Strands of Sorrow

by John Ringo

  “Then God help us if the Secretary of Health and Human Services made it, sir,” Major Skelton said.

  “If she has, we’ll obey her orders, Major,” Ramos said. “While making pointed suggestions what those orders might be. What is the status on Two One?”

  * * *

  “Decker, I have a puzzler for you,” Faith said as Condrey sideswiped a black Expedition out of the way of the following tracks.

  “Yes, ma’am?” Decker said. They weren’t engaging infected but they did have a nice trail of them.

  “Why is the State Department more armored up than the Pentagon?” Faith asked. “We could barely get Trixie though those defenses. Although they’re low enough the infected aren’t having any problems.”

  “I’m not sure, ma’am,” Decker said.

  “’Cause people don’t like them as much, ma’am,” PFC Twitchell said.

  “That makes sense,” Faith said.

  * * *

  “Crap!” Faith said as the adjustment round hit right in the middle of the WWII memorial. “No, no, no, NO! Gawwwd DAMNIT! LEFT YOU DUMB SONS-OF-BITCHES!”

  “They can’t hear you, ma’am,” Decker reminded her. The adjustment was being done by their one surviving ANGLICO NCO, who was up in a Gunhawk.

  “I know, Staff Sergeant,” Faith said. “But it’s a crime and a waste.”

  “And, again, ma’am,” Decker said. “Those who are honored will understand.”

  “Still a crime and a waste, Staff Sergeant . . . Okay, looks like they’re on target . . . Alpha, First. We free to call the rain, over?”

  “One more adjustment, First, over,” Alpha replied.

  “Roger,” Faith replied. “We’ll just cruise up and down the square . . . Sergeant Major, marching up and down the square . . .”

  * * *

  “I’m getting calls that if you hit the Memorial again, they’re going to open fire on us,” Sophia said over the intercom.

  “Please pass to them that adjusting rounds in here is like threading a needle in a thunderstorm, ma’am. Would they prefer I hit the Vietnam Memorial, the World War Two Memorial, the Reflecting Pond or the Korean War Memorial? Possibly the Washington Monument? As it is, the German American Friendship Garden is about to be toast . . .”

  * * *

  “There are eighty-seven secure bunkers in the D.C. area alone,” Colonel Ramos said. “That does not count the extensive underground works of the Smithsonian, assuming they are not totally flooded. Then there are the dispersal sites. Some of those we don’t know the status. Some we do. Mount Weather reported itself as H7D3 compromised then went off the air. Given that most of the Congress and the SCOTUS was evacuated there by that time . . .” The colonel shrugged.

  “Wasn’t the President reported at Mount Weather, sir?” Faith said.

  “The President was evacuating to Mount Weather when communications were compromised, Lieutenant,” Ramos said. “However, since his Marine pilots had not been vaccinated and the detail was, it was elected to take him by ground vehicle. That was the last anyone heard of him. It is possible he is in one of the bunkers or could have made it out of the D.C. area and be somewhere else or could be dead. We don’t know. Raven Mountain, which had pretty much the entire remaining Congress as well as half the Supreme Court, just went off-line. Nobody knows why. H7 presumably, but they could have just lost all their commo nodes. And the SecState was reliably reported there. The SecDef was in the Tank. He’s been positively identified as KIA.

  “However, all the major successors—Speaker, President of the Senate and Cabinet Secretaries—as well as the Secret Service details for the President and the Vice President, were vaccinated. Other details the data is sketchy. Bottom line: There may be high officials of the government remaining in these bunkers. Now that conditions are down to yellow, on the surface at least, we will begin active inspection of each of the facilities. Back to confined space combat.”

  “Oorah, sir,” Colonel Dawson said. “As my junior lieutenant would put it, it’s scrummin’ time.”

  “Speaking of which,” Colonel Ramos said. “There are two major objectives which I’m sure all the lieutenants are hoping to breach: The White House and Eighth and Eye.”

  “Eighth and Eye?” Faith whispered to Captain Dobbins.

  “Marine Barracks,” Dobbins whispered back.

