The sane thing would have been to back down, but this was too good an opportunity to pass up.
“Yeah?” I got out when he relaxed enough to let my voice box work. “Looks to me like you could use someone who makes sure it doesn’t escalate.”
It was a gamble; I was well aware of that. I had watched Hamilton physically tear into one of his NCOs last winter who did nothing more grave than whine about lack of leave. Then again, unlike a few other abusive assholes who haunt these corridors, he commands—and gets—unquestioned loyalty from his men… who have proved their worth to him, and apparently, it’s a mutual thing. I knew I had the wrong kind of reputation for him to take me seriously—my goal had always been to be a career officer and get as far ahead as I could. What he was looking for were hard-hitting grunts. Since I got stuck with Morris using me as his secretary right from the start of the apocalypse, most of the heavy hitters thought I was a soft paper pusher. The fact that Hamilton gave me Miller’s file got me hoping that, maybe, he had realized that I was capable of much, much more than that. Now I just had to make him see reason. Easy peasy, right?
Hamilton considered for a moment but then moved a step back. That still left him hulking inside my personal space, but the physical contact was broken. I didn’t make a move, like showing weakness by rubbing my throat, and instead continued to stare straight into his eyes. “And how are you going to accomplish that?” he asked, just jovially enough to make it plain that he was silently laughing at me.
“First, let me get Morris off your back,” I suggested. “He’s sent you on how many milk runs this week? You should be the one sending people out to fetch, not be told to do the fetching yourself.” Hamilton didn’t betray any emotion on his face, yet when he gave a slight nod, I felt confident to continue. “Second, we need to be proactive about the developing dissent among the scavengers. Virtually all of them are trained fighters by now, or else they couldn’t survive out there. They should be under our command. You heard how Morris keeps dismissing them as lazy mouths we’re happy not to be required to feed. Half of our recruits are way greener than them and have started to get fat and lazy as they continue to sit around on our bases.”
Something about my statement was rubbing him the wrong way. I could see the interest dimming. Hamilton confirmed that with his response. “Too much political BS, boy. Do better, or get the fuck out of my way.”
I allowed myself another moment to think and consider. “Miller is going to come after you for almost getting his woman killed. Our covert intel group reported today that the Silo changed her status to serum-incubated, so she must have gotten infected but somehow survived.” I doubted he’d be interested in the details, so I omitted them. “I presume you don’t want to give him the chance to be welcomed back into the fold? If he’s as good at manipulating people as his file says, Morris will eat out of his hand in under a week. That means he’ll sideline you to garrison duty or some shit in the meantime. That’s a complete and utter waste of resources.”
When I fell silent, Hamilton considered, eventually gracing me with a lazy smirk. “And you have the solution to that?”
I didn’t, but I wasn’t going to admit that. “What you need is a win—and one that cements you as our top dog. You need a team that you can rely on.” I paused, thinking. “Whatever went wrong at the factory, it can’t happen again. Let me help you build a better team than Morris is sending you out with right now. Else, you’ll keep suffering defeat after defeat if you go toe to toe with Miller again in the future.”
I could tell that he didn’t like my assessment, but since he didn’t protest, I got the sense that I was on the right track.
“What qualifies you for the job?” he wanted to know.
I had an answer for that. “For one, you lost your XO and half your staff in that ambush. You haven’t filled the position yet, so you must still be looking for a good candidate,” I pointed out. “One chance to prove my worth to you is all I ask. I get Morris off your back and get your perfect strike team together.”
“And in turn?”
“You take me with you.” When I got no reaction for several seconds straight, I couldn’t help but grimace. “If you want to kill Miller, you’ll need a better team.”
I got a sardonic grin for my trouble. “I don’t need him dead,” he drawled. “Just out of commission. And it looks like he has designated the perfect target to accomplish that himself.” So much for why he had me do a profile on Lewis.
“Consider it done.”
Hamilton considered my statement before giving a last, curt nod. “You have three days. And you’d better not screw this up if you want me to believe you’re anything more than an imbecile’s lapdog,” he told me, and left.
That was easy, I thought to myself.
Of course I had to jinx it—but none of that turned out to have been my fault.
I realized something must have been up when, two days later, I woke up to a general rise in considered threat levels, the entire base staff buzzing with news that nobody knew anything concrete about. Nothing had come over the radio channels, but two of our sources—one from New Angeles, one from Dispatch—alerted us to the fact that some shit or other was going sideways, both hubs also on high alert but without official intel being released. It was another day until I happened to be strolling by Emily’s office after a harassed-looking private hastened away from it that I got my answer. I found her sifting through her notes, a satisfied look on her face. I should have known that couldn’t be a good sign—and got confirmation for that minutes later, when as a throw-away comment she mentioned, “No need for you to go looking for that Lewis woman anymore. I will have everything I need in a few days’ time.”
Maybe it was the fact that everyone else was on edge, but that statement didn’t sit well with me. “You found someone to establish contact with her?”
No emotion was visible on her face, but she did look oddly satisfied. “Taggard is taking care of it.”
Now that sounded more in line with what was happening—the next stage of the ongoing catastrophe.
