Jack Archer (Book 3): Year Zero

by Taylor, Keith

  He couldn’t take his eyes off the soldier. He looked young, late teens or early twenties, and his inexperience showed. He was panicked, under pressure, and Jack knew the slightest thing might make him do something rash. Even now he could see the soldier’s movements become more twitchy and erratic as he waited for help to arrive from the Humvee. His fear was growing by the moment. It was clear that any second now it could boil over.

  “Please, sir,” he said, fighting to keep his voice steady. “We’re not your enemy. Whatever problem we have here let’s settle it amicably. I can toss out my gun if it’ll make you—”

  “Keep your hands where I can see them!”

  Jack’s breath caught in his throat. He hadn’t moved an inch, and in the back seat Garside was frozen like a waxwork model.

  “OK, OK, we’re not moving,” he said, deciding that maximum grovelling cooperation might be the only way to save himself from a bullet. “What can we do to help defuse this situation, sir?”

  “Both of your step out of the car,” the soldier ordered, his voice cracking under stress. “Slowly! Keep your hands where I can see them.”

  Jack could barely bring himself to move, but after sucking in a deep breath he summoned the nerve to push open his door and climb out, his hands pressed against the roof of the car as he moved with exaggerated care. As he stood the revolver slipped from his lap to the driver’s seat, and he raised his hands above the door frame to show that he wasn’t a threat.

  “Private! Holster that firearm!”

  The voice calling out from the Humvee was so authoritative, so self assured that as soon as he heard it Jack felt the order go straight to his spine. Without spending so much as a day in the military, the urge to stand to attention was so strong that he almost pulled a muscle fighting it.

  Thankfully the young soldier reacted just as strongly. In the blink of an eye calm seemed restored to his world. Those four words seemed to strip him of his fear and panic, restoring in him the absolute certainty that came from the order of a superior officer. He tucked his gun into the holster at his hip and stepped back, his back rod straight. “Sir, yes sir!”

  A figure climbed down from the back of the Humvee, storming around the side until he finally came into view. He looked around his early fifties, gray hair shorn in a tight crew cut, his uniform failing to hide a small paunch that suggested he spent his days behind a desk rather than on the battlefield. “Now what in the hell’s going on here, private? What’s the damned hold up?”

  The soldier stood so stiffly he looked as if he’d shatter if you pushed him over. “Sir! Three armed civilians in a police patrol car, sir! They fired on us.”

  “Yeah, I heard the shot.” The officer quickly looked Jack up and down before turning back to the young soldier. “OK, stand down before someone ends up dead, y’hear? I told you to warn ‘em, not shoot ‘em.” He turned back to Jack. “Son, you firing at my vehicle?”

  Jack froze, unsure how to answer. “Umm… yes, sir. I’m sorry about that. We thought you were someone else.”

  “Someone else, huh?” He looked back at the white pockmark in the Humvee’s windshield. “Well, probably not the smartest move you ever made. A little more firepower and you’d have taken out my driver.”

  He paused for a moment, pondering what to do next, and then he let out a tired sigh. “But nobody’s dead, so today I’m inclined to let it slide.” He looked down at Cathy, sprawled out on the road. “Ma’am, you’re welcome to stand. Here, lemme help you up.” He reached down and offered her a hand, which she took gratefully on the second attempt before shakily climbing to her feet.

  “Thank you,” she blurted out. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to…” She waved a trembling hand to the Humvee. Her face was white as a sheet, and she looked like she was about to burst into tears. “We thought someone was chasing us.”

  “It’s OK, ma’am. We got bigger fish to fry today. Private, can you take this young lady to the truck and get her a drink of water before she falls down?”

  The officer turned back to Jack as the private led Cathy away. “I’m Colonel John MacAuliffe,” he said, extending a hand. “What’s your business here? Where you headed?”

  “Jack Archer,” he replied. “We’re headed for Truckee. We’re looking for the safe zone.”

  The colonel shook his head. “Not a good idea, son. Safe zone ain’t safe no more. I’d advise you to turn back the way you came and get yourself on the next road to the east.”

