He took a few steps toward the heavier man, waiting for his chance. “I heard some rebels kicked you in the nuts in Amarillo. It sounds like there’s a whole Army division still in play. How does that make you feel? Tough guy.”
“Rebels didn’t do squat. The Reboot Legion must never be compared to the scum we’re eradicating.”
The man at the gate had also taken offense to his apparent misuse of the word rebel. “Is that what you call yourselves?” Ted asked.
“Rebels, yes,” ER said in an agreeable tone. “Reboot Legion. Reb L,” he added, shortening it. “Get it now?”
“I call you terrorists,” Ted said matter-of-factly.
“We’ll see who’s the terrorist.” Ramirez pulled a small revolver from his pocket. “Remember this? It belonged to the vice president. You gave it to some asshole at Andrews. That asshole shot two valuable members of my team.”
Ted reflexively held up his hands, but he was far from surrendering. “That asshole was my friend Frank. I hope he sent your guys to hell. They swept us at the door. How’d they let you keep yours?”
“I’m a national hero. They look the other way for guys like me.” The pistol was trained on him for a few seconds before Ramirez dipped it a little. “Wait, you said ‘us.’ Who else is here? Where are they?”
Aw shit. He’d accidentally said more than he’d needed to. It was a rookie mistake. Emily was going to chew him a new one for it. If he ever saw her again.
“Up yours,” Ted replied.
Ramirez snapped his fingers. “You lost the briefcase, right? Maybe you thought you could lock us out using a manual terminal. Such an act could be executed by a skilled programmer, or a high-ranking member of the US government, but you’d have to come here to the air defense mainframe. And that means…” The gun pointed at his face. “Let’s go downstairs.”
Amarillo, TX
Brent and Trish were the first to arrive at the Cadillac Ranch. He’d driven in a confusing series of turns and backtracks, on the off chance someone tried to follow them. Driving with no headlights was a challenge, but he became accustomed to it as his eyes adjusted. The eastern sky was at nautical twilight as he pulled onto the short dirt road leading to the half-buried cars.
The younger woman had been quiet for most of the ride, but she shifted toward him once they were parked. “Brent, thank you again for coming to my rescue back at my house. I have to admit I never saw any of these guys as upstanding human beings, but you’ve changed them. They’re putting their lives on the line for a cause greater than themselves. It really was amazing tonight.”
Brent was taken aback by her dive into the personal. “Well, as long as we’re admitting things to each other …” He took a deep breath. “I’ve always thought of you as a daughter. Mara and I never got to have any. I reckon you’re as close as I’ll ever get. That’s why I went out to save you from Curtis and his thugs.”
She unclicked her seatbelt and leaned over to give him a hug. The personal contact and the smell of her hair almost made him tear up. He’d missed Mara for the past few years, but never as much as he did while in that embrace.
Trish pulled back and looked outside. “Do you think the rest of them made it?”
“I’m sure they did. We saw them leaving.” It was true he saw Cliff and Kevin drive off, but not the other three men. They’d all taken different routes through the city.
Dwight didn’t know what to say for the next few minutes, so he sat at attention, sure another car would be along shortly. After about five minutes, he saw one. “Thank God. They’re here.”
The headlights on the lone car came up the abandoned highway but went by the turnoff for the Cadillac Ranch, so Brent flicked his headlights on and off. “They must have missed the turn.”
A few seconds later, the car turned around.
“Come on, let’s greet them,” he said while hopping out. Almost after the fact, he opened the back door and brought his shotgun with him. If the bad guys were out there, he wanted to be able to fight back, no matter what else he was doing.
The headlights were blinding as the vehicle slowly came up the dirt road. They’d switched so many cars over the course of the night’s activities, he had no way to know who was driving based solely on the make of vehicle. He had to wait until it pulled alongside him before he got a look in there.
It was a man he didn’t recognize…
CHAPTER 26
Minot Air Force Base, ND
“Can you hack in?” Emily asked over Kyla’s shoulder.
