“They will be going with you.” Tom stared off into the sunset. “We both know they will be dead weight.”
“So, you want to take on the gang by yourself?”
“Yes, but I need the grenades and the Humvee with the .50. Can you do that?”
“Sure.”
“Then we’re good to go.”
“If that’s what you want, I am good with it. But, can I tell you that I have been waffling back and forth on taking these guys out since I saw the captain’s body, and I get why you want to do what you want to do.”
“What else do we have left?” Tom shook his head. “I’ve been on shore for a few weeks, and I can’t see anything to salvage from this except to preserve my honor. What else is there?”
“Not much,” Stryker admitted. “But the real problem is that we need to understand that a lot of people around us don’t have our tool box, and need us to keep them safe while they try to rebuild the country. It’s hard, and I struggle with it every day. I would love nothing more than to walk into a good restaurant, order a meal, and go to a movie afterwards. But, that is not going to happen.”
“How long have you been ashore?”
“I was never off shore.” Stryker was momentarily confused by the question. Finally, he understood. Tom had no contact with anyone but the people on his ship, so he presumed all the survivors were at sea when the die-off happened.
“Why are you still alive?”
“There are a number of us who were immune and Erin is probably one of them as well. I was in Pendleton when the plague hit, I lost my wife and child, and I have been simmering in this shit stew for close to three years.”
Tom started to speak, but leaned back against the bench. “So, you guys have lived with this for three years and still just plow on and try to help out?”
“Pretty much. But, Erin and I just got married and we might even have a kid on the way. Life does go on, even where we are now. All I’m trying to say is that I know it looks bad and that you, and maybe even me, get to a point where you don’t give a shit anymore. But I know that there are people who want to rebuild the country, and they would be better off with guys like you and me around.”
“So, you don’t like my plan?”
“It’s not a plan. It’s suicide. If you are really are that far gone, I guess I just wish you good luck. But, if you want to be a part of something that is positive, then you can’t just throw your life away.” Stryker took a deep breath. “You aren’t defeated until you quit. You suffer setbacks, you lose battles, and you may even lose hope. But, until you quit, the possibility of prevailing is always there, no matter how screwed up things seem to be.”
“So, you don’t think I am up to it?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’ve been in the navy for years, and the fact is that you had to do body shots when both Erin and I we’re doing head shots at the same range during the battle.”
“Erin?”
“She’s a better shooter than you are right now. You have been sitting on a naval vessel, and she has been out in the shit. You’re a good shooter, but nowhere near good enough. The fact is you have the attitude of a marine but not much to back it up. You have been fooled by being around people with no skill into thinking your skill is highly developed.”
“Well that’s all very flattering, but no, I would rather you just tell me what you really think.”
“I doubt that.”
Both men watched the ocean lap against the shoreline.
Stryker deliberated on a half-empty pool filled with green slime.
Tom studied the palm of his hand for a minute or two.
“I have another problem.”
“And that is?”
“Those men may not be skilled, but they are still honorable men, and they want payback for what happened to a captain they respected and loved. How am I supposed to say no?”
“Just say no.” Stryker shrugged. “You already said they would be useless anyway.”
“Not that simple. It involves what they consider to be their honor, and you can’t just ignore it. They are still military men who grew up with a code of honor that isn’t much different than ours. I can’t just pretend that doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter, and it should. But, I wasn’t sent here to salvage your sense of what is honorable. Or, to help you through your moral dilemma about how to deal with your men. You either tell them they can’t stay, or you put them at risk.” Stryker paused for a moment “I was sent here to get you guys to San Diego and that is my mission. The rest of this stuff is important, but it’s not really my problem.”
“It would matter to any marine I ever knew.”
“Well, it does matter to me, but the mission comes first, you know that.”
“I also know that the mission changes with the circumstances and those must have changed for you. They sure as hell did for me.”
“We can go around and around about this, and if you really feel you need to kill these guys, we can talk to Captain Thomas about it, and come back and finish the job. But, you really can’t do it with the men you have. They aren’t up to the task.”
“They work for me, and I probably should let them come along, but I guess I really don’t think that’s the best idea.”
“Rationalizations always work until the shooting starts and reality steps in. It won’t work. You would get them all killed in the end and it will be for nothing. If you go it alone, you get killed. Pick your poison and live with it.” Stryker’s voice had a note of finality in it.
“We’ll see, I guess.”
“It’s getting late and we need to find rooms. You want to talk more in the morning?” Stryker’s voice carried a note of frustration.
“I don’t know that we need to.”
“Suit yourself.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“You can’t just leave him there to do this by himself,” Erin stated in a hushed voice.
They had left Tom with the Humvee and some food and water, after skirting around the base to the east.
Stryker was driving with a grim determination etched on his face. The rest of the sailors rode in the trailer, after two of them got in Stryker’s face about leaving Tom alone.