“Taggard?” I asked, cautious enough that she did glance up for a moment. “Are you sure that’s wise? He doesn’t have the best reputation around.” Which was putting it mildly.
Emily’s stare turned hard. “Says the man who’s right now licking the boots belonging to the biggest asshole around.”
I never found out why she detested Hamilton as much as she did; it wasn’t hard to imagine he’d given her a reason for the animosity, though. “But he isn’t Taggard,” I pointed out. None of the people on the list of prospects for the team I was assembling had been a part of his men—including stress on the gender, and for exactly the reason that first came to mind. In fact, working with him had become a quick criterion to exclude possible candidates. This didn’t bode well—and not just for the intended target, considering that us coming for his wife the first time around had prompted Miller to send every single scavenger in the country into high alert.
All that—and more, I was sure—must have been plain in my voice as Emily made a vexed sound as she leaned back in her chair and regarded me levelly. “I need samples from that woman’s body, not the body itself.”
With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I was close to pointing out that it would still have been a good idea then to preserve said body—and in an alive state—should she require more samples, but considering the topic, it felt like a moot point. So I dropped it and moved on, hoping she hadn’t doomed us all.
The staff meeting we had later that day was an uncomfortable one when the radio guy explained that the scavengers were scrambling again—and again a scant week later. I missed another update when I was out with what would be the last tour of cleanup-and-requisition with my men, only to return to base with Hamilton waiting for me already.
“You have that list ready?” I nodded. “Good. We’re moving out tonight. And you’d better not mess this up.”
Of course, half the soldiers
on said list weren’t stationed anywhere near our base, but that turned out not to be a problem since we wouldn’t be remaining here much longer, anyway. Our new destination seemed rather odd to me—one of the abandoned complexes in the foothills of the Colorado Rockies. I was told we were to meet with several other select task forces there—including Taggard and his men, who had arrived here earlier today. That the man himself wasn’t even part of our meeting was telling.
That Emily barged in halfway through the strategy meeting was telling as well.
“You need to bring Bree Lewis to me, as soon as possible,” she told no one in particular. Everyone was staring at her with a mix of irritation and general what-the-fuck-is-going-on written across their faces. I had a feeling that Hamilton and I were the only ones in the room to whom that name meant anything. Morris certainly looked like he’d heard it for the first time… again. At least she was still alive. Since Hamilton didn’t look surprised, I figured the news might just be the reason why we were throwing months of schedules and plans overboard to head down to Colorado—and I didn’t much care for the conclusions those thoughts led to.
Nobody said anything, but that didn’t deter Emily in the least. Brandishing an envelope, she went for Hamilton. “Here, give her this. And don’t be a dick about it. She’s a much more valuable asset than you or any of your men are. You are to escort her here as soon as possible,” she went on explaining, ignoring the stony look Hamilton was piercing her with. “Alive, and willing, if possible. I’m sure she’ll see reason, but if coercion is required, you’re free to use all means necessary.”
Hamilton didn’t bat an eyelash as he accepted the letter from her. I couldn’t help but stare at Emily, having a hard time sorting things out with not enough details available to me. What had suddenly changed? But, more importantly, if Lewis had escaped from where Taggard had dragged her off to—and it was without question that she hadn’t come willingly—I highly doubted she would be susceptible to any kind of offer or bribery. In fact, now the almost knee-jerk reaction of command to scramble and switch tracks made sense: Miller must have decided that he’d had enough, rallying whatever forces he could and sending them on the warpath—straight for us, or, more likely, that abandoned base he must have been thinking was our headquarters. It made sense to give him a target that we could stand to lose, although it didn’t feel great to know I’d soon be stationed right there. Morris hadn’t gotten to the part of the meeting yet where he’d detail our battle plan, but considering Hamilton’s presence—and the fact that Emily presumed Lewis would remain alive to follow her summons—it made sense that our goal wouldn’t be total annihilation. I had a feeling that if things were different, Hamilton would have looked much more eager than he did right now.
Emily was already turning to leave, but Morris couldn’t let the distraction go just like that. “What, pray tell, is so important about that woman that you keep laying into me about her at every occasion possible? And why should she have any interest in coming here of all places?” I had to admit, I was surprised Morris was that aware of the state of things out there.
Emily gave him a vexed look but deigned to explain. “She might very well be the key to cracking the serum project that we have been looking for for ages. And she will see reason once she reads my letter.” When Morris just kept staring at her—not unlike Hamilton, I noticed with the appropriate amount of horror that thought and its implications brought with it—she relented. “She’s still infected with the virus, although I doubt she has realized the implications of that yet.” When we all kept staring at her, she shrugged. “She’s basically rotting from the inside out because of the latent secondary infections that must have occurred during the transmission of the activated virus. Anyone would be horrified at that thought, but trust me when I tell you, it is every scientist’s worst nightmare to get a confirmation like that.”
That said, she left. Morris stared at the closing door for another second before resuming the briefing as if nothing had happened. Glancing at Hamilton, I found him smiling slightly until he noticed me looking. His face turned expressionless almost immediately but his gaze challenged me to say something. I didn’t, not stupid enough to traipse into that trap.