She’d gotten through the first password gate with no problem, and now she had access to the mainframe. It surprised her that she understood the operating system. “Yes. Actually, this is a lot like the code I worked on with the Navy. It’s probably from the same defense contractor.”
The VP tapped her on the shoulder. “Good work. Keep it up. I want it to be ready for when your uncle comes back. Then we’re going to get the heck out of here before we get caught.”
She typed maniacally at the keyboard, using her polished programming skills to work her way through the file system until she came to a folder with some promise.
Presidential Emergency Satchel
She was hit with a password gate as soon as she tried to gain access to it.
“This is where we get down and dirty,” Kyla said quietly to the two women with her. “Though I never thought I’d find myself anywhere near nuclear codes like this.”
Emily laughed. “Yeah, well, that makes two of us. I’m supposed to be at a grand-a-plate fundraiser in Ohio today. At least, it’s what my schedule said before the world went into the crapper.”
“Sounds like fun,” Kyla said while breaking into the system.
The vice president didn’t sound happy. “It gets old. Trust me. The first dozen are fun. Meet new people. Get press taking your photos. Be the most important woman in the room. But it gets tiring always being on your A-game. You get pictures taken every second of the event, even when food falls out of your mouth.”
Prior to the disaster, that life would have terrified Kyla. She liked being by herself, or with one or two others. She avoided crowds whenever she could. However, even a fancy dinner party sounded better than her new existence on the run.
“Yeah, that does sound—”
The door flung open, causing her to stop talking and see who it was.
“Uncle Ted!” she cried out as he was pushed inside. A pissed-off Hispanic guy came through holding a revolver. She jumped out of her chair as her uncle shuffled over to Emily.
“Nobody touch nothing,” the newcomer insisted.
Emily caught Uncle Ted and held him close. He stayed there for a moment, then seemed to think better of it. They separated and put about a foot between them.
“Is that my gun?” Emily inquired, not showing any fear.
The man nodded.
“Emily, you remember Lieutenant Eduardo Ramirez?”
“From the plane,” she replied with awe.
“I’m glad we could all get together like this. The last time I saw you two, you were both supposed to be dead. Especially you.” ER pointed the gun at Emily.
“What do you want?” Kyla volunteered, hoping to take some of the heat off Uncle Ted and the VP.
“What do I want? I want what everyone wants: an upper government official with the authority to transfer command of the nuclear arsenal over to its new owners.”
“I want a puppy,” Uncle Ted deadpanned.
Ramirez wasn’t amused. He swiveled the gun between the three of them.
Three?
She looked around for Meechum, but the Marine wasn’t anywhere obvious. Before she gave her away, Kyla turned back to the front of the room. “We don’t have anyone like that here.”
“You would be the guests of honor under any other circumstances. There are teams of programmers working on changing over the authority of the briefcase without having the correct people present. They would all be glad to meet you. They’d be e
specially glad to have you help them out by unlocking the system for us.”
Emily shifted on her feet. “We aren’t going to help you do anything.”
“Oh, you don’t think so? What if I did this—” Ramirez aimed the gun at Ted’s face, which prompted Kyla and Emily to both shout, “No!”
“Well, that’s interesting. The both of you don’t want me to kill this man?” Ramirez chuckled in an unpleasant manner. “I’d like to do this without hurting a soul, but the only one I really need alive is…” He bobbed the gun between them. “None of you.”
His aim settled on Emily. “I need your eyes for the biometric scanner, but I don’t need the rest of you.”
“Wait a second, ER,” Ted pleaded, “let’s talk about this.”
“Oh, that’s so sweet. You two are into some weird boss-underling relationship, aren’t you? I wish I had someone to report this to.”
Ted put up his hands and took a step closer. “Just tell us what you want. We’ll do whatever we can, so no one gets hurt.”
Ramirez grinned. “Your little programmer needs to open the interface. I see she’s most of the way there.” He craned his neck to look at the computer screen. “Then your VP is going to enter her biometric information. From there, we’ll transfer full command to the briefcase.”
