Still the man just stood there.
“Fuck it!” Gordon said. He walked over to the man and pistol whipped him in the face. The man fell to the ground.
“Stop!” the man screamed finally.
“Where are the rest of your boxes?”
“Out in my truck,”
“Take us there now!” Gordon demanded, he pulled the guy up by the back of his shirt and pushed him through the door.
They walked through the hallway and came to an exterior exit door.
“My truck is out there,” the man said.
Gordon kicked the door open and flashed his light outside. He could see what looked like an old farm truck. He pushed the man through the open door, causing him to stumble and fall.
Walking over Gordon grabbed him again but this time was met with resistance. The man elbowed him in the crotch.
“Shit!” Gordon cried out in pain.
The man took off running toward his truck.
“Freeze!” Dan yelled.
Gordon stood up clearly hurting but ran after the man. Managing only to make it around to the driver’s door, he stopped when Gordon fired a shot in his direction.
“Listen, I don’t know what you’re going to do to me, that’s why I hit you. I don’t know who you are; I’m getting this medicine for my family.”
Gordon was seething with anger. Looking at the man, he yelled. “Step away from the truck!”
Dan came up alongside Gordon and ordered the man to get on the ground.
“Step away from the truck! I need to see if you have something we need!” Gordon barked.
“I don’t want any trouble; I’m just getting this for my family. Please let me go,” the man begged then took a step closer to his truck door.
“This is a fucking waste of time!” Gordon screamed as he squeezed the trigger and shot the man in the chest.
The bullet hit the man with a dull thud. He instantly dropped to the ground, dead.
“Why did you shoot him?” Dan asked.
“We don’t have time for this shit anymore, Mason needs the meds,” Gordon re-holstered his pistol and started to rummage through the boxes in the bed of the truck.
Dan just stood there looking at Gordon in amazement.
After going through several boxes, Gordon exclaimed, “Here they are,” he pulled an inhaler out of a box and held it high. Not wasting another moment, he then took off running back to Jimmy and Mason.
When Gordon reached Jimmy’s truck he could hear Jimmy wailing with grief. He could not see Jimmy but the cries told him of a fate that should not have been. Gordon just stood in the darkness listening to his friend and wanting for the outcome to be different.
DECEMBER 12, 2014
“When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon.”
– Thomas Paine
USS Makin Island, Indian Ocean
Barone was abruptly awakened by banging on his stateroom door. He sprang from his rack and opened the door. Wiping sleep from his eyes he said, “What is it?”
“Sorry to disturb you sir,” a nervous lance corporal said.
“Well, what is it?”
“Sir, there is an important call for you.”
“A call?” Barone asked, looking confused. He stepped away from the door and walked over to a chair in the room. “Come on in lance corporal.”
The lance corporal nervously stepped in.
“Since it required you to come down here and wake me up, who may I ask is on the call?” Barone asked, with a hint of sarcasm.
“Sir, it’s the president.”
Barone stopped tying his boots and looked at the lance corporal. A myriad of emotions came over him, shock, fear, anxiety. He went back to tying his boots and cleared his mind. Not wanting this young man to see him nervous he abruptly finished the conversation by saying, “Lance Corporal, you may leave. I will be there shortly.”
Barone sat up and exhaled deeply. It was obvious that the call was prompted by the raid on Diego Garcia. He never expected he’d received a call from the president. He would have expected to hear from some general. If the president was calling then he assumed that they wanted to come to some type of settlement. Now curious to find out what the president wanted, he quickly grabbed his blouse and headed toward the CIC. The usual short walk seemed to take forever; his anxiety was at an all time high. In his entire career he had never spoken to a president. Now he would, but the circumstances were extraordinary. When he entered the darkened command center all eyes were on him. Maj. Ashley stood up and said, “Sir, we have a secure line in the back room.”
Barone just nodded to Ashley and walked briskly to the back room and closed the door. He looked down at the receiver on the desk. He paused for a moment to get his bearings. On his walk he had run through how the conversation would go. With anticipation that the new president would toss around words like traitor and mutiny, he promised himself to remain calm and keep his composure.
He cleared the onslaught of thoughts, sat down and picked up the receiver. Swallowing hard he spoke into the receiver, “Lieutenant Colonel Barone here.”
Silence.
“Lieutenant Colonel Barone here.”
Still silence.
“Is anyone there?”
“Colonel Barone?” a voice asked, breaking the silence.
“Yes, Colonel Barone here.”
“One moment,” the voice said.
Barone was tapping his foot with nervous energy. The anticipation was excruciating.
Seconds felt like minutes. Then a familiar voice filled his ears and brought back memories of a congressional hearing he was subjected to years ago. He now remembered he had met the president during a hearing about the shooting of an unarmed Iraqi in 2004. Barone had volunteered to testify on behalf of a Marine who had been indicted from his unit. He recalled that the president was fair in his cross-examination and only wanted to get to the truth.
