Surge Together (Book 3 of the Sheffield Chronicles)

by Nate Castle

  “That’s more like it,” Aaron said. “All I can say is whoever decided to bring more than one tractor here is a genius. If not we’d be playing Hollywood stuntman still.”

  Tractor driver #1 took that as a ‘green light’ to rescue Clyde. Another driver had already taken a cable from his side tool box and attached it to the forks of tractor #1. Driver #1 raised the arms of the tractor to full extension first, and then raised the forks that were attached to the arms using a separate lever.

  With the forks now a good height above where Clyde was crouched over, the cable that hung below the forks was at a perfect height. The final step, would be using a third lever to push the forks forward, so that the cable would be close enough to Clyde for him to grab ahold of. Before this process began though, Clyde took matters into his own hands and lept from his squatting position and bear hugged the cable, clearing at least a five foot gap.

  “Oh my lanta, is this guy out of his mind?” tractor driver #1 yelled.

  He reversed the direction of the arms to lower the arms and bring Clyde to safety. Clyde was thrilled when he got to the ground because he actually had an audience watching this time, so doing his ‘signature move’ where he waved at the crowd seemed appropriate this time.

  “One thing you’ll learn about Clyde as you spend more time around him, is he never does anything the normal way,” Aaron said to the still concerned tractor driver #1,“Even something like giving a handshake, he will find a way to make irregular, for example making you shake his hand when its behind his back.”

  “How did it feel to be in the spotlight again?” Hank asked Clyde.

  “Yeah buddy, it felt good, real good,” Clyde said, “Sorry to be a douche about my dismount, it had to happen though.”

  “Good now, get on the bus and entertain the nurses for a bit,” Hank said, sort of half kidding, “I can’t have you out here slowing down this next operation.”

  Clyde gave Hank a fist bump as he walked towards the bus.

  “Alright tractors, do you thing,” Hank ordered.

  One by one each tractor got into position. The driver’s got out and attached cables or clips, whatever they had on hand to the frame and undercarriage of the trailer. The goal was for two tractors to push the trailer forward while the other ones braced it to avoid having the end that was sticking up in the air come crashing down to the ground. Realistically, five tractors were not needed for this simple task, but to their defense they also weren’t accustomed to executing construction operations.

  When the trailer was resting in its final location, Hank did the honors of opening the trailer door. Tom and his cronies were already near the front of the trailer. They were standing but all were bloodied up with moderate injuries from when Clyde intentionally dropped the trailer from the overpass. Most appeared to be covered in cow manure, which made sense since they had to spend the last hour plus on top of a dozen cattle.

  “Hiya,” Hank said and extended his hand to help the men down.

  Tom accepted the offer and so did the others.

  Once down on the ground, Tom said, “Someone please fill me in on what happened?”

  “We will, but after we get you guys some medical treatment,” Hank said, “With the amount of blood some of you are losing, we need to get you to a hospital fast.”

  He was glad that they didn’t argue with him and willingly boarded the bus.

  “Oh and one more thing, how many of those cows are alive?” he said, unsure if any way that question was answered would make a difference.

  Hank hopped into the driver’s seat of the bus and off they went back to the White House. One aspect of the plan started to bug him. From the back of the bus, he could hear Tom interrogating Clyde about ‘why he wasn’t injured at all’ from the ‘accident’. If Hank could do it over, he would have roughed Clyde up a bit to sell the story that Clyde lost control and flipped the truck and trailer. This made him remember the time when his college roommate would often say, ‘C’s get degrees’, meaning it doesn’t always have to be perfect.

  As expected, General Kaplan was waiting for their arrival with twenty men standing by his side. At this point, Tom and the others realized they weren’t in fact going to a hospital, and Tom pulled a small blade from his pocket.

  “What is this shit?”

  “I would be real careful when deciding on your next move son, “ General Kaplan said.

  Him and the twenty men had surrounded Tom and his cronies. Kap did have a sidearm on him, but wasn’t planning to use it unless absolutely necessary.

  “Your best option is to come with us,” said General Kaplan.

  “You frickin' liars, you’re gonna pay for this!” Tom said, directing his anger at Hank and Clyde, “Alright we’re coming.”

  Kap knew better than to relax, he’d seen this trick too many times over the years. As he was about to turn around and start leading Tom towards the holding room,Tom would probably attempt to stab him. Tom was the type of guy that would try to take as many guys down with him even though he knew he had a losing hand. Kap turned around intentionally at the right moment and it caught Tom off guard, causing him to lose his balance. This gave Kap the opportunity to grab ahold of Tom and put him in a chokehold. Kaplan’s men saw this happening and immediately put Tom’s cronies in similar chokehold positions, ones you could only name if you had watched enough UFC fights to learn about them.

  “Ahhh, it feels good to get my hands dirty every once in a while!” Kap said to the others, as he pleasantly escorted Tom to a secure room inside the White House.

  Inside the room was a box that had built in anticipation of one day needing to house ‘prisoners’. Tom and the others were put in the box. Kaplan could finally relax as he felt they now had a handle on the situation.

