Collapse Series (Book 6): State of Vengeance

by Summer Lane

  “You really think that destroying one base will bring down the whole of Omega?” Harry snorts. “There are thousands of Omega strongholds across this country – across the globe. You’re so grotesquely outnumbered, it’s almost comedic.”

  His words resonate, casting a pall over the room.

  “And you, of course, would know all about being loyal to Omega,” Chris says at last. “Because you’ve been giving up their information to us to save your ass from a firing squad.” He shakes his head. “You and everyone else in Omega – you’re all the same. And that makes you weak. It’s not about the group – it’s not about the team to you people. It’s about making yourself better. Making yourself wealthier. Making yourself more powerful.” He shrugs. “It will be your downfall.”

  “Omega will welcome me back with open arms,” Harry says.

  “What makes you think you’re going back?” I demand. “What makes you think that I won’t just pull out a gun right now and throw a shot right between your eyes?”

  Harry looks stricken for a moment. Surprised.

  He collects himself and replies, “Because, as you’ve said yourself so many times…you’re not like us.”

  I glare at him.

  Just watch me, I think. I wouldn’t even hesitate.

  “Which brings me to the reason Harry is here in the first place,” Chris says, his voice booming in the small room. “He’s going to open the front door to Sky City for us.”

  “Wait…what?” I say.

  “Colonel Rivera – when he first brought you into the bunker,” Arlene says, “He used a hand recognition scanner to open the airlock.”

  I remember.

  “Harry’s position as a District Prefect and General has granted him access into Sky City before,” she continues. “And it still will. We don’t have to breach the first door.”

  “Just the second one,” I say.

  “That’s right.”

  I tilt my head, finally understanding why Harry is still here. Why he’s still alive. And why Chris hasn’t thrown him across the room by now.

  Because he can actually make our job a little easier.

  “How are we going in?” Vera asks.

  Chris flashes a brilliant smile.

  “The fun way,” he says.

  *

  “I’m pretty sure you and I have very different definitions of fun,” I say, horrified. I’m standing in the Chow Hall with the rest of the operatives. The tables and chairs have been cleared out, and Chris’s team is lined up.

  Chris is holding an oxygen mask in his hand, along with a black vest and backpack.

  “Okay,” he says simply. “Let’s go over this one more time. This is the oxygen tube, and this is the rip cord that will deploy the parachute.” He motions to a three-ring cord on the side of the vest. “Don’t pull the oxygen cord. Most of you already know this, because many of you are SEALS, like me.” He looks at me. “And yes, Commander Hart. Our definitions of fun are very different.”

  “I don’t think I can do this,” I mutter.

  We have been going through “ground school” for the last three days. It seems like such an achingly long amount of time to prepare for a mission, but this is something that cannot be taken lightly. Although many of the operatives of the Angels of Death have jumped before – I have not. And neither has anyone on my team.

  Uriah stands on my right, Vera on my left. Andrew is beside her, and Alexander is beside him. “HALO jumping is easy,” Andrew replies in a quiet voice. “You just have to make sure your oxygen is working or you can lose consciousness and forget to pull the parachute cord.”

  “Fantastic,” I say.

  “And jumping from a high elevation will be a freezing experience,” Vera adds. “We’ll have to keep warm, or we’ll be ice sculptures when we hit the ground.”

  “That should be familiar territory for you,” I say.

  She gives me a look.

  “Sorry,” I shrug.

  But not really.

  Chris reviews the basics of deploying our chutes one more time – a small drogue chute is deployed first, catching the air, and then ripping the main chute out of our packs.

  I’m nervous.

  Yes, I have been through worse. But jumping out of an airplane and parachuting into enemy territory is not something I have ever aspired to do.

  Ever.

  “What happens if the chute malfunctions?” I ask.

  “Then you die,” Alexander states.

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “It’s true.”

  “Whatever.” I look at Chris. “Tell me there’s a failsafe for a chute malfunction.”

  A couple of people in the back of the room chuckle.