  “We’ll draw objectives out of a hat,” Ramos said. “Most of them are company or platoon objectives. Given Lieutenant Smith’s adventure in Crystal Land, there will be an additional company or platoon as backstop as well as a response unit. Once we’ve determined the objectives, we will look at how we’re going to work that out . . .”

  * * *

  “First Platoon, Alpha Actual.”

  “First,” Faith said, firing one-handed at an infected charging out of a cross corridor.

  The basements of the buildings in D.C. all seemed to be interconnected. You just couldn’t “clear” the damned things. And they were as rife with infected as Crystal City.

  The basement of the Department of Commerce was no more or less awful than the Department of Agriculture or EPA. So far, Faith had yet to get a “good” target. Other lucky bastards had gotten to clear the Capitol and the White House and Eighth and Eye. Although it was taking most of 2/1 to clear the Smithsonian. And so far she had yet to find a “secure facility” that had held out. She’d heard they’d found some in the Department of Education of all places.

  Just another bug hunt.

  “Abort operation. Return to base using minimum force necessary to successfully extract your personnel. Is that order understood?”

  “Abort, aye,” Faith said, shooting another infected in the face. “Could you define minimum force, over?” It was still moving so she shot it a couple more times just to be sure. Didn’t want an ankle biter. They tended to trip people up.

  “No further and I quote wanton slaughter of afflicted individuals close quote. Pull out using minimum force. Just get back to base. We’re stood down. Alpha, out.”

  “What the fuck?” Faith said, switching frequencies. “Platoon. Mission abort. Pull back to the tracks. No worries, no sweat, we just got an abort from higher. Don’t know why. We’re Romeo Tango Bravo. Rearguard, you’re now point. Let’s plow the road . . .” She didn’t even bother passing on the “minimum force” thing. What the fuck?

  * * *

  “What the fuck, sir?” Faith said when she got to the forward command post. “We were practically to the fucking bunker!”

  “We’re breaking down and pulling back to Reagan,” Captain Dobbins said, his face tight. “The Secretary of Education is number thirteen in the line of Presidential Succession. Her first order on getting in touch with Command was to stop the clearance. So we’re stopping clearance unless that is clarified. That is an order, Lieutenant. We’re determining fall-back lanes at this time. As soon as we have them figured out, we’re pulling back to Reagan. Is that understood?”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Faith said.

  * * *

  “What the fuck?” Faith said, setting down her tray.

  The combined mess in the Festival Dawn was massive but she could always seem to find Sophia.

  “Sit,” Sophia said quietly, shaking her head. “Just . . . You haven’t seen the new directive?”

  “No,” Faith said, sitting down. “What new directive?”

  Anna silently slid a folded sheet of paper to her.

  “While the zeel of the United States Military in suporting there nation in this time of difficulty is apreciated, their reminded that the persons aflicted by H7D3 are human beeings and should be treated as such . . . .”

  The photocopied Executive Order went on like that for a full page. Someone had beat her to red-lining it. “Genoside will not be tollerated by this administration . . .” “Invesigations possibly leading to crimnal charges . . .” “detaled serch for crtical indiviiduals.”

  There wasn’t one single line which lacked a misspelled word and most
had some egregious grammatical error.

  It was signed “Elizabeth Sovrain, Secretary of Education, Acting President.”

  “The positive to that missive is that the issue of American schools is clarified,” Anna said in her most impeccable British accent. “The person in charge is a bloody loon.”

  “So no more clearance?” Faith said. “And did we lose the ability to run spell-check entirely?”

  “No,” Sophia said. “We’re back to tag and bag like before the Fall. Where we’re going to find the Tasers and sed-a-gives is fortunately not my concern.”

  “What about vaccine?” Faith asked. “We going to be slitting the throats?”

  “No,” Sophia said. “We’re going to be administering care.”

  “Cutting their throats is administering care,” Faith said. “Or are we supposed to keep them strapped to a bed for the rest of their lives?”

  “I don’t know, okay?” Sophia snapped. “Did you catch the part about ‘child soldiers’?”