  16

  Horseshoes and Hand Grenades

  Logan felt pretty relieved when the Zyrgian craft landed at the White House as promised. The occupants exited on their own accord, the Zyrgians followed behind.

  “Bring your President here, I need to talk to him, “ Clearokyt said to Logan before he left.

  Logan did as he was told and President Taylor was on the craft talking to Clearokyt within fifteen minutes.

  “The disks are ready. You’ll need to deploy your teams in one hour.”

  “How did you know to pick Logan up?” the President said.

  “Like I said before, most of the rooms in the White House are not soundproofed, so I overheard some of your conversations. Imagine what the kratyriac unit is hearing, especially since it has more capabilities than my craft does. Why didn’t you listen to me when I said you have to be careful what you say and how loud you say it?”

  President Taylor deflected the question, “I’ll have my teams ready before the hour. Have them meet inside this craft?”

  “Meet outside the craft. There will be more crafts coming to help transport.

  President Taylor was relieved that Clearokyt didn’t pry at him for an answer to the earlier question. He left the craft and on his way back to get the teams organized a few thoughts popped into his head.

  Now we can finally put all of these Europeans to work. It will also make for a more productive work environment here, not having as many people around to clutter the place up.

  He had no memory of what Clearokyt had outlined in their first meeting regarding the disks. Was it teams of 4, or 8 , or 12?

  I like the number 10, let’s go with teams of 10. If I remember correctly, there are 3000 Europeans here. So if we have 600 teams with 5 Europeans and 5 Americans on each team, then we should be in business. If Clearokyt later wants to tweak the teams, that’s his prerogative. Wait a minute I keep thinking Clearokyt is a guy alien, but I really have no way of knowing that. I should ask him what he is, but that might really piss him or her off? Focus, focus, you've got too many thoughts racing through your head. Clearokyt’s gender is of no importance whatsoever.

  President Taylor got a bullhorn from his office and went to the
cafeteria, which seemed like a good place to start.

  ‘To the lawn immediately, the selection process begins in ten minutes sharp. Mandatory for all residents to go.’

  He moved on from one crowded area to the next, repeating the same message again and again. Ten minutes later, almost everyone was on the lawn with a few stragglers hustling over.

  “Now I want you to line up, twenty-five per line, in order of most attractive to least attractive, with the most attractive person at the front of the line and the least attractive at the back. Go!”

  Some took the job seriously and started coming up with criteria to determine attractiveness, but most stood there with puzzled or shocked expressions.

  President Taylor continued,“Relax gents and ladies, I’m totally kidding! I do want you to organize yourselves into lines of twenty-five, obviously not based on attractiveness though. I guess my career prospects of being a comedian are not good.”

  Earlier that day he had worked things out with Sierra, at least temporarily and he felt great about that. She was now standing next to him with a large bucket of silicone wristbands organized by color. The lines of twenty-five formed quickly.

  “Raise your hand and keep it raised if you are European.”

  Walking up and down the rows, he began picking teams by tapping people on the shoulder and saying a number out loud so he could keep track of how many people he had already put on the team. Once selected the person would walk over to Sierra, be given a wristband that was the same color as the rest of their team’s and then form a new ten-person line with their team on the south side of the lawn.

  President Taylor selected five Europeans for each team based on the hands that were raised and chose five Americans based on the hands that weren’t raised. He knew there were better more efficient ways to get this process done, but he didn’t care at this point. The selection process was complete within thirty minutes.

  Five more Zyrgian crafts landed during the process and began loading teams. The crafts didn’t look capable of holding a combined total of 6000 humans, but they had the ability to bend things into an alternate reality, freeing up another space to transport 1000 people in each craft. Even though some colors had to be repeated, having color coded wristbands helped a great amount to keep the teams organized.

  “Good luck out there, make us all proud!” President Taylor said to the departing teams before boarding.

  Out of the remaining people who didn’t get chosen for teams, there were many familiar faces. President Taylor tried to sneak away from the group un-noticed, but Logan and Hank cornered him.

  “Why weren’t any of us picked for the teams?” Logan asked.

  “Just the luck of the draw, it was random,” said the President.

  It wasn’t random, but I can’t tell them that right now. I don’t want to raise any red flags with the Zyrgians when they overhear this conversation.

  He had intentionally picked what he considered to be “2nd string” players for the teams, and kept his best players or “1st string” here. Placing the disks for the Zyrgians to create the force field was fine and all, but he had his doubts. He wanted to have his best performers on site so he could execute the secret missions that the Zyrgians didn’t know about if necessary.

  He would have to wait until they were all gathered in Hank’s soundproofed room though before he could spill the beans to his ‘1st string team’. And that couldn’t happen until the Zyrgian crafts had departed.

  Clearokyt did not ask questions before he left with the convoy of crafts, but if he had, the President’s answer would have been, ‘I need these guys to help me get information out of the IHL agents that we captured’, which in part was true.

  General Kaplan was already on the same page as the President and he led the ‘regulars’ down to the soundproofed tunnel room that from here on out he would refer to as ‘the Emerald Room’, the name having no meaning whatsoever. The ‘regulars’ included: Kap, Logan, Hank, Shelby, Noel, Christina, Cade, Sierra, Aaron, Clyde, and the President.