Jose rode in the back reading a magazine from the hotel.
Stryker and Tom had stood toe-to-toe for the better part of twenty minutes arguing. It would have been a face-to-face argument, but Tom was close to a foot shorter so it was only a figurative description.
“I can’t force him to do anything. He’s a grown man and if he wants to die, and his men let him bully them into coming with us, well, that’s not really my problem.”
“I have a problem with it.” Erin stared at him with an even expression.
He pulled the Humvee to the side of the highway. “Go on.”
“We can send these men north on their own and go back and help Tom.”
“Wait a second; you are looking for a fight?”
“No, I am looking to do what’s right, the same way you always do.”
“You don’t see me anxious to do this, so this one is on you, and I never want to hear about how I had to make somebody else’s fight my own again. You break this one and you own it for life. You feeling me on this?”
“Perfectly.”
Stryker sat back in the seat and reviewed the bidding. His first thought was to say no and move on.
Then he wondered if Erin was advocating this action to make him happy.
Then he concluded he was wasting time questioning it and said, “Why?”
“I don’t have some sort of creed; all I have is a sense of what is right and wrong, and if we walk away from this, were on the wrong side of that equation.”
“No argument from me.”
“We need to bring them into the conversation.” Erin jerked her head back at the sailors behind them. She got out of the Humvee and walked back to the trailer with her M-4 dangling from one hand.<
br />
“Are you guys really total pussies?” She looked into the face of each one before slowly moving to the next.
Stryker walked down the other side of the trailer, and several men looked his way with nervous expressions.
“Tom didn’t want us to come along. What the hell are we supposed to do? I asked you two to help me out and convince him to let us stay with him and you refused.” The man who spoke was one of the two that gave Stryker grief about leaving Tom. His name was Carl and his expression was filled with frustration.
“How about you grow some balls,” Erin replied in a sweet tone of voice.
“You ever hear of creative dissent?” Stryker asked.
“Well, no.” Carl looked confused.
“Well, good because it has nothing to do with this situation.” Stryker beamed a smile at the man, who continued to look confused.
“Can you spell it out for me?”
“Sure. Tom thinks you guys are all fucktards, and between you and me, you guys really are. But, let’s set that to the side for a moment and consider the larger issue.”
Carl stared back at Stryker with an ambivalent look. Stryker was pretty sure he understood enough to not like his comment, but was dumb enough to seek clarification.
“So, you want us to go help him.”
“It would be a nice gesture,” Stryker replied dryly. “You know, like you send your mother a bunch of flowers on Mother’s Day.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“We might want to go back and help him out if you and the rest your guys are into that sort of thing.”
Carl hesitated only a moment. “Let’s go.”
“What about the rest of you?” Erin asked. Several of the men wore doubtful expressions.
“I don’t want anybody with us who doesn’t want to be there. Those of you who don’t want to come with us; we can drop you off and pick you up on the way back.”
“What if you don’t come back?” A small man with a neat mustache asked.
“Well, it is a long walk. You might be able to get a vehicle running and drive it, but I wouldn’t count on being able to do that.”
“That’s not much of a choice.”
“Life’s a bitch and then you die.” Stryker shrugged with no expression of regret. “But, we don’t have a lot of time, so anybody who doesn’t want to go back with us, you have ten seconds to unass my trailer and if you don’t, we aren’t stopping to let you off.”
Stryker walked back, got in the driver’s seat, and waited.
Erin joined him. “Nobody is getting out.”
“They won’t.”
“Why not?”
“They are herd animals and think that life is safer by staying in the herd. Nothing could be further from the truth, but it’s a powerful instinct and they will follow it.”
“What are we going to do with them?”
“I guess we find Tom, park them somewhere, and go get the bad guys.” Stryker glanced in the rear view mirror and started the motor. The diesel engine chugged to life and he spun the vehicle into a U-turn and started back down Highway 1.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
They sat on a hilltop, watching Tom glass the base from the next rise over to the south. The men had left the trailer and were eating beef jerky and other snacks they took from the hotel.
They had taken the detour around the base, parked the Humvee behind the knoll, and left the sailors at the bottom of the elevation. The sun was beginning to set and Stryker lowered his binoculars with a look of frustration.
“They are all either inside the buildings or they’re not here. Either way, we got nothing for now.”
“How are we going to let Tom know we are back?” Erin asked.
“After it gets dark, I’ll walk over and let him know he needs to come back here, and we can plan something together.”
“He might shoot you.”
“He would if he heard me coming, but he won’t.” Stryker rolled over on his back and squinted.
“Let’s go talk to Jose,” Erin said.
“Why?”
“He might know something.”
“I don’t think so, but I have nothing better to do for now, so why not.”
They backed off the hilltop, walked down the incline and stopped to the side of the Humvee, where Jose was still reading his magazine. Stryker wondered if he read every damn word of the thing.