  Jack felt a chill run down his spine. “What do you mean, it’s not safe?”

  The colonel shook his head. “I’m sorry, but that’s need to know, and you don’t need to know. Just believe me when I tell you you don’t want to be within a hundred miles of that place. I’m saving your ass. Now turn back and head for highway 36.”

  “No!” Jack was surprised by the force of his own voice. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to yell, but I need to get to Truckee. My wife and daughter are waiting for me there.”

  The officer’s shoulders slumped. “Damn it.” He scratched his stubble, eyeballing Jack, weighing up the pros and cons of giving away classified information. Eventually he gave up with a sigh. “Son, I’m afraid I have some bad news. You might want to take a seat for this.”

  Jack shook his head. “I’ll stand. What happened?”

  MacAuliffe reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a half smoked cigar, rolling it between his fingers as he spoke. “My men and I came from the Truckee camp just a couple hours ago. We’re on a pharmacy run, gathering supplies from the towns up here, but ten minutes ago we received new orders to regroup at Beale AFB. The camp’s being evacuated.”

  Jack felt his breath catch in his throat. He leaned back against the hood of the cruiser, his knees suddenly weak. “Evacuated? Why?”

  The colonel took a deep breath, and his face creased into a frown. “This is classified, but… hell, if you got skin in the game I guess you deserve to know what’s going on.” He placed his hand on Jack’s shoulder and leaned in. “There’s gonna be another attack. A bomb was found on one of the supply trucks coming in to the camp, and we believe the intention is to destroy the safe zone.” He pointed back the way they’d come. “You’re damned lucky we spotted you. We were about to head west to Marysville when we saw you back at that last junction. Who knows what you’d be driving into if we hadn’t caught up with you.”

  “When you say bomb, do you mean…?”

  MacAuliffe nodded. “It’s nuclear, yes.”

  Hearing the colonel’s words Jack felt the bottom fall out of his world. He was so close. Karen and Emily were just a few dozen miles away. He could almost feel them in his arms, and now… now they were being snatched away in the cruelest way imaginable.

  “The evacuation,” he asked. “It’s going on now? Will they get everyone out in time?”

  “I’m sorry, son, but I just don’t know. We’ve been trying to get the camp back on comms since we heard. All I know is that there were around seventy thousand civilians at the camp by the time we left, and more were arriving by the minute. That’s a hell of a lot of people to evacuate on short notice, but we just have to keep our fingers crossed.”

  “Colonel!” The private ran back from the Humvee holding an over-sized field radio. “We’ve raised Truckee. I have Captain Standish on the line for you.”

  “Hot damn,” MacAuliffe said, chewing on his cigar as he grabbed the radio in both hands. “Standish? I hope you have some news for me, ‘cause you know I don’t like sitting here in the dark.”

  The radio crackled, and a faint voice drifted in over a deep rumble emanating from the speaker. “Yes, sir. The serial number matches item eight on the itinerary. You were right, sir, it’s part of the Incirlik arsenal. The boys tell me this one is… hang on, I wrote it on my hand… it’s a W80 dialed in for five kilotons. It’s been activated, and they tell me that the command disable mechanism has been tampered with. They said it’s been set up for the conventional payload to detonate if th
ey so much as show it a screwdriver. Whoever screwed with this thing sure knew what they were doing, sir.”

  MacAuliffe cursed under his breath. “OK, what’s going on now? Are they getting everyone out OK?”

  The radio crackled again, as if the man on the other end was holding the transmit key, but for a long moment there was only the deep rumble in the background. Finally, just as MacAuliffe raised the radio to speak again, the voice returned.

  “Well I’m… I guess I’m around five miles east of Carpenter Ridge right now, sir. They told me the further north the better if we want to keep the fallout from hitting Reno.”

  MacAuliffe frowned. “Say again, Captain. I’m not sure I’m reading you.”

  “There’s an old gold mine close to Hobart Mills, sir. I figure if I can get it deep enough into the shaft it might contain some of the blast.”

  The colonel’s face turned white. The cigar fell from his lips as his jaw fell slack. “Standish, are you saying you have the nuke with you?”

