before he has a chance, I will crush him.”
“My superiors in Asia have never understood my strategy. But I always knew that your father—the former Secretary of State for the United States of America, and the last vestige of the former government—was the key to ending it all. And you were the key to your father.”
He inhaled through his nose, and smiled broadly at me.
“Look around you. We have a million men here, all armed with the latest technology. What does your father have? A few thousand at most. Even if that train you were so eager to get to him had arrived with its guns and ammunition, it would not have made a difference. Now he doesn’t have even that.”
“It is the end,” he said. “Tomorrow we will launch an all-out attack on Camp Zion.” He gestured to the big soldier who stood behind me, and he grabbed me by the arm and pushed me out of the room.
How are you going to get out of this one? I asked myself as we walked back to the other shed. Evangelist was gone, probably dead. Mack Hawley was definitely dead. The two women I came to rescue were prisoners, just as I was. I was surrounded by enemy soldiers, and tomorrow they would attack and destroy Camp Zion.
“Hello Sweetheart,” I heard the soldier behind me rasp into my ear as we walked. I turned to see who it was, but he held me so tight that I couldn’t look. It took me a second, but then I recognized the voice.
“I told you not to call me Sweetheart, Madrigal,” I whispered back to him.
He chuckled. “Well, I’m too old to change my ways. Ready to take a little helicopter ride?”
I smiled. “Absolutely. Mind if I bring a few friends?”
“You wouldn’t be the same girl I knew in St. Louis if you weren’t trying to rescue some other hard-luck case. The more the merrier.”
We walked to the other Quonset hut where the women were being held and past two guards standing by the doorway. They nodded to Madrigal as we entered. When we got inside, I got the opportunity to turn and look at him. He looked pretty much the same as how I knew him in St. Louis, but with a Coalition uniform. He produced a small knife, and cut my hands free.
The women were sitting on crates and boxes that were stacked in one corner. In addition to the five who had accompanied me, another three were there. Hopeful barked once when he saw me. We shushed him, and I spoke quietly.
“We’re getting out of here,” I said. “You can stay if you want or you can come with us.”
“Are you kidding?” one of the ones who had been there before said. “If you’re planning on going to Camp Zion, you may as well shoot me now. They are going to destroy that camp tomorrow.”
“Well, that’s your choice if you want to stay here,” I said. “But I suspect that my Father has a few surprises for the General come tomorrow.”
“I’m in,” said the girl who had brought the message to me.
“Me too,” said Ellie. “The biggest mistake I ever made in my life was leaving you.” She stood and came to hug me.
“What about you, Reba?” I asked. “All Mack ever wanted was for you to be safe.”
She frowned and stared at the wall before speaking slowly.
“I never treated him the way he treated me,” she said, a tear in her voice. “I didn’t deserve him. He loved me even when I treated him like crap.”
“Choosing to live would be a good start to paying him back,” I said. She turned slowly and looked at me, then nodded.
“Then it’s settled,” I said. “Madrigal will take the four of us to Camp Zion.”
Hopeful barked again.
“Excuse me, the five of us.” Back to ToC
30. THE SECOND COMING
INFINITY: DAY 1590: CAMP MEGIDDO
Apparently Madrigal had been in the Coalition camp for quite a while. He’d learned that every evening at 9 p.m., half a dozen helicopters left the base to resupply troops that were stationed in the foothills surrounding the valley. When darkness came, he brought back four Coalition uniforms for us to put on. He also gave me a 9mm pistol. While we put the uniforms on, he took out his K-Bar knife and cut an opening into the back of the Quonset hut large enough for us to scurry through.
We crept between the tents and trucks, following him about 100 yards to the helicopter pad. The three others waited in the shadows with Hopeful as he and I crept up to a large helicopter with blades that were just beginning to turn. He climbed in behind the pilot and hit him over the head, tossing him out on the pad outside. In the meantime, I looked in the back to make sure we didn’t have any other riders, then motioned for the others to join us.
The three of them strapped themselves in their seats in the back. I climbed over the seats and dropped myself into the copilot’s seat.
“You know how to fly this thing?” I asked him as he put on his headphones and began turning switches.
“I know this chopper like I know my ex-girlfriend’s backside,” he said, grinning. He stopped. “Just don’t getting any ideas about throwing cushions out to people in need.”
I shook my head. “The only people in need I know are the ones on board. Let’s get out of here.”
He grinned again. “You took the words right out of my mouth.”
A minute later, six helicopters began rising from the ground. Five of them headed toward Coalition forces surrounding the camp. The sixth—ours—headed straight west.
“SC, SC, this is Madrigal,” he said into his radio. “The bird has flown. Repeat, the bird has flown.”
“Roger,” I heard in my headphone. Then there was silence.
I watched the countryside pass by in the darkness, knowing that when we landed, my four-year journey would be over and I would be with my father. Just as the wake up in the camp in Tennessee had been hard to believe, now I was having trouble believing that the life I had lived for four years was coming to an end.
The helicopter rose higher and higher, leaving the desert behind us and rising over the Sierra Nevada Mountains that we had seen in the distance. When we continued over the mountains for several hours, I turned to Madrigal.
“How far away is the camp? Shouldn’t we be getting there by now?”