“Jose,” Erin said.
“Yes.”
“Can you come up the hill with us and look at the base and tell us what you think?”
“Sure.” Jose shrugged, put the magazine down, and followed them up the knoll.
Stryker motioned him down as they approached the crest and Jose copied their belly crawl to the apex of the hill.
“Why is nobody there?” Stryker asked.
Jose glanced up at the sun. “This is when they drink and andar por arriba.”
“Drink and get high,” Stryker said to Erin.
“Where do they do it?”
“It’s in a building that used to be a recreational center behind the barracks. When the power is out, they go there and sit on the patio. The wind from the ocean keeps them cool.”
“Is the generator out?” Stryker asked.
“I think so.”
“Why?”
“It makes a lot of noise and I don’t hear it, so they probably had to shut it off until they get more fuel for it tomorrow.”
“They don’t have batteries?” Erin looked at him in disbelief.
“I don’t know anything about that. All I know is that when the noise stops, they move to that patio and drink or smoke drugs.”
“How high or drunk do they get?” Stryker asked.
“I guess as much as they can. I used to go outside the camp when they did that so they wouldn’t bother me. I slept on the beach on a blanket.”
“There’s no fence between the base and the beach?”
“No, it is a part of the recreational area and the beach is what most people used when they aren’t working. They fish and rent little sailboats or the ones that you paddle with your feet.”
“Thanks, Jose,” Stryker said. “Why don’t you head back down and get something to eat.”
Jose backed down the hill for a bit, and then stood and walked back to where the Humvees were parked.
Stryker felt the wheel turning in his head, and saw the entire battle unfold before his eyes.
The drunken and stoned Mexicans would be sleeping on lawn chairs on the patio. They would be unaware of any approach that was done with stealth.
He closed his eyes and envisioned what he conceived of as the patio area. It would be long and open, but narrow. There would be no place to get concealment or cover, aside from perhaps a barbeque grill that would sit on one side of the patio to keep the smoke away from the patrons on windy days.
It would have tables and chairs close to the building, probably under a patio cover, and the hard core drinkers would be there. The rest would be sleeping on the recliners that sat in front of the patio cover, and they would be scattered across the front of the property that faced the beach.
It seemed too easy, but the image persisted.
Tom's back was still to them, and he hadn't noticed their presence on the hill behind his position.
Stryker shifted his binoculars to the base. There were no sentries or other force protection in place. From time to time, men would emerge from what he assumed were the barracks and cross the open ground between the buildings and then disappear behind the low two-story building that sat nearest to the beach.
He shifted to the building to the right of the barracks, and saw a row of six Humvees, two of which carried Ma Dueces with ammo belts dangling from the weapons.
"We could use those .50s on the Humvees." Stryker handed the binoculars to Erin. He shifted his gaze to the hill Tom sat on, still intently watching the base.
"Yes, we could."
"It looks almost like we could wal
k down there and just take them. No sentries and nobody seems to be armed."
"It might be better to wait until they are partying tonight and closer to the beach."
"Great minds."
"So, what's the plan?"
"I'm thinking that I'll go get Tom after nightfall, and we will sneak in there and turn the Ma Dueces on them."
"Stunning in its detail." Erin snickered without taking her eyes off the base. "What about the rest of us?"
"I guess you guys set up as an ambushing force and, if there is pursuit, we lead them between two positions and we kill whoever is following us."
"Where is the ambush point?"
"I'm working on that now."
"Work faster."
Stryker nudged the binoculars away from her and then scanned the highway to the north of the base. There was no high elevation to be seen and no buildings close to the highway. He sighed and looked again at the hill Tom sat on.
"The only elevation I can see from here is these hills that we're on, and to drive between them, we have to go cross country."
"It's flat as a pancake," Erin replied.
"Rocks; gotta watch for rocks." Stryker shifted his focus to the expanse of land between their position and the base.
"Do you see any obstacles?" Erin looked concerned.
"Just one shallow arroyo. We can do it, but it's going to be with headlights on, and that makes us an easier target, but also ensures that they can follow us if they want to." Stryker looked at Erin with a stare of assessment.
"What?"
"If I put you on Tom's Ma Duece with Carl, can you handle the weapon?"
"I've only shot it once, but if you can get them close enough to me, I think I can do fine with it."
"Then we have the beginnings of a plan."
"What about the other men?"
"I'm still working on that."
"If you bring them close to the other hill, this one will be useless as an ambush point. It's too far away for the M-16s."
"I know. Like I said, I'm working on it."
Stryker looked to the east of Tom's position and spied a small clump of boulders huddled on the otherwise flat landscape. They were around a hundred meters from the ambush point and would provide good cover.
STRYKER - OMNIBUS: BOOKS 3-5: A Post Apocalyptic Tale Page 46