Thomas had just started to offer Will and Marcus a drink when General Braden flew through the door. He stomped in the room with Matt in trail.
“Thomas!” General Braden said as if he had been searching for him for hours. “The bombings have started!”
Chapter Thirty-Six
“What!?” Thomas, Marcus, and Will all said together. All three stood up at the same time as well.
“Where?” Thomas asked.
“West coast,” the General said. “It appears they are obliterating California.”
“What do you mean?” Will asked frantically. “All of it?”
“Well, certainly not their precious camps,” General Braden said. “Our sources say they are sticking to the cities right along the coast for now. I’m sure they have all their strategic points. We also received word as we were heading out the door to find you that more bombers were in the air. Departed off the east coast.”
Marcus turned to Will, “I’m sure they are safe up in the mountains. There’s hardly anyone up there.” He turned back to the others, “We need to act now. They’ve probably killed millions in California alone with bombing there.”
“We don’t have everything you need yet,” General Braden said to his brother. “It could be a suicide mission.”
“I think we have enough to stop them from sending out commands to bomb,” Marcus said. “It won’t be pretty in that mountain. Plus, I’m willing to do what is necessary to stop them.”
“Marcus!” Ray said, “you can’t be thinking about doing this. We don’t have the capability to remotely detonate yet!”
“I’m well aware of the situation, Ray,” Marcus said. “We have enough explosives to bring it down from the inside.” He turned to Will, “Are you still in?”
“I’m in,” Will said with a nod of his head. “We need to move now.”
Will hadn’t planned on rushing into the plan. He hadn’t fully mentally prepared for what he was about to do. In his mind, he had pushed it back for one more day. They had hoped to have remote detonation capability for the explosives they were going to place on the inside of the mountain by the next morning. Will imagined the next morning he would wake up and just be ready to jump into the stressful situation. Now that it was here, right here, his stomach sunk and he was losing confidence in himself. He didn’t have time to lose confidence. It now appeared that the entire country depended on him and Marcus. He knew they must do this. It could be the difference between life and death for his family up in the mountains.
“You don’t,” Ray said. “You don’t have enough explosives to do what you think. I have a guy that will explain a better plan to you. Go get ready.”
Marcus and Will rushed to their rooms. They needed to play a part now. Marcus had instructed him a little on the acting required, full time, in order to get where they needed to be. As they rushed to their rooms, Marcus reminded them that they shouldn’t act like they are upset about the bombings beginning. Will thought he must be visibly fuming about the situation and he took a mental note to push back all the thoughts of his mother and Lea in California. He and Marcus were supposed to be two loyal CMA employees that were arriving as called.
They both dressed in their fresh, clean clothes. Will placed on his disguise which consisted of a ‘WWNL’ hat and a pair of glasses. He wasn’t sure why it had been decided that he wear glasses but he still placed them on his face. Marcus didn’t have a disguise at this point. He put on a nice borrowed suit. He combed his hair. He had already shaven that morning. He adjusted his tie in the mirror and went out in the hallway to wait for Will. Will walked out of the room a minute later looking like a new, eager, young employee that was to shadow the great Marcus Braden.
“You’ll pass,” Marcus told him.
He liked the glasses and hat. He especially was fond of the badge that Will had around his neck. It reminded him of every cameraman that Marcus ever worked with.
The two reconvened with the others in the great room. There was now several bags sitting on the floor. They looked like the typical camera equipment that would be carried on any usual job for Marcus. Will and Marcus knew that the bags weren’t filled with any camera equipment. They were filled with plastic explosives. An unfamiliar face that stood next to the General gave them a crash course on the procedure for placement. They originally were supposed to be getting a little bit more advanced training at some point during the day.
The man looked like he spent most of his life in the military. He was maybe in his fifties. He still had closely cropped hair as if he was still required to do so. He wore a skin-tight shirt that he tucked into his pants. It was clear he still kept in shape from his toned muscles. His voice was constantly hoarse. It was probably from a lifetime of yelling commands at lower ranked soldiers.
The man drew a makeshift map for Marcus and Will. He told them that the plastic explosives had to be placed in exact locations for maximum damage. He explained to them that inside the mountain there were multiple layers of protection. There was the outer blast door, but there were also several inner blast doors. A nuclear bomb could detonate inside the main blast door and theoretically, people could still be safe inside if they were beyond another closed blast door. He further explained that with the meticulous placement of the explosive, they would not be trying to cave in the mountain. Marcus and Will were puzzled by this. The man told them the only way to penetrate all the security measures outside of a nuclear explosion going off inside the mountain with all the blast doors open, was his plan he was explaining to them now. Marcus and Will listened intently. They wrote a few reminder notes down on the map page. Marcus tucked the hand-drawn map into his inner suit jacket pocket after the man finished explaining.
