Finding himself in a parking lot, he turns knowing he can’t run any further with the pain coming from his cut feet. Expecting to be hit immediately by that which is directly behind him, he raises his arms to protect himself from the impact. Nothing. He lowers his arms and is confused at seeing nothing. He touches the back of his head remembering the feel of fingers and a hand expecting something to still be there. He knows he didn’t imagine it as he can still hear screaming emanating from within the tall building he is now standing in front of.
With his heart racing, he looks at the unfamiliar building. He racks his brain for a clue as to how he got here but comes up blank. There are images in his mind but none form a coherent pattern. His feet sting so he sits on the paved lot watching the door for signs of anything heading his way. He can’t go further until he stops the pain in his feet and the bleeding. Feeling along his bloody feet, he finds no embedded glass shards.
Taking a good look at himself for the first time, he notices he is covered in blood; his clothes are caked in it. Fear rises again thinking he has been greatly injured. His outer shirt is shredded, barely even on him, as are the bottoms of his jeans. He removes his outer shirt and checks himself to locate the reason for all of the blood but finds himself whole. Well, except for his feet. He presses the remains of his shirt against his feet to stop the blood flow and then wraps pieces of it around them.
He walks gingerly across the lot, keeping an eye on the building he just left, and picks a random direction. The sun is coming over the horizon and a chill fills the air as he limps along a street. In the distance, he sees a wall and heads warily in that direction. A short time later he sees a large metal gate and sits down on the pavement outside. His feet ache and he removes the strips of cloth he put around them. He isn’t comfortable just banging on the gate or shouting given his very recent experience but he just can’t walk any further.
He hears a screech of metal on the other side and the gate partially opens. Two soldiers step outside aiming weapons at him. He is too tired, sore, and scared to do anything other than continue sitting. They help him inside. They ask him about the blood on his clothes to which he has no answer. From behind, he hears, “Hands on your head and on your knees.”
* * * * * *
“We found this guy at the front gate but something doesn’t seem right, First Sergeant. We have him under guard,” the guard replies.
“What’s not right?” Lynn asks.
“It’s hard to explain, First Sergeant. Perhaps you should just see for yourself,” the guard says.
“Okay, we’re on our way,” Lynn responds.
“What the fuck is that all about?” I ask Lynn furrowing my brows.
“I haven’t the faintest clue,” she answers.
There is a cacophony of noise in the parking lot as trucks are warmed up, gear stored in Humvees, doors slammed, and the general murmur of conversations with the occasional bark of laughter or raised voice. The teams heading north gather in several vehicles and head towards the gate with a flurry of revving engines. Approaching the gate, I see a man kneeling on the ground with his hands cupped behind his head. Two guards stand behind covering him with their M-4’s. We pull up in front and stop. Exiting, I walk over with Lynn to the man and two guards.
“What’s up?” Lynn asks one of the guards with the guy on the ground looking back.
“We found this guy outside of the gate when we arrived this morning, First Sergeant. He claims he can’t remember anything except going to sleep on a couch, waking up in a dark building the next, and being chased. He said he saw the walls and made his way to the gate after escaping. We just thought it was odd especially with him being in bare feet and his clothes covered in blood,” the guard answers.
Lynn and I turn to get a better look at the man. His dark hair, hanging to the bottom of his ear, is matted. He is indeed not wearing any shoes. His feet are dirty and covered in grime. Cuts with fresh blood can be seen on his soles. The tattered jeans and what perhaps used to be a white or yellow T-shirt are smeared in rust-colored stains. It looks like he ran through a hose spraying blood; some obviously old stains and others looking relatively fresh. The thighs of his pants are caked and to the point of being solid rather than pliable cotton.
“Escaping from what?” Lynn asks.
“He said he’s not sure who they were,” the guard answers.
“Did you search him?” Lynn asks.
“We did, First Sergeant, and didn’t find anything,” the guard replies.
“Okay, good job,” Lynn says and turns to the man. “What’s your story?”
The man gives us his story but says he can’t remember anything prior to lying down on his couch. He feels that some time has passed between then and now but can’t remember a thing. He mentions he has vague dream-like recollections of running at night and other horrible things but those are just patches of images with no association.
“Call Drescoll and have a team come up to pick him up. Clean him up but keep him under guard,” I tell one of the guards from Green Team.
“Will do, sir,” he replies.
“We’ll help you but understand we have to take precautions,” I tell the man.
“Against what?” He asks confused.
“Have Drescoll brief him as well and find out exactly what he remembers,” I add to the guard.
“If you truly don’t remember and it’s not just a knock to the head, you’ll be filled in. Just wait here and you’ll be fine shortly. Sorry but that’s the best I can do right now but prepare yourself for a pretty shocking story,” I say. The man just nods.
Lynn and I climb back into the idling Humvee. Driving past the man and guards, we exit the gate with the rest of the vehicles following.
“What do you think that was all about? Do you think he could possibly have been a night runner?” Lynn asks.