“Colonel Barone?” Conner asked.
“Yes, this is him.”
“Colonel Barone, hello; this is President Conner.”
“Hello, sir.”
“Colonel, I don’t know where to begin, so let’s begin with, what the hell are you doing?” Conner asked.
“Sir, first let me say that what I am doing is in the best interests of my men and their-.”
Cutting him off, Conner asked him with a scolding tone; “What about the best interests of your country?”
“Sir, sending us back to the East Coast to dig up dead bodies is a fool’s errand. You know the magnitude of what has happened. I voiced my thoughts before we made our decision but no one would listen. I therefore deemed it necessary to act in the best interests of Americans that are alive in the hopes of keeping them alive.”
“So you thought that it more important to defy a presidential order and mutiny?”
“Sir, I -”
“So you thought you would seize US naval vessels and then lead those ships in an attack against a US military installation stealing even more US ships and property?” Conner asked, his tone becoming more aggressive and angry.
“I thought -”
“You thought what, colonel? You are now an enemy of the American people; you have committed mutiny and treason!” Conner yelled.
Barone paused for a moment before he attempted to respond. His assumptions about the accusations he’d hear were correct.
“What am I to do with you, colonel?”
Barone did not answer; he wanted to make sure he could answer without being interrupted.
There was an uncomfortable silence.
“Well, colonel?”
“Can I answer without being interrupted?”
“Go ahead, colonel.”
“I looked at the entire situation and felt that-” Barone paused and then completed his thought. “No; I knew that going back to the East Coast to assist in a recovery effort was futile. What about our families back in California, who is taking care
of them? I feel it is more important to keep as many people alive instead of digging up dead bodies. I did voice my concerns but the plan was in place and so I did what I knew was the right thing.”
After Barone had said his piece, there was silence.
After thinking about what Barone said Conner continued, “Colonel Barone, I have heard your excuse, I am giving you one chance to correct your errors and turn your ships around and go back to your original mission. As your Commander in Chief, I order you to do this. We will deal with you later. I need good men in the field and I need you to follow what is in the best interests of our country. Do you understand?”
Barone sat and thought about what the new president had ordered. He then felt in his heart that he was doing the right thing and told Conner, “Mr. President; I cannot. I have committed myself to my men and their families. I am sorry but your orders to go back east are foolish. I cannot in good conscience follow those orders. I accept full responsibility for this and my men are doing this because of me.”
“Colonel Barone, I am sorry to hear that. Here is what will happen. We cannot allow you to openly defy the government; we will be compelled to use force to stop you,” Conner said coolly.
“Mr. President, I would ask that you let us go peacefully, engaging in open conflict is not advisable.”
“Colonel you have done this, not us, we cannot allow this mutiny to go unchecked. We will stop you before you ever reach California.”
“Mr. President, I’m pleading, don’t take it to that level. We only mean to go home and take care of our families. We did not mean to get into a fight on Diego Garcia. We came under attack so we defended ourselves and will do so if we are attacked again. Sir, there does not need to be bloodshed. Please let us go freely.”
“Colonel, you have 24 hours to accept my offer. If after 24 hours you have not turned the ships around; we will consider you a hostile to the United States and an enemy of the people. We will use whatever means necessary to ensure you do not land in California.”
“Sir, I will not change my mind and again ask you for leniency. However; if attacked we will defend to the death.”
“You have 24 hours. We will await your reply. Goodbye Colonel Barone,” Conner finished then the line went silent.
Barone put the receiver down and sighed loudly. He needed to meet with his staff and work out a plan to avoid contact with any US military ships. He stood up, opened the door and before he left he looked back at the receiver. He had finally talked to a sitting president but not under the circumstances he would have wanted over the 18 years of his career. He chuckled to himself and closed the door.
****
Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado
Conner slammed the phone down, “God damn it!”
He looked around at the staff that surrounded him. No one said a word, they all just stared. They knew by hearing just his side of the conversation that Barone was not backing down.
“As you heard, I am giving him 24 hours to change his mind and change course. If not we must stop him. General Griswald, if he continues what are our options?”
“Sir, we have a carrier group located in Hawaii that we can use and we have three attack submarines in the Western Pacific.”
“General, contact our command in Hawaii and move some ships out of port and have them prepared to engage Barone and his ARG, also contact those subs and get them in position as well.”
“Yes sir,” Griswald said.
Conner looked at each person in the room. He then said, “We cannot allow this to stand, we must stop him. If we do not, this will encourage others to defy us. God damn him. We have enough to worry about, now we have to dedicate resources to stopping him.”
“Mr. President, this is a wise decision,” Griswald said.
“General, do we have any more information about the attacks? Our time frame to do something is running short.”
“Sorry, sir, we are no closer than we were a day after the attacks. This will take time.”
Everyone was getting accustomed to seeing Conner act out in anger. So seeing him again display his anger by slamming his fist on the table was not shocking.
