Invasion (Best Laid Plans Book 3)

by Nathan Jones

  The soldier held an AK-47 in shaking hands, raised almost to the firing position as if he was debating whether to start shooting. Was it mercy that made him hesitate, or the fear of revealing his hiding spot and becoming a target for the mob of tens of thousands of desperate prisoners that started only a few dozen feet away?

  Time seemed to slow as Trev looked between the shaking gun and the group of panicking people crowding the fence, willing the man to make the right choice. Then the young Russian turned to look northward at the mushroom cloud, and behind his plexiglass faceplate his features tightened into an ugly mask of grief and rage.

  The gun steadied and lifted fully into firing position. A moment later the soldier began shooting at the backs of the prisoners in front of him.

  There was no way to know where Lucas was, which meant any one of those bullets could hit his uncle. Beyond that Trev couldn't just stand by and let such an atrocity take place. So even though his instincts screamed for him to run and hide he instead found himself sprinting straight for the soldier. As he closed the gap he lowered his shoulder in preparation to tackle the man to the ground, bracing himself for the impact.

  The soldier's back was to him and the roar of gunfire obliterated any noise Trev made, so he probably didn't even realize he was in danger until Trev slammed into the small of his back and sent them both crashing to the ground.

  The AK-47 went flying out of the man's hands, and as the soldier lay stunned Trev lunged after the weapon, closing one hand around the grip and the other on the barrel as he crashed sideways to the ground. He rolled onto his back with the rifle pointed back at the soldier groggily pushing to his hands and knees. When the man snarled at him and leapt to close the distance between them Trev pressed the trigger, firing wildly at the man's arms and shoulders.

  The soldier dropped again, this time for good, and Trev immediately pushed to his feet and bolted for cover.

  Not a moment to soon. The gunfire had drawn the attention of the nearest guard tower, and the men up there must have seen Trev take out one of their fellow soldiers. As he threw himself behind the nearest tent and fell flat to the ground the whine of bullets filled the air around him and the tent in front and behind him were both shredded by a line of holes that cut them nearly in two.

  Trev army crawled his way in the opposite direction of the line of bullets just as it started back his way, only now low enough to hit the ground between the tents where he was. He reached the lane between the tents that would put him in full view of the tower and bolted across, expecting to feel the large caliber bullets ripping through him with every step.

  He kept up his sprint once he was between the tents, hearing the cloth shred behind him, and then dropped flat on pure instinct. Just in time to see the line of bullets pass directly above him again.

  The destroyed tent nearer the killing field was starting to sag, and this time instead of reversing direction Trev threw himself through the opening the bullets had cut in the canvas, scrambling forward through the empty tent towards the opposite side before dropping flat. His idea was to get far enough forward that the bullets coming at an angle from the tower above would pass over him when the second, lower sweep came back his way.

  It might have worked, but either way he didn't get a chance to find out. The whine of bullets abruptly stopped, replaced by a deafening metallic screech followed by an even louder crash and exultant cheers from the crowd outside.

  For a moment Trev just sprawled where he'd landed, lungs burning with each panting breath and his limbs shaking so hard it was physically painful. The legs of his coveralls felt wet, and it took him a long moment to realize with embarrassment that at some point his bladder must have let go without him realizing it.

  It was hard to care too much about that considering how he'd just spent the last thirty seconds literally outrunning death. If that wasn't enough of an excuse he didn't know what was.

  Once he'd got control of himself, at least enough to push what he'd just gone through to the back of his mind, Trev got his feet under him and stumbled towards the front of the tent. He was still carrying the AK-47 that he'd miraculously managed to keep hold of through it all.

  When he peeked out of the tent his suspicions were confirmed, that the guard tower that had been shooting at him had been overrun by prisoners while the machine gun's focus was on him. The furious mob had pushed it over in the direction of the outer fence, which had crumpled beneath it and created an opening for the prisoners to escape the camp.

  They'd immediately used that opening to swarm over the stunned guards in the fallen tower, and although Trev couldn't see anything but a pileup of thrashing people around the aluminum structure it wouldn't surprise him if the mob came close to ripping the machine gunner and his spotter to pieces.

  A sharp “hsst!” abruptly drew his attention, and Trev looked back the direction he'd come to see his family peeking out of the destroyed tent on the far side of the lane. His uncle was with them, and Trev felt an enormous surge of relief as he waved. Lucas waved back, then urgently motioned for Trev to come over.

  It took a surprising force of will to step out into the open after what he'd just been through, and Trev crossed the distance stumbling on shaking legs. His mom and dad caught him as he entered the tent, slowing his fall when he slumped to the ground.

  Lucas was leaning over the soldier Trev had killed, working to take off the man's riot gear. They must have dragged the body inside while Trev was running for his life. It looked as if his dad had claimed the soldier's stun baton, while his mom was clutching a heavy duty can of pepper spray. Lucas had two flashbangs clipped to his belt.

  Trev pushed up to a sitting position on rubbery arms, ignoring the disgusted noise Linda made when she realized why his coveralls were wet. “Why are you taking his riot gear?” he demanded. “Anyone who wears that is going to get torn apart by the mob out there!”