“I really don’t know but looking at the state of his clothes and lack of memory, I suppose it’s possible. We’ll have to talk to him when we get back and see if he can remember anything. If he can, that will give us an insight into the night runners,” I answer.
“You know that means you could have been right about Julie. She could have been one as well like Drescoll mentioned,” Lynn says.
“Yeah, I know. You get to ask her about it though,” I say.
“Fucking no way!” She retorts.
“Okay, well perhaps Drescoll can again but he’s already done that and came up with nothing,” I say chuckling.
We continue our drive north talking about the ramifications. Following the map, our little convoy makes several turns and we pull into a huge expanse of warehouse buildings. I stop just inside the open gate awed by the size. One extremely large warehouse sits across an equally sized paved lot. Tractor trailers line a humongous loading dock in front of rolling warehouse doors which are all closed. Many other semis are parked in the lot. The immensity of the one building is almost overwhelming. I just hope it’s not full of night runners and we don’t have to clear it.
We drive forward and pull to a stop near one end of the loading dock. A steel security door is set into the wall near the first bay. Setting up a perimeter with the teams, Lynn, Bannerman, and I walk to the door with Red Team. There is a coded security panel next to it but pulling on it, it swings open. With no power, the magnetic locks must have disengaged. Red Team enters at the ready but it is for naught as nothing greets us but mountains of pallets stacked ceiling high. The area in front of the sliding loading dock doors is clear with several fork lifts parked randomly. The inside is almost as light as the outside as the roof, almost four stories high, and is filled with skylights.
“Holy shit,” Robert says softly at my side.
It doesn’t appear anyone has touched this place since everything went down. The immensity of goods and supplies stocked within cannot be adequately described. There are mountains of items stretching far into the distance. Bannerman begins heading toward the stacks. I reach out to grab his arm.<
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“Wait. We still need to clear this place as I’m sure there are dark corners somewhere. There may not be night runners in here but we have to make sure we are alone before we start looking around,” I say. He nods stepping back.
“While we clear it out, think of a way to keep the doors secure when we leave,” I add. “Lynn, bring Black and Blue Teams in to clear the area. Red Team will keep an eye outside and be a response team if needed.”
“You got it,” Lynn says and calls outside to bring in the teams and organize the search.
It takes a couple of hours searching the entirety of the building, having to look between each and every stack, but we find it empty. Bannerman, along with Blue Team, begins inventorying the stacks. He even comes across a stack of blueberry flavored mini-wheats much to my delight. It takes a large part of the day and we still don’t cover the entire building. We check out the other buildings and find a tremendous amount of supplies. One building is entirely devoted to medical supplies, both over the counter and prescription medications. Another is a refrigerated warehouse that can no longer use the definition of being refrigerated. It emits an odor that reminds me of the slaughter yard down south. We close the door immediately knowing there is nothing inside that will do us any good.
“I think this will do us nicely,” Bannerman says as we prepare to depart. “I’ll have some of the drivers head up this way and begin carting supplies south. I think we can inventory all of this and leave a lot of it up here, replenishing as necessary. We’ll also have to gather more shipping containers. The only problem might be securing the place sufficiently. We can lock the rolling doors no problem but the security doors will be the problem. Anything we put on the outside can easily be cut. I suppose we could restore the generators and search the office spaces for the security codes.”
“Sounds like a plan,” I say happy we won’t have to continue going into possible night runner lairs searching of supplies.
We’ve been fairly lucky to this point but we push the odds each time we have to go inside a building. Plus, we can now clear out the area around our sanctuary without any fear of destroying supplies we need. This has been a good find. We load up and head back south. Passing by the bases, I see the sign for Madigan. The thought of our wall keeping the night runners in surfaces and I’m curious about the results. We don’t have much daylight left but make a note to visit tomorrow. Arriving back in the compound, I take Robert and Bri out for training before the sun begins to cast the last of its rays across our little space on earth.
Bannerman gives a basic rundown of our inventory at our meeting. He describes a plan for organizing crews to gather additional shipping containers, a full inventory of supplies, and provide a list of items to keep stocked on hand. He’ll take a couple of teams with him to provide security and to help search for the security codes.
“We’ll have plenty of supplies now so that just leaves the housing to work out. The walls will be up soon. When do you think we’ll be able to move into the housing?” Bannerman asks finishing up with his brief.
“I was thinking of taking Red Team up and look at the walls around Madigan tomorrow. With our supplies settled, I want to start clearing this area out and will take Craig, Robert, and Bri up to start getting them acquainted with the AC-130. I’ll gather the manuals as well and start training on the weapon systems. I was thinking about using Red Team for the crew. Anyway, my point is that we’ll look at the walls around the hospital and see what’s going on before making plans to move into the housing up there,” I answer.
“We can make do with what we have for the time being but it’s growing a touch crowded in here. It’s only a matter of time before that spills over into tempers,” Bannerman says.
“Okay, I’ll let you know what I find out. What about the man at the gate today? Did you manage to find out anything?” I ask Drescoll.