  “Yeah, I hear you back there,” I say, annoyed. “When you’re screaming without a chute for a twenty-thousand-foot fall, tell me how funny you think that is.”

  “The chute is the failsafe,” Chris tells me. “You get one chance.”

  I nod.

  “Okay, then,” I say. “That’s what I wanted to know.”

  “Just watch me,” he goes on. “Do exactly as I do, and you’ll be fine.”

  Great. I get one shot. If I blow it, I die.

  Wonderful.

  “For those who don’t have experience with HALO jumps,” Chris says, turning his attention to me, “you’re about to learn on the job, and these three days of intensive training have prepared you well for it. HALO jumping - High Altitude Low Opening. Basically, you’re jumping from a higher elevation. For us, that’ll put us at about twenty thousand feet, although most HALO jumps are around thirty thousand.”

  We have gone over the jump dozens of times, each of us practicing pulling our ripcord, falling and landing. The team scatters into groups and Chris straps the vest and pack to my back. “Where’s the ripcord?” he asks.

  I close my fingers around the cord on the right hand side of the backpack.

  “Pull,” Chris commands.

  I do.

  “Good.” He gives me an approving smile. “These vests don’t have an automatic chute deployment system – but it does have an altitude tracker.” He taps a small device attached to the pack. “When you reach a certain elevation, this thing will start screaming at you through the helmet. That’s the signal to deploy the chute.” He shrugs. “Or you can just use your common sense.”

  I roll my eyes.

  “You’re so comforting,” I say.

  “That’s what I’m here for, baby.” He kisses my forehead. “Come on. If Vera can do it, so can you.”

  “Don’t compare me to Vera,” I warn.

  Chris closes his mouth, offering a sheepish grin.

  “Right…” He leans closer. “Look, Cassidy. This is dangerous. You’re a damn good soldier, everyone here knows that. Manny’s going to pilot the plane that takes us in, and you can stay up in the air with him and monitor the mission.”

  “You know I’m not going to do that,” I say. “You fight, I fight.”

  He sighs.

  “I knew that’s what your answer would be,” he tells me.

  He knows me too well. As much as I would like to stay with Manny in the plane – I can’t. My job is to make sure my team secures the objective. I have to be an active part of that.

  I’m a fighter, and nothing can change that.

  Not even fear.

  Going on a crash course for parachute jumping is not my idea of a good time, but there is no other way to get into Sky City undetected. Our first priority is to take out the radio tower so that we can infiltrate the bunker. We can’t reach Sky City by vehicle. We can’t land on the airstrip that Manny once used.

  Coming in by air is the only way.

  “HALO jumps are fun,” Chris says. “I used to do them all the time.”

  “Yeah, well,” I reply, “you’re kind of insane.”

  “Nah. An adrenaline junkie, maybe. But not insane.”

  It is now completely dark. Almost zero hour.

  “What hap
pens when we’re done with this mission?” I ask.

  “We go back to Monterey,” Chris replies.

  “Without recruits?”

  “The Alliance will have to do for now.”

  I am not so sure.

  The Alliance and the militias are struggling without backup. This war is getting tight. Without extra recruits, we may not survive the next wave of Omega troops.

  “Almost time to go,” Chris says.

  Alexander walks across the room, looking at Chris.

  “We’re good to go,” he tells him.

  “Good.” Chris holds out his hand. “It’s good to have you back, Ramos.”

  Alexander shakes Chris’s hand – there is a flicker of emotion on his face, and then it vanishes. I think Sophia’s death has been harder on him than he would ever admit.

  “How is Derek doing in Sacramento?” I ask Alexander. “Did you see him before you left?”

  “He was healing up,” Alexander replies. “I imagine he’ll be battle ready in another couple of weeks.”

  Good to know. I had been wondering about Derek.

  Commander Buckley walks through the door to the Chow Hall, his dark eyes glistening in the faded light.

  “You’ve got a green light,” he says, his baritone voice filling the room.

  Commander Jones is right behind him. He looks at me, sadness in his eyes.