  His uncle gave him a patient look. “We won't wear it, we'll carry it with us.”

  “Why?” Trev asked. He was a bit high strung and realized he was shouting, but he couldn't seem to calm himself down.

  Lucas shifted his patient look to Trev's coveralls. “Because our goal is the military camp and my family, and one of us is wearing prison garb that will get him shot on sight.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Catching A Ride

  Getting through the fence among the mob of escaping prisoners was a dangerous experience in its own right. No one was specifically trying to cause harm, but in the panic there was the very real chance that anyone who tripped and fell in the press would be trampled before they could get up.

  Lucas led in the front, using his height to navigate through the crowd and provide an opening for the rest of them, while Trev and his dad did their best to hold the mass of bodies back from the group to the sides and behind. The rest of the family clustered in the middle, doing their best to hold each other up and keep moving forward.

  For a hectic few minutes all Trev saw was shoving bodies and pale, frightened faces. He stumbled, tripped, and flailed his way forward, sometimes pressed up against his family so tight he could barely breathe and shoving the crowd back as hard as he could, like he was pushing against the weight of an avalanche. At one point Jim went down, and it took all his strength to haul his brother back to his feet without falling himself and keep them all going forward.

  Out of pure expedience he'd stowed the AK-47 he'd taken from the guard beneath his coveralls so it wouldn't make him a target. He was carrying the vest from the soldier's riot gear in his hands and using it as a shield and to shove back, and the press constantly threatened to rip it from his grip. He could only hope his family members with the other pieces were keeping hold of theirs.

  But finally after what seemed like an eternity they managed to climb over the second knocked down fence, stepping carefully over the trampled razor wire. From that point the mob began to thin as everyone scattered in all directions.

  Lucas led the fami
ly northwest away from the camp, keeping with the edge of the crowd until they'd reached a stand of trees well out of range of the guards in the remaining towers along the fences. From there he turned them directly north.

  It was harrowing to head in the direction of the dissipating mushroom cloud, but there wasn't much help for it. They'd come out on the other side of the internment camp from where they needed to be and had to circle around. If they went around to the southeast they'd be fighting to get through hundreds of thousands of panicked people with the risk they'd be attacked at any moment, not just by prisoners but by any Gold Bloc soldiers sent to stop the escape.

  It was his uncle's hope that everyone would be going south or west, so if he led the family north around the camp they'd make it safely. With him in the lead they ran towards the cloud, watching it fearfully and imagining it was getting closer with every second. Which might not be purely imagination. Trev could feel his skin crawl at the thought of the irradiated dust and debris that cloud represented, which could be showering their bodies at any moment.

  It took a while to get where they were going, since they had to circle well around the camp to stay out of sight of the fence, a precaution they all agreed on even though most of the guard towers were either abandoned or had been knocked down by this point. They also had to stop for a brief time while Trev put on the riot gear to hide his coveralls.

  Lucas constantly checked his watch, face growing tighter with worry every time. The family was moving at the best speed they could manage, but to circle around a camp nearly two miles to a side long took time and Eva and Mary had only agreed to wait for three hours. Trev could do the easy math to realize that even as hard as they were pushing themselves it was uncertain they'd make it.

  Things got a bit easier when they reached I-75 and could follow it south to the military camp. There was less need to hide, and they even joined a few people already fleeing south along it. Some were Gold Bloc soldiers, others were civilians, but no one paid anyone else any attention in their haste to get away from the fallout coming for them.

  Before too long they reached the edge of the camp, where blending in became even easier among the flurry of people preparing to evacuate. Those who hadn't just dropped everything and ran, that is.

  In spite of the panic everyone in the military camp was solemn and silent as they went about their tasks. Trev was confused about that at first, until the camp's speakers blared out a brief but grim message, then repeated it about a minute later. According to Lucas's halting interpretation it was a report that all of the missiles that had been launched had now hit their targets, to devastating effect. Destruction was listed not by city but by country that had been totally annihilated, and a period of respectful silence was requested for the unimaginable loss of life.

  Trev observed that silence along with the rest of his family, as he hoped anyone with a conscience would no matter which side of the conflict they were on. Although when Lucas led them to the small house where his family had been staying, and he found his wife and daughter waiting for him in the front door, the silence was broken by a restrained but joyful greeting.

  The reunion could only be short by necessity, but emotions were still strong as everyone exchanged hugs and expressed their relief at each other's health and safety.

  After hugging his aunt Trev turned in time for Mary to throw her arms around him. He returned his cousin's hug fiercely. “Thanks for spotting me when I got here,” he said. “Uncle Lucas wouldn't have found any of us if it wasn't for you.”

  “We got lucky,” she agreed, hugging him for a moment more. Then she turned to accept a hug from Linda.

  After a while Trev hopped off the porch. “All right, let's go.”

  They turned to look at him, and Lucas frowned. “Hold on. We should probably think about how we're going to go about this.”

  “Think about what?” Trev demanded. “We've already lost a lot of time and that fallout has to be getting closer by the minute. For all we know it could already be raining on us.”