Conner scolded Griswald, “We don’t have much more time. Every minute that goes by without a response emboldens our enemies and makes them think we don’t have the means or the guts to do something about this. I am only being patient for you general; I need some answers and I need them soon.”
“We will continue to keep working on it sir,” Griswald responded.
Griswald was not being completely honest with the president. He did not want to give him what he had found out from his counterpart in Australia. From his conversations over the past week, the Australians had managed to secure information from one of the prisoners. The prisoner told them that he had been trained in Iran. He did not know where the bomb had come from as it was already there when they arrived. While this information was valuable he did not want to give Conner the excuse to nuke Iran just yet. He felt Conner had an itchy trigger finger. Griswald wanted to see if he could build a coalition amongst the new presidential staff to his mostly diplomatic and limited military option versus the president’s nuclear only option. Griswald realized what he was doing could be considered a violation of his duty to the president but he felt that going along with the president’s option would leave half the world a nuclear wasteland. He knew he didn’t have much time, so he needed to act soon.
DECEMBER 13, 2014
“The only cure for grief is action.”
– G.H. Lewes
San Diego, CA
Gordon sat on the edge of the bed, distraught. The thought of going to Mason’s funeral was dreadful. He could not help but think that he could have acted quicker. Regret filled his mind as he doubted his actions. He doubted his actions and thought he had been too cautious while he searched the hospital. If he had acted more quickly, Mason might still alive. His thoughts were also plagued by the feelings of guilt. He cursed that he had not secured enough supplies beforehand.
He had not seen Jimmy since that night. The entire event had caused heartache and controversy in the community. All were saddened at the news of Mason’s death and some had also used the incident for political gain by using it to strike out at Gordon. Dan had confronted Gordon later that night about the shooting of the unarmed man. As soon as Dan had finished arguing with Gordon that night he promptly went to Mindy’s house to inform her of the confrontation, the killing and Mason’s death. Mindy, shocked by Mason’s death, also saw it as a chance to publically condemn Gordon. She had called a special session of the board to meet after the funeral.
Life in Rancho Valentino had been insulated from the realities of what was happening to those outside the gate. Not realizing the harshness of the new world, Mindy was successful in seeding discontent against Gordon. He felt had they only been able to see the world outside they would see cause for his decisive action. Many in Rancho Valentino were spoiled and protected.
Those outside the gate did not have that luxury, and were scraping by or not at all. Many had already become victims of violence or lack of food and water. He now realized how important cooperation was in the community. Even those who disagreed with his actions, he needed them to have a successfully running community. However, Mindy had an agenda that was more personal. She had not been outside the gate; she had never had the chance to experience what was really going on. She wanted power and she wanted to humiliate Gordon. With the death of Mason, she would have her chance to publically call into question Gordon’s tactics and seek to have him replaced.
Gordon knew what was coming but didn’t care, except for the fact that every minute not focused on resupplying were opportunities lost forever.
Gordon stood up and stretched. He slowly walked into the dark closet and grabbed a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. Putting on the T-shirt, he noticed the absence of the fragrant smell so typical of his clothes. The softness also was missing replaced with a stiffness in the fibers from being
hung to dry outside.
When he exited he was greeted by Samantha. They exchanged the typical morning greetings. Samantha could see the weight of everything on his face and said, “Honey, come here.”
“What?” he said, not looking at her.
“Come here, give me a hug,” she said, grabbing Gordon and pulling him in close.
She just held him and kissed him.
“This is all so crazy,” Gordon said softly.
Whispering into his ear, she said, “I know, but you need to keep moving forward. We need you; we cannot afford to have you down like this.”
Gordon pulled away and looked at her.
Looking into his eyes, she could see the disappointment. She continued to console him by saying, “Gordon, I know you may have doubts because of what happened the other night. But believe me, I trust you, I believe in you. You did what was necessary to protect us and to get the medicine for Mason. It wasn’t your fault he died.”
“I could have-”
She stopped him from talking by placing her fingers on his lips and softly saying to him, “You did everything you needed to do. What happened, happened. It was not because of you.”
Gordon kept staring at her, her words of encouragement meant a lot to him. In many ways, they both shared the responsibility of being each other’s “rock.”
The tone in her voice then shifted, “I know that bitch Mindy is using this as a chance to smear you. I need you to fight back, we need you, and this community needs you. Don’t take her shit. You’re a fighter, that’s why I love you. You never give up. I know you need this time to reflect, but this afternoon you’ll need to let that go and defend yourself.”
As the words came from Samantha, they gave Gordon the confidence he needed. He brought her in close, hugged her tightly and said, “I love you, Sam.”
“I love you, too.”
A moment passed as they both just held one another, and as in many times before their intimacy was cut short by the voice of one of their children.
They both laughed. Gordon looked at her and said, “Thank you.”
The End - a Post Apocalyptic Novel Page 19