“Where is it?” Kyla asked, not seeing anything briefcase-like in the room.
“Safe at NORAD, with David, of course. He’s already working on controlling the arsenal while in the central defense facility, but having access to the briefcase will allow him to move around our new country with it. Once he has control over all the missiles, we can defend ourselves from any and all threats out there. It’s one of the important steps in the invasion timetable.”
Ted stalled for time. “Why do you need nukes when you have the most powerful weapon in human history?”
“Unlike your people, we conserve our resources. Not every problem is a nail, and not every solution is a hammer. Sometimes, you need nukes. Other times, you need…our superweapon.” He smiled broadly.
“You just want to be the hero again,” Ted said dryly, taking another small step toward the man with the gun. A second shape moved in the shadows behind one of the server towers. It had to be Meechum sneaking along the wall. Kyla began to understand what they were doing. Unarmed, while in the face of a gun, she didn’t think they had much of a chance.
“I’ll do it,” she rattled off with immediacy. “Just don’t hurt anyone.”
Uncle Ted spun around. “No, Kyla, you can’t!”
The scene served as a distraction for Ramirez. ER didn’t see Meechum right away when she came out from behind the six-foot server rack.
But, eventually, he did.
Minot Air Force Base, ND
Everything happened in what seemed like a single second. Meechum charged from behind the bank of computer towers, Kyla got ER’s attention by saying she was going to help him, and he was caught in the middle. He had to protect his two friends, so he lunged for the traitor as he turned his pistol toward the Marine.
He’d heard the wheelie gun fire once before, back in Air Force Two, so he was prepared for the loud bang. Still, being close to the deadly weapon made his insides go to jelly.
Meechum fell to the thin layer of carpet like a sack of flour. Ramirez was in the process of aiming and taking his second shot as Ted plowed into him from the side. The other man was fifty pounds heavier, so the impact hurt him as much as it did ER.
The gunshot went wide of its target, given that ER’s arm was the first thing he hit. Ted hoped to get him to drop the piece, but he held on even as they careened onto the floor in front of Meechum.
Ted glanced back to Kyla to see her stepping closer. “No! Get Emily to deactivate it!”
His niece hesitated, though he didn’t see what she did next. Ramirez pulled him into a headlock. The gun dangled precariously in the man’s bandaged hand, but he refused to drop it. However, he couldn’t get it pointed at Ted’s body without loosening his grip around him.
Ted struggled to maintain his position without getting squeezed any harder. He kept his right shoulder high against the other guy’s body, so the lock wasn’t total. When he sensed the slightest release, he shoved some more of his shoulder into the weak point.
The next couple of seconds, or minutes, were a blurry haze as he fought to stay conscious. Meechum was nearby the whole time, but she didn’t move as best he could tell. The two other women were at the computer terminal; he could barely see Emily’s brown hair from where he was. Despite wearing all black, she’d left the summer scrunchy in.
“They aren’t going to do it, you know,” ER taunted. “We’ve had teams working on this for three days. She’s not going to get in.”
Ted had talked to Rebecca many times about Kyla’s decision to go into programming. At first, it seemed like a great career path to a steady income and a nice job, but when she started working for the Navy, he had his doubts about her judgement. He figured there were more bucks to be made in the private sector. However, when she landed the job working on nuclear containment on the biggest and most expensive ship in the fleet, he conceded she must have a pretty good head on her shoulder. Now, he was certain of it.
“While you’re busy killing me, she’s going to shock the hell out of you, asshole.” Ted wasn’t ready to give up, and he was keeping his head barely above water, but the big guy didn’t seem close to giving in. However, as he continued to struggle, the other man breathed heavily. He saw his chance coming up.
Ramirez tried to aim the gun toward Kyla, but a desk was in the way. Ted certainly wasn’t going to let him move to get a better line of sight. The bigger man squeezed his arm around Ted’s neck and grunted, obviously anxious to kill him so he could get to the terminal.