Marcus considered the amount of detonation line they were looking at in the open bag on the floor. He knew the chances of survival for whoever was at the end of the line about to push the button were slim at best. After connecting all the charges together and trying to string the line far away from the explosive, he might be a hundred feet from the blast. Still inside the mountain. He pushed this thought far back into the pit of his mind.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Will and Marcus walked up the long and wide concrete path that led to Cheyenne Mountain’s entrance. Two guards stood behind a concrete blockade. Any cars approaching trying to breach through security would have to slow to weave around the concrete blocks. As Marcus and Will got within twenty feet, both guards lifted their rifles and took aim. They stopped. Marcus put up his hands. He could see they were wearing all black garb. A white and blue CMA armband was attached to their right arms.
“Hello fellas,” Marcus said and took another few steps forward. “I’m Marcus Braden, I’m in charge of public relations for the CMA. I have other duties as well.”
One of the guards, once he recognized who he was aiming his gun at, lowered his rifle. He had the typical response that Marcus was getting used to. His jaw dropped open.
“It’s been all over the news that you died in a plane crash,” the guard said.
The other guard noticed out of the corner of his eye that his partner was no longer holding his weapon at ready and he quickly glanced over at Marcus. He had been focused on the younger man that approached them. Upon recognition, he did a double-take between the other guard and Marcus and then he lowered his rifle as well. Marcus and Will still stood in place.
“Yes, I’m sure everyone has seen that news by now,” Marcus said. “My future role with the CMA required that I be...reinvented.”
The two guards looked at each other in confusion.
“As far as you two should be concerned, you never saw Marcus Braden,” Marcus said. “That man did die in a plane crash.” Marcus dropped his hands from the air. He grabbed his CMA badge and held it up towards the guards. “All you know about us two is that we are two CMA employees that have been called in. You checked our badges and let us through.”
“Whoa,” one of the guards said to the other, finall
y breaking their awestruck silence. “I bet the news guy does spy work.”
Marcus’s heart sunk. How could they have figured him out so quickly? Had the word been spread around the entire CMA staff that Marcus had been working for their enemy?
“Yeah,” the other said in agreement and laughed. He turned to Marcus, “What do they have you doing? James Bond type-stuff?”
Marcus smiled. Now he realized that these two guards thought he was a spy for the CMA. “Just a simple newsman is all.” He kept the smile on his face as he answered. He wanted the guards to continue to think he had very important work to do for the CMA.
“Riiiight,” the guard said. “Come on forward, gentlemen.” The guard appeared serious again as he waved them in. “Let’s check your credentials and then you can get on inside. There have been other arrivals this morning so I’m guessing you all have a meeting.”
Marcus nodded. He didn’t want to get into much back and forth conversation. He had hoped asserting his dominance as they arrived would do the trick. It seemed to. The guards gave their badges nothing more than a quick glance and let them go. They were surprised that the main blast door was wide open. He assumed that it stayed closed pretty much all the time and then there’d be other doors for people to use.
They followed the instructions given by the man that drew the map so they could make it to the exact location deep inside the mountain. Marcus wished he had gotten the man’s name. They were in such a rush to get here. That man may very well have saved their plan from immediate disaster. They had hoped to cave the mountain in with the explosives. Now inside, they could see the thickness of the inner walls and the several blast door inside would make that impossible with the meager amount of explosive material they brought with them. He noted that all the inner blast doors were open as well. This was good for their plan.
Marcus quickly threw on a hat and put on a pair of awkwardly large glasses. Now that they were inside it was more likely that they could run into someone who knew that he wasn’t supposed to be there. He wasn’t even supposed to be alive. They went winding through the halls and ended up making a few wrong turns. They tried to be casual about their lack of knowledge of their whereabouts, especially when they were around other CMA employees walking around. A couple of times they had to ask for where a specific door was. Marcus would drop back and act curious about something in the hall while Will did the talking.
They finally made it to the location after about five minutes or so of wandering. It was exactly as the man had described. It looked like a very small exposed section of what must be an extremely large, steel tank. There had to be much more of the tank beyond what they could see. They figured this must be in the engineering portion of the complex. There were a few scribbled labels on the map. It was drawn so quickly that is was difficult to understand parts of it. Large, steel pipes ran from the tank and were directed to what they guessed were pumps. There were a few of the pumps that sat in front of the steel tank. The lighting in the area was low, but they were happy about the lack of illumination on them because they were about to place plastic explosives over the entire exposed area of the tank.
They immediately went to work placing the clay-like material on piping and on the corners of the exposed area of the tank. They tried to keep it hidden on the back sides of the pipes and behind the pumps. Once they placed all that they had brought with them, Will turned and watched for anyone that might come by while Marcus placed the small metal tube detonators into the explosives. He then strung parallel wire to each detonator tube.
“Well, that was a bit easier than I expected,” Marcus said as he looked around after finishing with the detonator tubes.