  With all eyes on him President Taylor spoke,“Let’s keep this short and sweet. You weren’t selected to place the disks because I wanted you all here in case the Fadothials attack us before the disks are set up and we need to resort to Plan B.

  “Information about Plan B will be given out only on a need to know basis, I hope you understand. Next, I’m going to need your help in getting some answers out of the IHL agents we are holding in the ‘box’. It’s an interrogation if you will.”

  Clearokyt set everything up for the humans so that no tutorial was needed before the mission. Every team was given a device that resembled a tablet computer and acted as a virtual assistant. The device would give spoken commands in English to the team members about the exact location that the disks should be placed and how to do so. To get the humans on the ground in their specified locations, each craft would slow its speed by 68%. The team would enter a new chamber of the craft when ready to deploy. The chamber was equipped with a net that would shoot out from an opening beneath the craft.

  Unlike in a parachute where a cord needs to be pulled, the humans weren’t required to do anything besides stay in the net until it lowered them to the ground. Once the team was standing, the net retracted itself like a tape measure bag into the craft and was ready for the next team to enter. This process was used again and again until each team was in position. The plan called for every region of the US to have a team in it. How would the force field span wide enough to prevent the Fadothials from entering Earth? Wouldn’t it just prevent them from entering the US, but not necessarily the whole globe? The answer to that question lied at an intellectual level of thinking that wasn’t yet attainable by the human brain.

  Clearokyt put his craft on cruise control, his objective now was to monitor the humans placing the disks and ensure they weren’t getting attacked by either the Fadothials or other humans such as the IHL. In the event that they were, Clearokyt was confident he could have a craft reach any point in the US in under two minutes and wipe out whoever was causing the attack. If it was a Fadothial rather than a human, the threat would be harder to eliminate.

  “Here is some dinner boys,” Noel said, “Now I’d like to ask you a few questions if you don’t mind.”

  She had brought five plates of food into ‘the box’ and sat down next to Tom and his associates.

  Logan was happy to see Noel back to a more pleasant mood, she had been kind of a downer recently, and not fun to hang around. She had volunteered to interrogate the IHL guys and take a play out of the ‘good cop bad cop’ playbook. If she didn’t get the answers she was looking for they would bring in the ‘bad cop’.

  She said, “So it’s no secret that you work for the IHL. I’d like to know what are the goals both short-term and long-term of this organization, and how large is the organization?”

  17

  Discovery Bay

  Logan thought for sure that this meant doomsday. The sky had turned an army green color in some parts, grey in others. He was expecting a fleet of Fadothial crafts to land any minute. With no real plan on how to fight them, he felt pretty hopeless. Others in the building shared the same concerns as Aaron and Clyde went outside to go check on things. When they returned Clyde provided a report to the group.

  “No crafts in sight thankfully,” Clyde said, “But I’ll tell you one thing, there is a shitload of garbage falling from the sky. Or at least we think it’s garbage.”

  “There are only bad connotations that can result from that,” Logan said, “And the trash, is it in just one area or is it everywhere you look?”

  “Everywhere, I walked 100 yards in each direction and it was the same consistency throughout,” Clyde said.

  “I’ve been hearing about your stunts Clyde. The more things turn south, the more stunts you’ll be able to justify. So I guess that’s good news for you?”

  “Hell yeah brother, you ain’t livin’ if you ain’t trying,” said Clyde.

&
nbsp; “Let’s go see if Noel is making any progress.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, with this IHL stuff, I’ve never heard of them before, you’ve got the wrong guy,” Tom said.

  Noel was staying in character and not raising her voice at Tom, who she knew was lying to her with every answer.

  “Ok Tom, you get one more chance to come clean with me. Are you going to make the smart choice?”

  “You don’t want me to have to lie about who I really am, do you? That doesn’t seem ethical. I’m going to continue telling you the truth, like I have been doing.”

  “Ok Tom, that’s all the questions I have for you. Good luck,” Noel said and knocked on the wall of the box, letting those outside know that she was ready to come out.

  General Kaplan gave Noel a hug when she got out and thanked her for trying to flip Tom.

  “Someone start heating up the iron,” he said.

  “Like an iron for clothes?” Aaron said.

  “No, but that would be a good idea though. What I’m talking about is the branding iron, the kind used to brand cattle,” Kap said.

  “I’m on it,” Logan said.

  Shelby followed Logan out of the holding room and down a long hallway to a utility closet. Logan punched in a six-digit code and then placed his right thumb on a scanner until 3-beeps disabled the lock and he could open the door. Even from the inside it looked like a basic utility closet, but when you pulled back a sheet of felt, it revealed a walk-in room that contained a lot of high valued items. Anything from weapons to personal mementos were in this room. Logan reached onto a shelf and grabbed the brand. It looked like a tool that you would use to tend to a fire in the fireplace.

  “You’re really going to brand this guy babe?” Shelby asked.

  “Yeah, the longer we wait the worse it’s going to get. We need answers ASAP. I know it’s not the most humane way, but it’s not like this guy didn’t have any choices in the matter.”