He grinned again. “It’s farther away than you—or General Despair—would ever guess. And yet it’s closer too.”
I stared at him as he chuckled. “OK, keep your secrets,” I said.
We kept flying west. About an hour later, Madrigal began to laugh. He turned a switch and I heard a very angry Asian voice over my headphones shouting at us.
“General Despair is a little slow on the uptake,” Madrigal said. “He’s telling us to turn around.” He turned another switch and began talking.
“Sorry General, we got lost,” he said into his microphone. “We were headed for Vegas. Is that west, or east?”
“This is your last warning,” the voice said. “Turn around or you will be shot down.”
As if in response, two jets flashed by us, one on either side coming from behind and flying close.
“Not to worry, sweetheart,” Madrigal said to me. “We got angels on our side.”
In response, I saw more dark objects flying toward us in the pre-dawn darkness. The two jets that had swooshed by us turned and bolted back toward the east.
“Jets!” I said. “Are those our jets?”
“Yes ma’am,” Madrigal said. “And that’s just the start.”
The sun was about to come up in the east, behind us, but suddenly the light grew brilliant. About a minute later, I heard a low boom.
“That’s not a nu
ke, but I’d bet it’s pretty close to one,” Madrigal said. “Fuel bomb. Makes the atmosphere explode. Goodbye Camp Megiddo.”
“But how?” I said.
“I would imagine it was one of our stealth bombers. Flew right past their radar. Don’t worry; that won’t be the last of it. They didn’t want to use another nuke on American soil, but there won’t be any more Coalition troops when they’re done with them.”
“So Camp Zion was just a ruse?”
“Oh it was real enough,” he said. “Your Father had the job of holding things together while our Forces overseas took care of the countries that attacked us. Now headquarters is just a little bit farther west. We’ve all been waiting for General Despair to put all of his bad eggs in one basket. It’s been a long time coming, but today is Judgment Day.”
Stunned, I thought about what Madrigal had said as I watched wave after wave of fighters, bombers and attack helicopters fly east toward what was left of Camp Megiddo.
As the sun rose in the east behind us, we flew over the coastal mountains and I had my first ever view of the Pacific Ocean. The morning light shone on a spectacle that I had never expected to see: the entire Pacific Fleet of the United States Navy.
From left to right, as far as I could see was a massive armada of ships. And right in the middle of the fleet was the largest aircraft carrier I had ever seen.
Madrigal got on the radio and called ahead. A minute later, we were setting down the helicopter on the flight deck. As I unfastened my seat belt, I looked up to see the tower above. The words “U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln” had been crossed out with white paint. In its place was scrawled: “U.S.S. Second Coming.”
As Madrigal shut the engines down, I saw a crowd of men and women in uniform running up to greet us. I crawled back over the seats into the rear compartment. Hopeful was barking joyfully, leaping around as if he were a puppy again. Ellie was all smiles, the first time I had seen her smile since we had been reunited. And even Reba had a wistful smile on her face.
“He would have been happy, you know,” I said to her. “Just knowing you were safe, he would have been happy.”
She smiled, tears coming to her eyes.
We turned and opened the doors, and were immediately awash with well wishers. Everyone seemed to know who we were, even though we didn’t have a clue as to who they were. I took a step outside and was immediately pulled out by the crowd. They cheered and slapped me on the back.
“Thank you,” I said. “Thank you all for your—.” My words caught in my throat as I saw a familiar young man, around 30, staring back at me. He was dressed in a flight suit. He had a scar on one cheek and a big grin on his face. He pushed his way through the crowd and gathered me up in his arms. We kissed for what seemed like forever, but yet not long enough.
“Evangelist,” I breathed.
“It’s just Edward, now,” he said. “I’m out of the Secret Service.”
“Hey Cuz,” I heard Madrigal say loudly behind me. “See, I got her here safe and sound, just like I promised.” Edward pulled away and slapped Madrigal’s hand high in the air.
“That you did,” Edward said. “Listen, I have someone who wants to meet both of you.”
Edward led us through the crowd and across the flight deck to a smaller knot of people. Most of the men wore the uniforms of flag-ranked officers, admirals and captains and such. But one man, an older, weathered man who I knew very well, wore a simple windbreaker and slacks.
“Father!” I said. I let go of Edward and ran to him. He held out his arms and took me into his embrace.
“Forgive me,” he said. “I should have come for you sooner. But there was so much to be done.”
“There’s nothing to forgive,” I said. “You’re here, and I’m here, and that’s all that matters.”
I looked into his face. It was the face of a man who had carried the sorrows and worries of an entire country—an entire world—on his shoulders. When the United States government had all but been lost, when city after city had been destroyed, when every possible way of defending ourselves was taken from us, he had continued to pull Americans together to fight for what they believed in. I was proud to be called his daughter.
“You’re not the same girl I knew four years ago,” he said to me.
I smiled. “No, I’m not. A lot has changed.”
“What’s important never changes,” he said.
And as I looked around us—standing on the deck of a massive aircraft carrier, surrounded by soldiers and sailors who had come to take our country back—I knew that he was right.
###
I hope you have enjoyed this electronic book. If you would like information on Prevail Publications, or other books by Glen Robinson, visit me at http://glenchen.com. On Twitter, you can follow me at http://www.twitter.com/glenchen.
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