“Yes sir. He wants to go recruit a few hundred skilled refugees over to our side. We can get them killing crawlerz in no time. We just killed their general. The prisoners we took are telling us the bulk of the men back at the base are just trying to survive sir.” Yue answered in her most level tone of voice. She’d thought about adding in the whole flyby thing but opted to save that for the rebuttal she thought she was about to need.
“Did he talk you into this or are you also an idiot? Do you have some kind of suicide pact? Please tell me what you think is going to happen when you pull up in a parking lot full of well-armed militia who think your boyfriend’s the antichrist?” Shaun asked her. He was of course referring to the fact that Jeff had been the one who created the plans to abandon the refugees in the first place. Yue bit her tongue before responding. Shaun had almost died because his uncle had allowed a bunch of senators to go on a picnic outside Weathertop. If it hadn’t been for Yue and Jeff, then Shaun would be rationing cans of spam buried under a pile of crawlerz in a sealed off space in the base. He wanted to call them stupid?
“Mr. President.” Yue said in a chilly tone of voice. “We’re requesting that you send out another couple of chinooks with reinforcements. We also would like to request the flyby of a bomber. We’re hoping a show of force will give us the opportunity to speak with them. Shaun, we have to try. We can’t just go around blowing up American citizens. Especially not when it was the government who wronged them in the first place.”
“We didn’t wrong anybody. Your boyfriend did. My uncle did. Me and you were both just as abandoned as those pricks who attacked your train. I’ll send the reinforcements. You’ll get your flyby. Hand the headset back to Jeff and I’ll patch him over to the operations center to get it all setup. If you get yourselves killed don’t come complaining to me.” The President paused and Yue could picture him taking a deep breath to try and reign in his frustration. “Good luck.”
Yue handed the headsets to Jeff who was just in time to be put on hold. He looked over at Yue who gave him a thumbs up. Jeff shook his head in bemusement. Somehow Yue just knew the right words to say to people. Yue watched while Jeff jotted down notes and coordinated with the Weathertop operations group. Leaving him to wrap that all up she went back in the passenger section of the big helicopter to check on LeBron. She found him sitting in the back with the prisoners listening intently as they answered more questions about the base they were flying into. Yue had him slide over so she could sit down on the bench next to him.
“Anything new?” She asked.
“Not really. They’re nomadic. They send out crews daily to go fix up buildings and gather supplies. They move their people around pretty often to keep the crawlerz from stacking up on any one place. Most of them are national guard or reservists and their families. They try to stick to survivors with a military background as it makes it easier to keep everyone under control and doing what they’re supposed to.” LeBron answered.
“Any more clarity around how much they all hate us?” Yue asked. She wasn’t bothering to hide her questions from the prisoners. She wanted them to feel like they still might get tossed out the door once they got up high enough. Right now the big bird of war was still sitting on the ground, but she expected that to change very shortly. They had to hit the base today or the people there might all disperse. LeBron had just told her the forces they wanted to meet with moved around frequently. Moving around like that was really the only way to survive in this new normal if you didn’t happen to have a base like Weathertop in your back pocket.
“The leadership really hates us. Feels totally betrayed by us. Everyone else just like kind of hates us. They don’t seem as committed to it though if that makes sense.” LeBron answered. That made sense to Yue. General Rattigan had to have known it was suicide pulling a gun on Jeff like that. He’d done it anyway. His hatred had totally overridden his sense of self preservation.
Yue leaned back in the chair and watched while the squad guys continued asking the same questions in different ways to try and wring every last bit of useful intel out of the prisoners. LeBron turned his attention back to the interrogation. He was busy scribbling notes on a pad of paper. Occasionally he’d throw a question out himself, but he mostly seemed content just to listen in. Yue was starting to get nervous about how long they’d been sitting on the ground when the blades started whirring faster. Settling back into the seat she strapped herself in and waited for the weird sensation of being pulled up into the air.
That weird helicopter way of lifting off always made Yue feel a little queasy. It was disorienting how you just kind of left the earth behind. It was like you knew about gravity but just didn’t care. All around her the men and women from the suicide squad were busy prepping for the next battle. The intensity of this fight was like nothing they’d ever experienced before. The daily missions out against the crawlerz had been one thing but now they were mixing in missions against people who could shoot back. The crawlerz may have all kinds of superpowers but they didn’t have snipers.
Thinking of the crawlerz Yue checked her watch. It was weird now that text messaging and Facebook updates weren’t really a thing anymore watches had come back into vogue. It was suddenly inconvenient to pull that phone out of your back pocket when you could just glance at your wrist to see what time it was. Phones had mostly been relegated to being fancy cameras out in the field. Back at Weathertop they were still cool because you could actually get on the WIFI there and send one another text messages. You could even make phone calls to one another. It was craziness. The IT guy had been stupid busy making sure everyone had the ability to use the software to take advantage of the wireless network at the base. As soon as you walked off the base though all those reminders of a smart phone life went out the window.