Ted squirmed as he fought against the pressure, though his vision blurred from lack of blood. It wasn’t anything like he pictured as a heroic saving of the women, or the nation, but real-life combat was never like the movies.
Just have to keep him here.
“Dammit, why won’t you die?” Ramirez asked. “I should have shot you back on the runway.”
A shiny object hit Ramirez on the head with a sickening clunk. The pistol went off at the same time, and the man’s grip on Ted immediately loosened. ER rolled to one side, sweeping him underneath for a second before he fell out of the other man’s clutches. He tried to tumble away to get free, until he realized Ramirez’s gun-arm was free, too.
The pistol was pointed at his face.
NORAD Black Site Sierra 7, CO
Tabby was sure Mom and Dad would disapprove of her actions of the last fifteen minutes. The decontamination procedure was an embarrassing exercise all the way through. She’d been instructed by a hidden voice that she needed to strip away all her clothes in order to enter the hazardous materials shower. She was willing to strip down to her underwear, but that was as far as she’d go.
Minutes later, after standing alone in the freezing metal room, Charity’s voice came over the speaker and reminded her she was the first in line. The other two could easily be tossed back out the front door, come what may.
After that, beaten again, she ran through the shower as instructed. The automatic drier actually felt pretty good, and it was a relief to be clean, but when she came through another door and found her replacement clothes sitting on a chair, she almost didn’t put them on. It was the same skimpy jumpsuit as Charity had been wearing, only hers was shiny blue rather than white.
Tabby looked around the chamber for alternatives, but there was absolutely nothing besides the metal seat. “I have to wear this?” she asked the voice controlling her journey.
“David wishes you to adhere to the same dress code as the rest of his Reboot Legion. Your original clothing has been disposed of. You will not be offered an alternative. Blue is a great honor.”
“Hardly,” she said, unsure if she would be more embarrassed inside the unitard or standing in the nude outside
it. In the end, she swallowed her pride and put it on. When she fidgeted and stretched it all it would go, she looked at herself in the shiny metal of the door.
I look ridiculous.
She hurriedly unspooled her three braids. It broke her heart to do it, since Mom had been the one to arrange them, save for one repair job done by Audrey, and it was the last thing she owned of her. However, she was certain her mother would approve of why she’d done it. Tabby arranged her long hair, so it fell over her chest, giving her a tiny bit of extra cover. She kept her front zipper sealed all the way up to her neck.
When she came through the last door, a man in a golden jumpsuit stood waiting for her. “I’m David. Welcome.”
“Why am I here?” she replied, unimpressed.
He got closer, noting Tabby’s twitchy step in the opposite direction. “I saw you on television, of course.”
Tabby had been curious if anyone had gotten her message while she’d been inside the St. Louis television station. It seemed like a long shot at the time, since she learned everyone in the viewing area was dead, but if this guy saw it…
“So, you saw me asking for help. Obviously, my message went to the wrong person. You killed them all, didn’t you?”
He stood there looking sad, which was transparently fake. “I hate killing, Tabitha Breeze from Bonne Terre, Missouri, but the world is a cruel place. When I saw you on television, I was struck by how the necessary evil of the reboot had left at least one piece of the old America I couldn’t bear to extinguish. I found your passion to find your parents riveting. I, of course, knew you’d never reach them, but that’s what made it so tragic, and beautiful. It was an impossible task, just as it was for David to slay his Goliath.”
“You’re quoting the Bible? After all you’ve done?” Mom and Dad had made her go to church, which she accepted more as a time to hang out with them than a spiritual exercise. However, she would never in a billion lifetimes believe this man knew a single lesson from the Good Book if he was truly the one responsible for killing everyone.
“All I’ve done?” he chuckled. “I’ve saved you from a terrible fate. I would think you’d see that. You called out to me and now I’ve rescued you.”
Minus America Box Set | Books 1-5 Page 64