  “Yes, sir,” came the quiet reply. “I’m sorry, sir. There was no way we could get everyone out in time.”

  MacAuliffe stabbed at the air with a finger as he spoke. “Captain, stop that truck right now! Get out and run south. If you leave now you can still clear the blast radius!”

  A long silence, followed by a quiet voice. “I’m sorry, sir, but no. Here’s the turnoff for Hobart Mills.”

  “Standish, I’m giving you a direct order. Get out of the truck. You’re already out of range of the camp. You hear me? Get out of the God damned truck!”

  There was no response.

  The colonel yelled into the radio again, unleashing a string of curses at the captain, but it was hopeless. He called impotently into the radio for minutes, but the louder he demanded that Standish run away the more insistently the ensuing silence sounded the captain’s refusal. It was clear he wasn’t going to reply. MacAuliffe was trying to give orders to a man who had already accepted his fate.

  “God damn it!” The colonel yelled, hammering his fist against the hood of the cruiser. He spun on his heels, desperately searching for something, anything, he could do to prevent what he knew was about to happen.

  Finally MacAuliffe’s shoulders slumped. He dropped the radio at his feet, staring south across the endless pine forest. He knew there was nothing he could do to save Standish. The die had been cast. All he could do now was—

  The silent flash appeared on the horizon.

  Jack threw himself to the ground.

  ΅

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  BRACE

  “DID YOU KNOW I’ve never been on a helicopter?”

  Valerie smiled down at Emily, a broad smile beaming out from beneath a set of ear protectors so large they covered her cheeks. “You know what?” She leaned in and whispered conspiratorially. “Neither have I.”

  Emily raised her eyebrows with surprise. “Really? Never ever?”

  “No, honey, never ever ever,” Valerie laughed. “I think most of the people who ride helicopters are soldiers and people with a lot of money. Bus drivers like me don’t really get the chance.”

  “Have you ever been on a airplane?” Emily asked, and then continued before Valerie could open her mouth to answer. “I go on the airplane to see grandma in Texas. We went in the summer. She has a new dog to play with.”

  “Oh wow, that’s great! Do you—”

  “His name’s Custard,” she interrupted, “because he’s yellow like custard.”

  In the seat beside Valerie Ramos groaned, his eyes closed and head hanging between his knees.

  “What’s wrong with Doctor Ramos?” Emily asked.

  “I don’t think he likes to fly,” whispered Valerie. “I think it makes him feel a little sick.”

  “Mmmm hmmm,” Ramos muttered, leaning back. He forced his eyes open as a gassy belch bubbled up his throat. “Honey,” he said, looking down at Emily, “do you think we could have a little quiet time? I’m not feeling great, and the noise is...” He trailed off and waved a hand as another belch arrived.

  Emily pursed her lips and nodded. She turned and sat back in her seat by the window, and for a few moments she gazed out at the arid landscape far below. She looked distracted, as if she were counting in her head, and after ten seconds she turned back to Valerie. “You know Custard isn’t really made of custard. He’s a real dog. He’s just the same color as custard.”

  Another few seconds of silence passed.

  “Do you like custard?”

  Karen swooped in and grabbed Emily beneath her arms as Ramos began to groan again.

  “Hey, pumpkin,” she said, planting the little girl on her lap. “We have to be extra quiet, OK? Just until we land.”

  “But I’m excited, mommy! I’ve never been in a helicopter.”

  “I know, pumpkin,” Karen replied, stroking her hair. “I heard you the first five times.”

  “Have you ever been in a helicopter, mommy?” Emily tugged at Karen’s shirt. “Mommy. Did you hear me? I said have you ever been in a helicopter?”

  “Hold on, honey,” Karen replied, brushing her off as she peered out the window. “Where are these guys going? Ted? Hey, Ted!”

  Krasinski turned back to face the cabin from his seat beside the pilot, shaking his head and tapping his ear protectors. “I can’t hear you. What is it?”