  Chris takes a deep breath, looking around the room. Most of these operatives are strangers to me – soldiers that Chris brought with him out of Monterey.

  “Let’s go take out Sky City,” he says.

  I swallow a massive lump in my throat.

  I don’t know what’s coming next. Whatever it is – it’s going to change everything.

  I just know it.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The cargo bay of the C-7 Caribou rumbles and rattles like the inside of a tin can. I sit on webbed nylon, a stretchy net. My hands grip my vest. The lights are dim and dull. The operatives are lined up on each side of me and across from me. Chris is on my left, on the end. Elle is in the cockpit with Manny and Bravo – she will not be allowed to participate in the HALO jump. She is a little too young for this.

  Arlene is staying behind in Camp Freedom, monitoring our progress via radio. Harry Lydell sits on the edge of the bench across from me, silent and pensive. He seems about as thrilled to be here as I am.

  Which is not very.

  We all have earplugs smashed into our ears, the rumble of the aircraft deafening. We have to shout directly into one another’s ears to even be heard.

  “It’s loud in here!” Vera yells at me, seated directly across on the bench.

  That’s a gross understatement.

  The four propellers on the massive wings echo throughout the cargo bay. The engine roars. A small radio is clipped to my vest, the earphone shoved deep into my ear. “Ready, Freddie?” Manny’s voice crackles.

  “Nope,” I reply, dipping my chin to make sure my voice hits the speaker on my vest. “But go for it anyway.”

  “I plan on it! Bombs away!”

  His hysterical laughing stops as he cuts off the transmission. I steal a sideways glance at Chris, calm and cool – as always. My heavy pack of weapons and gear is weighing my shoulders down. A tactical helmet is strapped tightly to my head, an oxygen mask and tube hanging to the side of my face, ready for the jump. On top of that, I’ve got the parachute attached about mid-chest level. For Chris, it’s not a big deal. For a small girl like me, I feel like I’m giving a piggyback ride to an elephant. My heavy gear is packed into a kit bag right below the reserve chute. I’ll drop it to earth about fifteen feet before impact. Because I’m small, my kit is small, too. The bigger gear bags stay with the bigger men on this mission.

  Chris puts his hand on mine as Manny turns the plane around. We don’t have that much of an airstrip, so his takeoff will have to be skilled and quick. I squeeze Chris’s fingers. My stomach flips on itself. Not because of the flight.

  But because of what I know I’ll have to do.

  The aircraft bounces down the meadow. I can’t see anything – there are no windows here. I can only feel the pressure on my chest as the plane gains speed, bumping and accelerating, until we lift off the ground. I am pressed against my seat as we rise.

  My ears plug up as we gain elevation. Because our starting point is Camp Freedom, our elevation has gone from roughly nine or ten thousand feet to fifteen thousand feet in just a couple of minutes.

  It won’t be long before we reach our jump point.

  I take a deep breath, feeling sick. Honestly, nothing has ever scared me more than this. Slave labor? No big deal. Guerrilla warfare? Piece of cake. Countless firefights and a rescue mission into Los Angeles? A walk in the park.

  But this? No. Just no.

  “Breathe, Cassie!” Chris shouts, putting his hand on my knee. “You can do this.”

  I nod, too nervous to speak.

  We continue our ascent until Manny hits cruising altitude, and the aircraft levels out. I inhale and exhale. We’re at least twenty thousand feet up.

  No big deal, I tell myself. You’re a tough girl. You can do this.

  I look at Vera. She is a pale shade of white and green.

  At least I’m not the only one who’s nervous.

  “Listen up,” Manny’s voice crackles into my ear, “we’re about five minutes away from the drop zone. When the prep lights flash, I’m going to open the cargo bay door. You check and double-check your gear. I don’t want anybody taking a long drop with a short stop.”

  “You’re not helping anyone,” Vera yells, barely audible.

  Chris and I double-check our gear.