  “No,” Faith said. “I think my brain shut down before that point. I’m no grammar Nazi, just ask Captain Dobbins, but my eyes started watering. Who can’t spell ‘genocide’ for God’s sake?”

  “‘There shall be no more use of child soldiers, and all such persons shall be discharged immediately,’” Anna quoted. “I was informed persons who were admitted without regular training standards—‘here’s a gun, go shoot zombies’—are being allowed to voluntarily discharge. And one line hinted at criminal charges for ‘crimes against humanity.’”

  “I heard Da’s on his way up by P8,” Sophia said. “He might be facing charges.”

  “She’d have a mutiny,” Faith said mulishly.

  “What happened to Semper Fidelis?” Sophia asked.

  “Always Faithful to the nation, Sophia,” Faith said. “And this is not faithfully discharging our duty to the nation! There are survivors! What about them? They can’t get out without us clearing?”

  “She considers the infected to be survivors, Faith,” Sophia said. “Her daughter apparently broke containment right after the Fall. So she wants us to find her, okay? Well, she wants the ‘military’ to find her. We’re out on our ass. And Da is probably breaking rocks.”

  “There has to be something we can do,” Faith said.

  “We haven’t found anyone higher on the list,” Sophia said. “And since we’re not actively clearing, we’re not going to. If something doesn’t break, we’re looking at that . . . She could be Acting President For Life.”

  Faith looked at her nearly untouched plate and picked it up.

  “Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I’ll see you gals later.”

  * * *

  “One state cannot introduce and ratify a Constitutional Amendment!”

  Jerry Carter was the chief counsel for the State of Texas Recovery and Reestablishment Committee. Based in Hamlin, the committee was in the process of finding and counting enough citizens to be eligible for reestablishment of statehood.

  So far they’d gotten a hard count, with documentation of citizenship and residency, of forty-five thousand people. Sixty-five was the magic number. Twenty thousand more and they’d be the only state with one congressman and two senators.

  And, technically, the ability to amend the Constitution. Including the Twenty-Fifth Amendment, which was the current sticking point.

  “Show me where it says how many states have to be in the Union,” Acting Governor Brad Thurman said. The former head of the Texas Rangers was nearly eighty and still hard as nails. Ask any of the infected that had had the bad luck to run across him.

  “It doesn’t. When we meet the test for a state, we can have a by-election for Congress, an election for governor—think I’ll be running unopposed there—the governor chooses two of his ‘cronies,’ that’d be Charlie from Amarillo and Bubba from B’ville, then we can introduce an amendment. At which point, only verified states get to vote for ratification. We can introduce and ratify as many as we want. And the quorum of the Senate and Congress will be one congressman and two senators from Texas. Sarah’s a shoe-in for the congressman’s spot. And Sarah, Charlie and Bubba are already onboard.”

  “This is insane,” Carter said.

  “No,” Thurman said quietly. “What’s insane is what’s going on in Arlington. And we’re going to fix that. Either that or hoist the Lone Star and that’s a can of worms we’ll only crack if we’re forced to . . .”

  * * *

  “The Secretary is no more nor less insane than any other person previously judged competent to assume an office of authority,” Colonel Hamilton said. “Her insistence that we suspend all ‘wanton slaughter’ of the infected together with performing aggressive search operations for her daughter are forms of obsession that rise to the level of neurosis, not psychosis. The fact that it is a very bad order does not make her insane. ‘Competence’ in regards to the articles and Amendment is a matter of psychological competence not technical competence. There is no medical reason to not swear her in as Acting President.”

  “At which point she supersedes Undersecretary Galloway and her . . . okay not ‘insane’ but clearly impossible-to-effect orders go into effect,” General Brice pointed out. “There is no way the forces we have can ‘secure and maintain afflicted.’ We’re outnumbered a hundred to one. And you can’t sweep the tunnels for her daughter, who is either dead or infected, without ‘wanton slaughter.’ Ergo, she is not technically competent to be the acting President under the current conditions.”