“Yeah, except it’s going to be a little awkward running this wiring around these halls,” Will said. He bent down and looked in the bags. “There isn’t a whole lot of this wire left. There’s the remaining from the spool you have and then just one more spool.”
“Will,” Marcus said, “we’ll get it as far as we can and then you need to get out. Get out as fast as you can.”
“Marcus, what are you saying?” Will asked. “We both need to make it out. We also still need to find Jackson.”
Marcus took a deep breath. He had forgotten that Thomas wanted them to find Jackson.
“How are we supposed to do that?” Marcus asked. “This place is huge.”
Will looked over at the tank and piping where they had placed the explosives and thought for a moment. “We could leave all this here while we go see if we can find him.”
“I hate to say this Will, but I think his chances are slim,” Marcus said. “We have no idea what he looks like. We don’t even know if we are calling him by his real name.” Marcus held his hands up by his sides. “Will, I’ll blow this and then hopefully I can run out of here too. I imagine some people that are near the entrance will be able to get out. I just hope that Jackson will be one of them.”
Will sighed. “He doesn’t even know that this is coming.”
“Listen, Will,” Marcus said, “The business that Jackson is in...the business that I was doing for the ARF, is a risk. It’s all volunteer. He knows that he is risking his life. I don’t want this to be the end for the guy, but this needs to get done soon. If we cut them off at the head, they shouldn’t be sending out any more bombers. Who knows what has been lost now on the east coast? Who knows where else they were planning on bombing today.”
Will dropped his shoulders. “Alright,” he said in a defeated manner. He picked up the camera bag that held the last spool of wire.
“This isn’t on you, Will,” Marcus said. “Is that the problem?”
“I’m tired of the death,” Will said. He now looked angry. “It seems like most people in the country are dead. We went into our town and there were bodies all over the place. I’ve had to kill. One of them was someone I knew.” He shook his head.
“This should be a step in the right direction to end all of that,” Marcus said. “You know this needs to be done. Think of your family. Think of that girl of yours. Lea. What happens next after they kill off everyone in the cities?”
“I know, I know,” Will said in a frustrated tone. He didn’t want Marcus to say any more about what could happen to Lea.
“You are a strong man, Will,” Marcus said. “Much more than many others. I saw how you were up there in the mountains. I know I wasn’t there long with you all, but what I saw was a leader. Look, you are even here now.”
Flashes of dead bodies lining the streets of Oakhurst started to pass through Will’s mind. The putrid mix of smells; decaying flesh and thick noxious smoke. He pictured the man he shot in the woods. He fell, probably dying immediately. He saw himself holding a gun to Tanner's head. Tanner's eyes looking into Will’s moments before he pulled the trigger. His mind moved to the bombings taking place today. How many people were still holding up in those cities? How many people who had the same mindset as him and his family? People who didn’t trust what the CMA was doing, rightfully so. Then, his thoughts went to Lea. They went to his mother and Lea’s family. To Lewis. What would happen to them if he and Marcus didn’t succeed today? Were these haunting deaths just something he was going to have to bear? He would have to bear them on his conscience so that others would stop dying. He realized this was a war and horrible things happen in war. How could he have been so naive to think that they could hide out in the woods and never have to deal with anything difficult?
“Thanks,” Will said. “I know that it needs to be done. It’s just not easy. Just a moment of weakness for me, I guess. No one goes through life expecting to live in these conditions and have to...kill people.”
“Very true,” Marcus said and then paused for a moment. He bent down and picked up the bag that held the detonation control unit. He took a deep breath. “Are you ready?”
“Ready,” Will said.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Will regained himself from his temporary moment of vulnerability and then walked ahead of M
arcus to check around the next corner. He waved Marcus on. Since they were in the engineering section of the complex, they came across some maintenance related items that lined the halls. They found a few yellow ‘Danger’ signs that are usually put up around chemical or water spills. They put the signs at the beginning and end of long hallways over the wire in a hope that if anyone came across it, they would think it was for some maintenance purpose and be none the wiser. They also found a roll of ‘CAUTION’ tape. They planned to use it at each major door they passed through to prevent anyone from finding the explosives before they could detonate them.
The remaining wire from the first spool brought them well clear of the engineering section. Marcus was relieved and beginning to think his chances were better than he originally calculated. Marcus and Will knelt to the floor to connect the next spool to the end of the wire. He picked at the plastic lining with his fingernail. He pricked his finger a few times with some of the stray fibers of copper that were already exposed.
“Marcus, is that you?” a female’s voice said.
Marcus shot up straight and whipped around.
“Ava?” Marcus said in surprise.
“You are supposed to be...I mean...I reported that you had died in a plane crash,” Ava said.
“That’s what I keep hearing,” Marcus said.
Will set his bag down on the floor next to Marcus’s. Both bags sitting together now concealed the spool of wire they had just begun working on from Ava’s view.
“I’m glad you are alive,” Ava said. She extended her arms and walked towards him.
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