  “Remember, arms out, legs out,” Chris says, bringing his mouth to my ear so that I can make out his words. “Keep your appendages spread apart, you’ll fall slower. Too fast and you’ll get ahead of everyone. Stay with me and do exactly what I do!”

  I nod. We’ve gone over this before.

  I lean forward and kiss his cheek.

  “If I live through this,” I holler, “promise me we’ll go on a real date sometime.”

  “A date?” he replies.

  “Yeah. You know, like dinner and a movie? Kissing on the front porch?” I force a shaky smile. “All that romantic crap.”

  Chris takes my hand.

  “You got it, kid,” he promises.

  Alexander looks at Vera, Andrew looks at me, and I look at everyone else. Chris pats my knee and then straps his oxygen mask on. Everyone does the same, and suddenly I’m keeping company with a sea of faceless soldiers.

  We are scary. We are dangerous.

  Despite my terror, I am proud. The light in the cargo bay goes dark, and then everything is red. “I’m opening the cargo bay door,” Manny says through the radio. “Stand back and enjoy the view, ladies and gentlemen.”

  The door slowly opens. I strap my goggles on, make sure my gloves are secured. It’s too loud to hear anything, between the deafening noise of the engine and the screaming wind. From this point on I can only go through the motions of what we practiced.

  The bottom door of the cargo bay levels out, forming a perfect jumping platform. I look out, into the night sky, and it takes my breath away. We are hovering just above the clouds. All I can see for miles and miles is a layer of white, and above that, the moon glows like an opalescent diamond, incredibly bright.

  The Earth looks peaceful from up here. Like a glittering snow globe.

  The light in the cargo bay turns green.

  God, I pray. I know I’ve begged you to let me survive before. But seriously. This time I really mean it. Please don’t let me die. Not like this.

  I hope someone’s listening.

  Everyone in the room stands up. I do the same. We are perfectly lined up and spaced apart. I stand right behind Chris, staring at his parachute pack. I touch my own vest, feeling for the ripcord.

  “Green light, go, go, go!” Manny says.

  Chris and I are first. We
are all lined up nose to tail, literally right next to one another. We will be falling in a stick, a diagonal line across the sky, staying close until it is time to deploy the chute.

  I know that I cannot hesitate, because I could endanger the lives of the other jumpers. So I steel myself, say a prayer, and go for it. I let myself fall beside Chris into the open air. The sensation of falling is unlike anything I’ve ever felt, because it doesn’t end after the first five or ten seconds. It keeps going, and I feel weightless.

  I feel like I’m flying.

  I keep my arms and legs spread out like a star, as I was told, and there is nothing but the night sky and me. There is no noise up here. The wind resistance cuts against my body, tossing me around like a kite. The oxygen in my air tank and mask keeps my lungs and brain pressurized. The temperature is numbingly cold – it must be far below zero. I am thankful now for the thick, bulky clothes and gloves.

  The terrifying rush of adrenaline that I felt during the first few moments of the jump subsides. I am still scared, but now that the initial jump is out of the way – I feel better. All I have to do is pull the ripcord and float down to earth.

  But these thoughts are lost to me as I tilt my head and look at the sky. The moonlight is reflected against the white clouds, making it seem like daylight. I see other jumpers spread out around me, dark, falling stars. We dot the night sky, silent, streaking toward earth.

  If I weren’t so focused on staying alive, I would say that it was beautiful, in a strange, unearthly way. I don’t have time to dwell on it – it’s only a passing thought. In just a few moments, we’ve reached the clouds. And then we’re falling through them, and it is the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen.

  And I say weird because I can barely describe it.

  I feel like I’m floating through a fog cloud, cold air and water sticking to my skin and clothes. I am still falling, so the wind is still whistling around me, but I can’t grasp anything. The cloud wisps right through my fingers.

  We’re out of the cloud.

  The mountains are visible below. A mass of dark, connective groundwork covered in trees. I see a relatively clear, rocky space below. That is our landing spot, and, thankfully, I seem to be heading right toward it.

  Let’s keep it that way, please, I think.