by A J Newman
Revenge in the Homeland
The Adventures of John Harris
Book IV
A J Newman
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This book is dedicated to my beautiful wife of over thirty years.
Thanks to Wes Newman for being a great sounding board for many of the ideas in this novel.
Thanks to Carole Lewis for beta reading, proofreading and editing.
Copyright © 2015 Anthony J Newman. All rights reserved.
ISBN 978-0-9912334-3-4
This book is a work of fiction. All events, names characters and places are the product of the author’s imagination or are used as a fictitious event. That means that I thought up this whole book from my imagination and nothing in it is true.
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Books by A. J. Newman
“The Adventures of John Harris” a post-apocalyptic America series:
Surviving
Hell in the Homeland
Tyranny in the Homeland
Revenge in the Homeland
“Grumpy Sam and Sammy” - A murder mystery series:
Where the Girls are Buried.
Who Killed the Girls?
These books are available at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00HT84V6U
The Adventures of John Harris:
A series about post-apocalyptic America.
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00HT84V6U
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Prologue
America is in a losing war with drug gangs, and illegal immigrants inside our country and Islamic Terrorists across the world. They probably have numerous sleeper cells already established in the states. Two nuclear EMP blasts would send us back to post-apocalyptic dark ages. We are also in decline, thanks to the poor stewardship of our elected officials for the past 25 years. My story just takes what our enemies and we are currently doing to destroy the USA and expands on these misdeeds.
Revenge in the Homeland is the fourth novel in a series of novels that tell how John Harris leads a group of survivors through the chaos of a country that has fallen apart.
The US president and a coalition of Third World Leaders have launched a major nuclear and EMP attack on all of the major powers and killed over 100 million Americans. The USA is in chaos with criminals and thugs attacking innocent citizens, while John and his team fight the corrupt Department of Homeland Security and the president. The USA has just completed a series of devastating attacks on the ISA, a new country formed by John Harris and his followers. Now it's time for ISA to get revenge and stop the USA from these brutal and senseless attacks.
I hope you have as much fun reading them as I did writing them.
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Chapter 1
Aftermath
Gulf of Mexico
July, 2021
Commander Cox lay on the deck and thought that he was dead. He had a ringing in his ears and was soaking wet. He could not see anything but a red haze and felt pain. His eyes burned when he tried to open them and he still only saw a dark red haze. His head and right hip were hurt and he felt like he had been beaten with a baseball bat. His hip had the searing, burning kind of pain. It was a number 15 on a scale of 1 to 10 that the doctor always asks you to use to let him know how painful your pain was. Well, this hurt and the pain was getting worse as he fully woke up.
He felt a slight motion and heard mechanical sounds. Familiar sounds that he just could not place. His mind wandered back to his home in West Virginia and his dad’s shop. The sounds were almost like those that his dad made while working in his shop at home. Suddenly there was a breeze blowing on his neck and face. It felt good. He realized that he hadn’t moved and immediately wondered if he was paralyzed. He wiggled his fingers and toes to start and there was no pain. He then tried to move his arm and the pain shot up to about 30.
“Damn," he thought. "I have to get up and get help. Where am I? How did I get hurt? Well, I can’t be dead because dead people don’t have pain, do they? Am I talking to myself or is this just my thoughts?”
He said, “Where am I?”
He heard his voice and thanked God because he was not dead.
“Commander, is that you? Damn, I thought you were dead. I am finishing a bandage for the Admiral and will be with you in a minute.”
“Okay.”
His mind raced through his life and he remembered the Naval Academy and saw himself in uniform. It only took another minute and it all came back to him; TSHTF, the battles with the Islamic extremists and finally the attack here in the Gulf of Mexico.
“Admiral, are you okay? Did we win?"
“Son, I honestly don’t know. I just woke up myself. The shock wave and then the monster sea wave nearly sunk our fleet. Captain Miller is performing damage assessment as we speak."
The medic finished with the Admiral and began working on the commander.
“I stopped the bleeding on your head and hip, and I am going to wash your face with warm saline water and get this blood out of your eyes. I need to check you for concussion.”
The warm water felt good on his forehead and he noticed that more light was getting through as the medic rubbed his eyes.
“Okay, open your eyes.”
He opened his eyes only to close them quickly. The sun was streaming in through the broken windows. He partially opened his eyes squinting to block out most of the sun. He looked to his left, saw the Admiral leaning against several life preservers and several crewmen with towels covering their heads. The Admiral was saying prayers over the bodies. He looked to the right and saw the ensign, captain and a crewman on walkie talkies trying to command a carrier. Now, he was scared.