So it came that, two weeks later, I found myself in that blasted base in the mountains, trying hard to make it look like several thousand people had been stationed here for the past year, not just a mere handful of degenerates in white lab coats with their brain-dead guinea pigs. Nobody had bothered to fill me in on what had been going on here, but I knew enough to be able to read between the lines—and for the first time ever, I had that terrible feeling in my gut that Emily had been right when she’d told me I was fucked if I let them shoot me up with the serum, whatever temporary perks it might lend me. I’d been aware that Taggard was a bad egg and had—as such men usually do—managed to exert a certain gravitational pull on others that weren’t cut from the best moral cloth out there, to put it lightly. But what must have been going on around here gave me the creeps and made me feel utter disgust for the people in charge who had not just let this happen while standing idly by, but must have signed the orders making it possible in the first place. Every brain-dead expression on a young soldier’s face reminded me of that, over and over again. This wasn’t the army I had dedicated my life to, even before the shit had hit the fan—and watching Hamilton sneer at them with a similar sentiment made it easy to see that the same was true for him. Until we’d arrived here, I’d thought the tales of atrocities that the scavengers were yammering on about were just that—stories. Now, I wasn’t so sure about it anymore.
A few days later, our scouts reported trains of cars crossing the eastern border, and Hamilton pulled me aside to give me the “script” for the inevitable showdown. Those were simple instructions, but so far removed from anything that made sense—or anything I wanted to stand for—that it took his warning glance for me to realize that I had no choice but to follow my orders, unless I wanted to end up like Taggard and his people. “Sacrificial scapegoat” didn’t quite cut it—but I could see how this was the best we could do, all things considered: let the scavengers have the blood they felt they were owed while we attempted to minimize the casualties on our side to the soldiers for whom not all hope was lost yet. I had my doubts about the plan, but there wasn’t much else we could do, particularly if Lewis turned out to be as psychotic a bitch as propaganda made her out to be. That she was just a figurehead that Miller was using was obvious, even though I didn’t understand why he’d sacrifice a woman he’d apparently professed to love like this. It kind of fit what I knew about the man, though.
Or so I thought, until I came face to face with Bree Lewis for the first time in my life.
It took me less than three minutes from her—somewhat dramatic—entrance into what we had set up as our final-showdown-slash-negotiation-ground to realize just how wrong I’d been.
The first clue was that she was high as a kite—not much of a surprise after I’d realized from just how quickly Miller and his people had cleared out our “barricades” to get into the room, making it quite obvious that they had, somehow, gotten their grubby hands on some of the boosters. Ruthless bastard that he was, it stood to reason Miller would subject his wife to the same treatment, and since she’d never actually gotten inoculated with the serum, the booster effects must have hit her like a freight train. She seemed to be handling it just fine, except for the decidedly crazy look in her eyes, understandably if your heart is going a mile a minute and your body is swimming with endorphins. I’d never forget the night of drills they put me through after shooting me up with that shit so I’d never underestimate just how superhuman I could feel.
None of that accounted for her shooting Taggard the moment she had a clear line of sight, executing him in one precise, perfectly coordinated and aimed maneuver.
Half the soldiers around me got ready for what could only devolve into a nasty hell of a melee fight, clearly expecting Hamilton to take the—
absolutely valid—offense as a cause for action. Knowing that he wouldn’t—not at having his sacrificial goat sacrificed out from the midst of us, at least—gave me a chance to observe the look on her face as she watched him drop to the ground. Her expression spoke volumes. Not just that pause coming from when she must have been waiting for a surge of relief and victory at having conquered her foe, quickly turning to stillness as she accepted that nothing she could ever do would undo what had been done to her. She allowed herself barely a moment before moving on to Hamilton, intent on standing her ground now that she’d gotten the pound of flesh she’d demanded.
They weren’t the actions of a scientist—a nerd spending her life in a lab, her fortitude cerebral only. Not even one who had, forced by circumstances and company, learned to survive. Not even those of an avenger. I’d expected all that on a decreasing scale of likelihood, operating under the assumption that Miller had simply built her up as a meat shield to hide behind. Instead, he had forged her into someone he seemed to be regarding as his equal, judging from the way he watched her deal with the situation—strong, independent, intelligent, but also calm bordering on cold, ready to defend her life if the need arose but happy to let her fend for herself until circumstances forced his hand. Even more so, it was everyone else’s acceptance—including his command group—of her being in charge, of her being the tip of the spear of their crusade that made me realize just how wrong I had been. My profile had been built heavily on what had happened before all hell broke loose, disregarding the possibility that she had changed not just by force but instead had willingly embraced her new life. I had no data to go by, but it was easy to guess this was also the reason why she had gathered hundreds of people so easily: they believed in her, not least of all because she believed in herself. Sure, without Miller and his people she wouldn’t have come this far—and it stood to reason that without them she would have been dead already, or long forgotten—but she did, and thus became as much a force to be reckoned with as every single one of them.
Beyond Green Fields | Book 6 | Red's Diary [ A Post-Apocalyptic Story] Page 2