  “The military does not decide technical competence, General,” Steve said. “If it did, half the Presidents we’ve had elected would have been overthrown by a coup. Which is why civilian control of the military is holy writ. What we are currently doing is considering mutiny. I am not onboard. The world does not need America led by a junta. In a year and a half there is a regularly scheduled presidential election. That’s if Texas does not act first. I doubt she will get reelected, and we continue from there. Well, someone does. She’s already said she’s charging me with crimes against humanity and insists that the military cannot use ‘child soldiers.’ She seems to feel Stacey and my parental rights should be suspended for deliberately ‘traumatizing’ our children. So Sophia and Faith are both going to have their commissions revoked as soon as she is sworn in.

  “I’m resigning. I was a ‘hostilities only’ officer and if we’re not continuing the war there’s no reason for me to be involved. If I need to take the fall to keep our country from being torn apart by a civil war, I’ll do that. My life, my fortune and my sacred honor. I’m shooting for house arrest and leaving everyone else out of it. If she attempts to try the entire upper command or my daughters . . . Then we’ll probably have a mutiny no matter what.”

  “I intend to resign as well,” Montana said. “I’ve got a nice little house in Coronado all picked out. Might go down and see about clearing a little town in Mexico since it will be outside her jurisdiction.”

  “I’m thinking Med,” Steve said.

  “We can’t all resign,” Colonel Ramos said.

  “No, but I am, Colonel,” Steve said. “I must. That way, you can put all the blame on me. I’d even go for house arrest since it’s going to be lifted as soon as she’s out of office. But I will not support a mutiny, coup or junta. I guess you can say I’m putting my faith in Texas.”

  “I’m putting my faith in Faith,” Colonel Ramos said.

  “Colonel?” General Brice asked.

  “Sorry,” Ramos said mildly. “Forget I said that. I mean, seriously, forget you ever heard me say that. Having not said it, I need to go make sure all sorts of people are involved in very important meetings . . .”

  Faith didn’t have much use for computers. Didn’t mean she didn’t know how to use them. After a class from Sophia, she’d been putting in more and more time. And she also didn’t do intel. But she’d learned to hum the tune.

  She started by finding out who was superior to the Secretary of Educat
ion in the hierarchy. Turned out it was just about everyone in the Cabinet. But to turn this around without a mutiny, she needed someone with some sense. Then there were the known facts. SecDef was dead. He’d been found in the National Military Command Center, aka “The Tank,” which had been lost to “turned” individuals. He was only identifiable by his dog-tags. Turned out in emergencies, the entire Cabinet had high-tech dog-tags. Bottom line: Off the list.

  President, who was last reported moving by ground convoy with his family, had never reported in at Mount Weather, which had also been lost. Raven Mountain was a question. It had gone off-line but no reason was known. It hadn’t reported being infected. But Raven Mountain was way the hell deep in West Virginia. No way to look there.

  VP: Convoy reported H7 compromised, contact lost. Probably KIA. Speaker of the House was in the same vein as the SecEd. Might have more sense but she’d only get one shot at this. Off the list. Also probably at Mount Weather but not for sure. President of the Senate. She recognized the name from some rants by Da pre-Plague. “Senile idiot” was what she remembered. Oops . . . Raven Mountain. Off the list. SecState. Mount Weather. SecTreasury . . . Intel reported him as having been killed in a helo crash on the way to Raven. The reason that the President had been moved by ground. Attorney General . . . Possible. Nope, Boulder. Off the list . . . Interior, Agriculture and Commerce she’d all checked. They were either outside D.C. or location unknown. Off the list . . . Off the list . . . Off the list . . .

  “Fuck,” she muttered. Every “higher” point in D.C. had been checked and there were either no survivors or the Secretary or whatever was gone.

  Locations unknown or low probability of info were: POTUS; SecState who had not been in State’s “secure facility” and only “reliably” reported at or near Mount Weather; AG, “reliably” reported in Boulder and had not been in the local bunker . . . VPOTUS, maybe. Compromised convoy sounded like T-O-A-S-T. That was it. The only remaining viable “possible” was the President. And he and his family were last seen leaving the White House headed for Mount Weather in a convoy.

  But . . .