***
Meanwhile, back at the Compound, John and Bob were piecing bits of information together to determine what happened, how much damage was done and who did it. This was the ISA’s Pearl Harbor and it would be remembered.
“Sir, our intel team has pieced the following timeline together from recorded radio transmissions and radar sightings. Bob, Ensign Teller, Gus and John reviewed the information.”
Bob was the first to speak, “There were four nuclear explosions; two large underwater nukes and two small airborne bombs. We are in contact with both carrier strike groups and the story is very bad. The Ford Strike group lost 2,200 men and women and the Bush lost 800. The Ford lost one cruiser, a sub, two missile frigates, one Marine troop ship and 14 aircraft. The Bush lost one destroyer, a Marine troop ship and five aircraft. Every ship was damaged, with the Ford receiving the worst damage.”
John asked everyone to bow their heads, “Heavenly father, please have mercy on these brave men and women who died or were wounded during this mission to free the people of Corpus Christie from the tyranny of the USA and the Chupacabras. We vow that their deaths will not be in vain. Amen.”
Gus asked, “Now, who did it? Some or most of my family is in Corpus Christie and this will be a major delay in setting them free.”
Gus thought for a minute, realized how insensitive the comment could sound and tried to apologize.
“I’m sorry for sounding so whiney and please accept my apology.”
“Gus, we know what you have been through, so don’t worry about it.”
An aide walked up to Bob and said, “Sir, the radios are back in operation and the Admiral wants a staff meeting ASAP. He invited John and Gus to join in the meeting.”
Bob added, “If I know my old man, the shit is about to hit the fan for our enemies.”
***
The medic woke up with a huge weight on his chest and a pain in his butt. His head was pinned against the wall and he couldn’t see what was on top of him. He hadn’t felt this bad since that three day drunk in Singapore. He struggled with whatever had him pinned
until he felt it move enough to free his head. This left him exhausted and he felt very cold. He turned his head to see what pinned him down and pain shot through his neck and brought tears to his eyes. He focused on the object holding him motionless and saw that a hospital bed was resting on his chest. He calmly tried to lift the bed to no avail. The pain was horrible at first, and then started waning. That’s when he realized that the wheel was sticking through his chest and blood was seeping across his belly onto the floor. He started praying.
He gained some strength, tried to move the bed again and actually moved it a little when something fell off the bed onto his head. It hit him right between the eyes and stunned him. Whatever it was, it was blocking the light and he could not see it. He grabbed for it and pulled it off him when he saw two eyes staring back at him. This scared the hell out of him and he lurched upward and rolled the bed off him. This motion resulted in the rest of the body falling on him, which again scared the shit out of him again. He rolled over to find himself looking at a dead kid. It was the kid named Johnny, who always had several guards at his side. His neck appeared to be broken and he was as white as a ghost.
The medic took a pen and paper from his pocket and wrote a short note to his wife and five year old son telling them how much he loved them and that they will be together again in heaven. He said a prayer asking God to watch over his family and the ISA and died.
***
The Admiral started the meeting by asking everyone to say the Lord’s Prayer and then asked the Lord to take care of their fallen friends.
“Ladies and gentlemen, this attack was well planned and executed. I have no doubt that the massacre of civilians was conducted to force our hand and draw us to the trap to be vaporized. Our defensive plans actually worked much better than one would think, considering the major loss of men and ships. If we had not spread the ships out, we would have lost all of them to those two large nukes.”
There was a round of applause and thanks to the team when the Admiral cleared his throat.
“Don’t pat yourselves on the back until we destroy those who executed this sneak attack on our country. Commander Cox, please brief the team.”
“Our intel points at the Chupracabras as the group responsible for the attack, with the UN happily playing a smaller role, but just as guilty. There isn’t any proof that the USA even knew of the attack. Each of you has data that has been gathered and one can follow the trail right to the Cabras."
John spoke up, “Sir, we need to wipe these bastards off the face of the earth. Do we have any active carriers and what are our capabilities?”
“John, we still have two carriers in the Pacific and three on the east coast and just as important we have the long range B-2 and B-56 bombers from the Air Force. We need a plan that decimates the Cabras and the UN from the air while we take Corpus Christie with boots on the ground. I think this will send a message to the USA not to fuck with us.”
“Admiral, I agree and my team will contribute in any way you need us to. Perhaps we give the president’s son back to him as a goodwill gesture to stop some of the hatred for our new country.”
“John, I have bad news. The president’s son was aboard the Ford when we were attacked and he was killed during the attack. He was thrown from his hospital bed into a wall and broke his neck."