  “Stay here, honey,” Karen told Emily, planting her firmly in her seat. “I’ll be right back.” She walked in a stooped crouch towards the cockpit and leaned over the back of the pilot’s seat. “What’s going on down there?” she asked, pointing out the window.

  Krasinski frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “The trucks. Look down there,” she said. “There’s a huge convoy on the highway, heading west. Is that your guys?”

  Krasinski craned his neck, peering down at the ground below. “Where the hell are they going?” he muttered. A seemingly endless train of cars and trucks crowded the black ribbon of asphalt, a slow moving snake that stretched so far that its tail was lost in the haze. “I don’t know why our people would be moving west en masse. There’s nothing in that direction apart from Beale.” He tapped the pilot on the arm. “Hey, can you get Delta on the horn? Ask them what’s happening down on the highway.”

  Karen watched the pilot as he called into his mic in a crisp tone, and after a few seconds of silence she jumped with surprise when the urgent response came through loud and clear, ringing out of the headphones she’d assumed were just sound canceling mufflers.

  “What’s your location?” The voice brusquely demanded, almost drowned out by yelling in the background. The pilot calmly read out a long string of coordinates, and when the response came back it was so loud Karen had to pull the headphones away from her ears.

  “Get out of there, now! Withdraw at max speed, and brace for turbulence!”

  The pilot didn’t need a second warning. He tugged back sharply on the yoke, pulling the Huey into a sudden steep, banking climb that sent Karen tumbling backwards. In the blink of an eye the floor of the chopper became a wall. She reached out and clutched at the pilot’s seat with grasping fingers, but it all happened too quickly. She couldn’t get a grip. As the Huey climbed she fell back through the cabin, landing painfully shoulder first against a steel bulkhead above the seats.

  Karen looked around, dazed and disoriented. Ramos and Valerie braced against each other as they were pressed down hard into their seats, jaws clenched and eyes closed, too afraid to scream out. Emily did the screaming for all of them. She hadn’t been buckled into her seat, and now she was pressed against the rear wall, clinging to Valerie’s shoulder as the shifting G force tossed her back and forth. One moment she was pinned against the seats, and the next she was tossed like a rag doll against the sliding door of the side wall.

  As the Huey turned into a sharp bank she tumbled sideways once again, but this time Karen was ready for her. She wrapped one arm in the black webbing that ran along the cabin’s rear wall, and a
s Emily fell away from the side door Karen launched herself out into open space, reaching out to grab hold of her daughter as she tumbled by.

  Emily crumpled over her mother’s arm, the wind knocked out of her by the impact, but as soon as she realized Karen had a hold on her she clutched at the arm like a spider monkey clinging to its mother, wrapping her arms tight around her, refusing to let go.

  “I’ve got you!” Karen gasped as she pulled Emily in closer, but there was no way she could hear her over the roar of the engine and the klaxons wailing from the cockpit.

  “Mommy!” Emily screamed, wide eyed. Karen could only see her lips move.

  And then the world turned a blinding white.

  ΅

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ONE LAST LOOK AT THE SUN

  CAPTAIN JAMES STANDISH dropped his radio to the bench seat of the truck, turning his attention back to the road. MacAuliffe’s voice continued to call out angrily from the seat, but Standish blocked it out. He needed to concentrate. He didn’t know these roads. The only directions he had were those he’d been able to memorize after a quick scan of a map back at safe zone Delta.

  He almost missed the turnoff from highway 89 when he reached it. It was little more than a dusty track, unpaved and overgrown, visible only by a narrow break in the pine forest. Standish had been expecting something a little better marked, but he figured it made sense. Hobart Mills itself had been abandoned since the 1930s, and the gold mine long before that, but the map still detailed the entrance to the shaft along with an old trail where the spoil had been carried out in carts. There was no earthly reason for it to be paved.

  He spun the wheel and sent the truck crawling into the forest, worrying for a moment that it would be too wide to fit between the trees that had overtaken the old mill town. It was clear no vehicles had passed this way in years, but Standish was determined to force his way through, and he had the saving grace of knowing he’d never be held to account for damaging military property. This was a one way trip. He’d taken his last order.