  “I'm not arguing that we need to go,” his uncle said reasonably. “We definitely can't stay here. I'm just saying we need to think this through. Have you considered how we're going to get eight people across a huge chunk of the continent with no supplies? You had enough trouble with a bike and plenty of food.”

  Trev hesitated. “No,” he admitted. “But there's got to be a way. Maybe we can find an abandoned superstore or sporting goods store that has bicycles. Or we can check houses as we go. Most garages have one or two old bikes sitting in there that just need their tires pumped up. The important thing is that we go now and worry about it when we've escaped the radiation.”

  “Here's a thought,” Mary said. “What if we drove?” Everyone turned to look at her in disbelief, and she gave them a tight smile. “What, just because we're all living in the dark ages doesn't mean that modern marvels weren't commonplace half a year ago. Think about it, guys! The Gold Bloc brought fuel and vehicles with them!”

  “Yes, which are all heavily guarded in the motor pool,” her father argued. “If they're shooting people on sight in the refugee camp what do you think they're doing to anyone who comes within 100 yards of that place?”

  The blond young woman glanced northward, then her eyes hurriedly darted away. “I don't know about you but I'd like to outrun whatever's coming our way, especially when we've lost so much time.” She gave her father a beseeching look. “I know it's dangerous, but don't you think they'd let a supply coordinator into the motor pool?”

  There was a long silence as everyone looked at Lucas. “I'm not sure that would be enough to fake my way in with things the way they are,” he hedged, clearly not liking the idea at all. “We're all together now. Is it worth risking some or all of our lives for this?”

  “Maybe we can at least check things out, see if it's possible,” Trev suggested.

  * * * * *

  In the end the prospect of trying to outrun fallout, hundreds of thousands of freed prisoners, and the Gold Bloc forces fleeing south from the ruin of their invasion camp made even insane risks seem justifiable.

  There was also the fact that everyone liked the idea of being able to reach Aspen Hill after a couple days of driving instead of months of walking or weeks with bicycles.

  Most of the vehicles in the motor pool had been parked on the street leading through the occupied town, where they were being loaded by frantic soldiers in preparation for evacuation. Oddly enough that actually made them more difficult to steal, surrounded by hundreds of soldiers constantly coming and going.

  On the other hand the few remaining vehicles in the motor pool, reserved for personal use by officers or still awaiting requisition, were in this situation actually the easier target. The fenced in concrete garage was at the southern edge of town, guarded by only four soldiers. That was more than enough guards to kill all of them if the plan didn't work, so Trev fervently hoped they'd accounted for the huge number of things that could go wrong.

  The plan began when Lucas entered the motor pool under the pretext of doing an inventory, to make sure none of the remaining vehicles had been stolen by panicking soldiers fleeing the fallout zone. Even though he was a fairly minor coordinator and not part of the formal military hierarchy he made a convincing argument, as well as providing his credentials and submitting to being patted down.

  Trev covered him closely with his captured AK-47 the entire time, ready to open fire if it looked as if his uncle's bluff had failed. But it didn't: apparently the soldiers decided that an unarmed man with his papers in order inside a guarded structure couldn't do much harm, and in the chaos they had no easy way of verifying his claims.

  Part of their lack of vigilance came from the fact that the motor pool was designed to make stealing vehicles difficult to the point of impossibility. The only way to drive out was through the heavily guarded checkpoint, and the soldiers there would immediately hear the sound of an engine starting or a vehicle approaching in plenty of
time to lower the sturdy steel pole that served as a gate and raise the six inch tire spikes that would turn any vehicle in there into a paperweight rolling on four flats.

  Assuming they didn't just riddle the vehicle and its driver with hundreds of bullet holes before it got within twenty feet.

  The plan was for the rest of the family to wait at the edge of town, ready to hop into the vehicle his uncle found once he managed to escape with it. The motor pool was surrounded by waist high concrete barriers and ten foot tall chain link fences topped with coils of razor wire, but while getting through that would be a daunting task it was easy enough to see inside. That would make Lucas's job harder if he caught the eye of any soldiers passing by outside, but it would also make it easier for him to signal when he was ready.

  While he was doing that Trev's dad and Mary would take advantage of the chaos in the camp to create a distraction big enough to draw away the guards at the entrance to the motor pool, or at least divert their attention. The easiest and quickest distraction was lighting several of the nearby tents on fire. It was every bit as risky as stealing the truck, but if caught they had a decent chance of disappearing among the tents in the confusion.

  Trev's job was to wait in hiding near the front of the motor pool, in a spot where he could also cover his dad and cousin while they created their distraction and got away. From there he'd watch to make sure the guards went after the distraction and didn't come back while his uncle was driving the truck out. If the soldiers didn't all leave or came back early he'd have to take them out, if he could, or at least prevent them from reaching the panic button that would deploy the steel bar and tire spikes.

  The entire plan was dangerous to the point of suicidal, but they had the advantage of most of the soldiers in camp being focused on the evacuation or dealing with the prisoners escaping the internment camp. Not to mention the fact that the nuclear apocalypse was at the top of everyone's minds and literally in front of their faces every time they looked north, keeping them in a semi distracted state as they went about their duties.