Yue could sense the nervousness in the air. It was early afternoon, so they had some time before the crawlerz came out to play. That time could slip away quickly though. Yue rehearsed different things to say in her head. How do you tell people to trust a government that hung you out to dry? How do you drop into the parking lot and win their allegiance in the few hours before it starts getting dark outside?
This was all assuming they even got the chance to talk to these people. Yue was second guessing the whole flyby thing now. What if it just pissed off the people inside the warehouse? What if they decided to go all Red Dawn and started screaming “Wolverines” and shooting at them when they tried to land? She was worried the show of force might not be the best way to go while simultaneously thinking the show of force was the best way to go. She almost wished they’d brought General Rattigan’s head with them to put on a spike in the parking lot of the warehouse. They could use the helicopter speakers to play “ding dong the witch is dead” to show these people they weren’t there to play around.
Realizing her thoughts were entering strange territory Yue pressed the mental brakes forcing herself to focus. She didn’t have a ton of time to come up with a plan for when they touched down. She didn’t bother worrying about what to do if they tried to land and were being shot at. In that case they’d turn around and fly away. The flyby bomber would come back and do the job for real. Yue hoped that wouldn’t happen but if it did it was out of her hands.
Yue started paying attention to the announcements coming through their headsets when the pilot informed everyone that they were approaching a hot landing zone. Jeff came over the intercom to give everyone a quick sitrep.
“Be advised we’ve performed a flyby on the target warehouse. Two other chinooks were dispatched from Weathertop as well and will meet us in the parking lot. If we encounter any sort of heavy resistance, we’ll wave off the landing and the bomber will come back. When we land secure the area by the numbers. Get on the guns and be ready. Once all is secure, we’ll look to make contact with the people in the warehouse. The objective is to invite their leadership to meet with us. Five minutes until wheels down. Everybody stays frosty. We’re looking to make these people ou
r allies.” Jeff concluded and the line went dead. No one had anything to add since Jeff had pretty much laid it all out there.
The squad soldiers were busy doing battle buddy checks. Battles are stressful crazy things. When the action gets fast and furious it pays to have done a quick spot check on the people that you’re jumping into the fight with to make sure their boots were laced up, they had plenty of ammunition and they had remembered to zip up their body armor. It was especially important since most of the people on the helicopter hadn’t been in a gunfight with an armed human enemy in a while. Preparing to fight the infected was a totally different prep than preparing to fight other people.
Yue felt the chinook’s forward momentum stop. They hovered in space above the expansive blacktop below. Evidently, they were waiting to see if the people down below had an RPG they wanted to try out. Yue realized a minute later that they’d really been waiting on the other two helicopters to arrive before setting down. Looking out the window she saw at least one other helicopter outside. Jeff’s voice came over the headsets informing everyone that their backup had arrived. A minute later the helicopter shook as they descended rapidly towards the blacktop.
The pilot performed some sort of aerial wizardry resulting in a controlled fall from the heavens to the parking lot below. The instant they touched down everyone was in motion. Men jumped out the door holding rifles and rocket launchers. One guy was busy getting the machine gun setup to cover the front of the warehouse. Once they could make it to the front of the helicopter without getting in anyone’s way Yue and LeBron went up to join Jeff. He was staring out the windows and talking over the headsets trying to orchestrate their approach. So far there was no movement visible over by the warehouse at all.
“I think we should send one of the men we took prisoner over to explain to the people in the warehouse why we’re here and why they’re still alive.” Yue said without any preamble. Jeff nodded. That sounded good to him. Way better than the complete lack of a plan that he’d come up with.
“Ok bring one of them up here so we can tell him what to say. I’ll tell everyone to hold their position for now. The first sign of aggression we unload on them and return to the friendly skies.” Jeff replied.
Yue had one of the squad perp walk a prisoner up to them. Once the man was in front of them Jeff spent a few seconds checking him out.
“I don’t suppose you beat the other one any less than this one, did you? He looks horrible.” Jeff said looking at the squad member who’d escorted the prisoner up.
“The other one looks way worse believe it or not.” The soldier answered. When you order an elite warrior covered in tattoos to question people you get what you get. Jeff sighed and returned his attention to the poster child for domestic abuse sitting in front of him. He started to talk but Yue beat him to it. She’d been worried Jeff would start off by identifying himself. That might not go over well if the prisoner told his people that the guy who’d ordered the government to abandon them was sitting out in the parking lot.
“You don’t look that bad. A little foundation and some blush…” Yue joked with the man. He didn’t seem super amused.
“Do you guys have some more information you need? I’m happy to tell you whatever.” The prisoner said. He was freaked out by the change in Yue’s demeanor.
“No you’ve told us plenty. Thank you so much for that and we’re so sorry about your face. That really does look like it hurts.” Yue said compassionately. Jeff had gotten the hint and was keeping his mouth shut. The squad soldier was standing back a few feet watching with interest to see where Yue was taking the conversation. The prisoner himself just stared at her unsure how to respond. Yue let the silence stand for a few moments before she continued on.