“Nothing. He doesn’t remember a thing. Only vague recollections but nothing of significance,” Drescoll answers. “I’ll keep talking with him but I don’t think we’ll get much. Julie’s memories haven’t returned yet either.”
“Alright but keep an eye on him. What turns once can turn back. I almost want to quarantine him until we can be assured. Julie seems to be okay, providing she was even one of them once. I’m still not convinced that’s what happened but we need to be safe,” I say.
“I’ll make sure someone keeps an eye on him until we’re sure,” Lynn says.
“Okay, I guess that’s all unless anyone has something else,” I say. No one does and we head to our small rooms for the night.
The next day I head north with Craig and Red Team. We’ll check out the walls and then take the AC-130 up for a quick flight so everyone can get used to the small differences. Most of the differences are in the back so we’ll pull the manuals and start studying. I’m anxious to get started clearing the area around Cabela’s now that our supply situation has been satisfied. I would just take bulldozers, copious amounts of C-4, or just use Bradley’s but I want to actually take out the night runners rather than just clearing possible hiding places for them. The AC is ideally suited for that.
Pulling up to the large steel gate, I open up and cast outward. I don’t sense anything within the immense facility but I can’t trust that. I didn’t sense any when we were getting our chutes down south but they were definitely there. I exit and, with the rest of Red Team, open up the gates. Looking to the sides with the possibility of seeing night runners where they starved to death outside, my heart stops. I mean literally stops before starting again with a heavy pound.
“You have to be fucking kidding me?” I say.
“What the hell?” Robert says at my side. “Why would anyone do that?” He says looking at a stack of chairs, tables, lamps, gurneys, pillows, and other miscellaneous stuff piled against one of the walls.
“Oh shit!” He says as the realization of what happened filters in.
“Oh shit is right,” I say feeling the icy feeling of dread sink to my stomach.
Just when things seem to be going right and we actually seem to be becoming more secure and safe. Staring at the piles of objects stacked against the wall, I now feel as if we were actually barely treading water and are now sinking. I walk over to the area and notice the grass trampled flat to the point that most of the area is bare earth. There is no doubt in my mind they scaled the wall and escaped. The sheer number of night runners it took to trample the area flat like this must have been immense. It almost makes me feel like giving up as we just can’t seem to get ahead. The walls, which we’ve spent an eternity on and relied on to provide safety, are not exactly rendered moot but they aren’t as secure as we thought.
“Base, Jack here,” I say into the radio staring at the large pile of crap still not believing what I’m seeing.
“Go ahead, Jack,” I hear.
“Get Bannerman and Lynn but clear everyone else away from the radio,” I say.
“Will do, Jack. Stand by.”
“Jack, what’s up? Why clear everyone away from the radio?” I hear Lynn ask.
“Can anyone else hear me?” I ask.
“No, Jack. You’re good. What’s going on?” Lynn says. I tell them what we just found.
There is a pause on the other end. “That’s all kinds of fucked up. Are you sure that’s what happened?” Lynn asks.
“Yeah, I’m sure,” I answer. “Is Bannerman there?”
“Yeah, I’m here, Jack,” I hear Bannerman say.
“Okay. We need to divert the wall crews now. We’re going to need an inside walled compound built with towers. Lynn, if you can still hear me, gather the other team leaders. I’m on my way back. Think about how to tell the others as well,” I say.
“I’ll call the crews now and divert them. Lynn says she’ll get the others. See you when you get here,” Bannerman says.
“Okay, let’s turn this around,” I tell Red Team.
“Sir, what does this mean?” McCafferty asks.
“
It doesn’t mean we are exactly fucked right now but the doc is lubing up his gloved finger,” I answer.
“We’ve been through worse. We’ll get through this as well, sir,” Gonzalez says.
“Damn straight. We’re going to get the manuals right now and study them hard. Then we’re going to turn the Spooky (AC-130) loose,” I say.
“Hooah, sir,” Gonzalez says. I sincerely think she says that just to see me roll my eyes.
After dropping by the aircraft and picking up the manuals, we head back to Cabela’s to discuss this new development. The fact that the night runners were able to get over the walls drastically changes our plans and our measure of feeling secure. The knot that has formed in my stomach tightens even more with the thought that the night runners have the capability to penetrate the walls.
Pulling into the parking lot at what I once thought to be our secure sanctuary, I hurry inside. Lynn has gathered the team leaders that aren’t out on assignments. I quickly detail my observations at Madigan which brings a silence to the group as each ponders for themselves what this means.
“Well, it’s obvious our walls aren’t going to be able to hold the night runners out on their own,” Lynn says breaking the silence.
“So much for our move to base housing. At least I’m assuming we won’t be able to do that as the houses themselves aren’t secure,” Drescoll says.
“Yeah, I think we need to drop the idea of moving to the bases for now,” I reply.
“That still leaves us with the problem of housing then,” Bannerman says.
“True. I believe we need to think about building quarters here in the compound. I think that will be quicker than fortifying the houses up there and it will leave us with the building here as a secure fall back point. Let’s table that for now though and talk about what we need to do to beef up our security here,” I say.
A New World: Awakening Page 27