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Chapter 2
Twice the Speed of Sound
Smyrna, Tennessee
December, 2048
Josh was gaining strength and was feeling much better by the next day. The surgeons had removed the bullet from his butt and repaired the wound in his left arm and chest. He would be sore and have to go through rehab, but otherwise was in good shape. He was visiting the ISA to write a story about John Harris, the first president of the USA. It was now the biggest story in the USA. Their story was he was a traitor and had saved the ISA’s ex-president and daughter. The real story was that he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The only good news was that he fell in love with her the first time he looked into her eyes and felt like there was a force drawing him to her.
Jenn only left him long enough to go home, get cleaned up and drive back to his room. Beth or Betty stayed with Josh anytime Jenn didn't.
“Mom, Mrs. Harris, you both know that I am here to write about the ISA’s most revered hero and founding father, so let’s get down to business. John and Jenn have taken me through the attack on the Navy in the Gulf. I need you two to give me what was going on the home fronts from your point of view. This is the human interest part.”
“Beth, you go first and I’ll give him the USA point of view.”
“Josh, first call me Beth. From the way Jenn has been crawling all over you, you’ll probably be calling me mom number two any day now.”
“Sorry about that, but getting shot and nearly dying at the same time that you realize that you love someone so much is quite an experience. I feel like I have to love her at twice the speed of sound because one of us could be gone tomorrow.”
Beth started laughing and laughed until she cried.
She regained her composure and said, “I’m not laughing at you; I’m laughing with you. The first several years after TSHTF, we were barely surviving on a good day. We were bombed, shot at, harassed, and we saw friends and fellow countrymen die in our arms. I met John during the 'Trip' and married him a few months later. Jenn was conceived during the first week that we met. We were being chased and shot at every day. We killed about 50 of those thugs during our escape from the Chupacabras in Idaho. The journey from Smyrna down to Mobile was one firefight after another. What I’m trying to say is that I get it. You have to grow up fast and love deeply before you lose everything. I just want you two to not do anything that can’t be undone until you really know each other.”
“Beth, how long did you know John before Jenn was conceived? I also want to hear more detail on the dive into the outhouse during the attack on the bunker.”
“Smart ass! I deserve that. That shit house story was just that; a made-up story that didn’t happen. Now let’s start just after the attack while we were waiting to hear how bad the damage and losses are."
Betty listened for a while, then spoke up, and asked, “Beth, were you actually fighting and shooting? Did you kill anyone?”
“Mom, Beth killed several the other day during the siege at Miller’s Farm.”
“Betty, yes, I did. The USA and their ally, the Chupacabras, have conducted a terror campaign against the rest of the country ever since TSHTF. Everyone in the ISA serves in the military and then is in the Reserves until they are 65 years old. John and Gus started training all of the women the day after TSHTF. Jenn is a captain in the Army, has fought in two wars and countless engagements around the world. She has been wounded four times and has had numerous broken bones. She has Purple Hearts and several other medals for bravery under fire and other heroic deeds.”
“Beth, I think that is great. The USA treats women as second class citizens, too fragile to do men’s jobs. Don’t misunderstand, I don’t want to be shot at, just treated as an equal. I never realized that we led a privileged life and that most of the USA was either living in poverty or in work camps. Sorry Beth, go ahead with the story of the early years.”
Beth covered the timeframe from the USA’s attack on Decatur to the attack on the Bunker. She left out hiding in the septic tank with Jenn to escape the gunfire.
Jenn walked into the room and quietly listened to Beth tell Josh and Betty about the early years of their struggles and the events that helped build the ISA.
Betty turned and spotted Jenn and said, “Hello Jenn. Your mom was just telling us about your heroics and the danger that you have had to live with. I am so sorry that my country put you through so much pain and suffering. As I told your mom, we lived in a great town, in a nice house and weren’t exposed to the bad side of the USA. Yes, we knew that the president was a dictator, but I think most of us were okay with that sin
ce he was delivering safety and security to us. I didn’t know that most of the country had a terrible life until the last few days.”
Jenn thought for a few seconds and replied, “I think that it is very important to get the story of the ISA's early years out to the world to demonstrate the tyranny of the USA and its comrades. The mass extermination of millions of people and the other millions that are in prison camps in the USA and around the world.”
“Jenn, it was against the law to watch the ISA’s radio and TV shows, so most people didn’t hear your side of the argument. The president always blamed John and the rogue Navy for the attacks around the world. Now that he is gone, President Wilton has even stepped up the propaganda against the ISA. She blames you for every bad thing that happens in the world."
"Well, Beth let’s go have some lunch while these two love birds get to know each other.”
***
“Madam President, Logan and his entire family have been rescued by the ISA Special Forces before we could react.”
Wilton went into a rage and pounded on the table.
“You are telling me that they travelled over 300 miles across our country and snatched these traitors right out from under our best DHS team?”