“Tell me what happened to General Rattigan this morning.” She ordered the badly flustered man. He looked to his left and right but didn’t see any help in the stoic faces of the people gathered around him.
“He pulled a gun on the tall man sitting here and you guys killed him in self-defense.” The prisoner answered.
“That’s a solid answer.” Yue said smiling. “Do you know why we met up with him this morning?”
“Not really.” The prisoner answered. He still wasn’t sure where this was all going but he felt like he was in less danger of being killed than he’d been ten minutes prior. Yue dropped the smile and told the prisoner what she wanted him to do. She leaned forward to talk to him to make him feel like she was sharing confidences and inviting him to be part of the plan. Without even realizing it he leaned in to listen to her.
“We were meeting with the general to try to arrange for a peaceful partnership between the US government and your militia. We understand that given the beliefs of your leadership you might not want to immediately renew your allegiance to the flag. However, we do think it’s best for all of us if we cooperate to wipe out the infected. The general had other ideas which is why he’s dead and we’re talking now. We need you to go find whoever’s in charge and convince them to come out and talk to us. Do you think that’s doable?” Yue stayed leaning forward while she waited for the man’s answer. The prisoner appeared to think it over before speaking.
“I can tell them. What happens if they don’t agree to talk?” The prisoner asked looking Yue directly in the eyes for the first time.
“We’ll just fly away.” Yue said innocently.
“That’s it?” The man asked.
“Absolutely. We’d want to fly as far away as possible to avoid the bombs that’ll rain down if your guys don’t want to play ball.” Yue responded sweetly. That elicited a bark of pained laughter from the man.
“You should’ve just said that part first.” He joked. “I’ll go try to get them to send out a delegation. It shouldn’t be too hard with that kind of motivation.”
Chapter 12: Do or Do Not
“Sup party people!” Drew called out from the open door of the helicopter. Yue looked down the length of the chinook to watch Drew climb aboard. She’d assumed he was going to join them.
“Lisa with you?” Yue asked.
“Nah. She’s still messed up from these ass-wipes beating on her when they had you two held hostage. What’s going on here? How come we’re just sitting in the parking lot while that beat up looking dude stumbles his way over the main building? Why are we not launching missiles at the building full of dangerous murdering traitors?” Drew fired the questions one after another. His face was smiling but he had a death grip on his rifle. He’d been hoping for some payback.
“You know all the people who hurt Lisa are already dead or locked up at Weathertop right?” Yue said with a tight grin. She didn’t really have time to deal with Drew’s righteous attitude right now.
“Yeah, but I’d really enjoy making some more of them pay.” Drew answered. He sighed and released his grip on the rifle so that it hung from his shoulder by the strap. He stared out the window while opening and closing his fists like he was trying to restore his circulation. LeBron and Harley had been on the other side of the chinook trying to find something to drink. For LeBron that’d meant water while Harley was looking for something a bit more medicinal. He’d forgotten to top off the old flask before jumping on the helicopter to fly out for a stressful day on the job. He was in dire need of some liquid lubricant to get him to quitting time.
After a quick round of bro-hugs and fist bumps Drew asked again what the plan was. Yue had been watching in amusement at the way the guys had greeted one another. They’d seriously only been separated for the morning. She was pretty impressed that Drew had managed to get out of bed in time to make the combat flight. He must really be pissed about what these people had done to Lisa. Probably more pissed that he hadn’t been able to protect her. Smiling Yue remembered it was a thousand percent her fault that Drew hadn’t been there. She’d hit him in the back of the head with a baseball bat to keep him from getting killed.
“The beat up guy is a prisoner we took this morning. His buddy is still han
dcuffed in the back. He’s going to go tell the nice people inside to send someone out to talk to us. Then we’re all going to become friends and fight the monsters together.” Yue explained it like she was explaining it to a toddler. Drew flipped her off and walked up to the front of the chinook where the pilot was sitting to get a better look at what was going on. The prisoner had already disappeared inside.
“Are we setting a timer or something?” Drew joked turning away from the window.
The crisp crack sounds of gunfire sounded from outside. Bullets began pining off the tough shell of the chinook. Jeff took a look out the window and ordered the chinook to stay on the ground. Answering gunfire came from their side including the sounds of their machine guns spinning up and dispensing a steady stream of death. Jeff had ducked back down to avoid getting popped by a stray bullet. He stuck his head back up for another peek then stood up all the way.
“I think we’re good now.” Jeff said. He thought the words came out ok, but he had to hide his hands. Only Yue had noticed that they’d been badly shaking.
“What do you mean by good now exactly? Your plan sucks so far by the way.” Drew asked from his position on the floor. He was stretched out over the random gear that hadn’t made it out of the helicopter.
Crawlerz: Book 5: Off the Rails Page 10