by Cory Mccoy
As our makeshift convoy inched toward the hospital, pockets of fighting could be heard in all directions. I could barely see Mount Hood past the smoke billowing over Portland. The roads were clogged with people trying to flee the city, anyone not already on the road was probably packing essentials into their car. It was nearly impossible to get past a gas station without having to drive on a median or a sidewalk, people were fighting to fill their tanks.
No one could have been prepared for this, people were panicking. The morally ambiguous had already began looting. Who knows what the hell they were going to do with the merchandise they stole.
It was only a few miles to the hospital, but the drive took well over an hour. Dusk had begun to set over this unlikely war zone by the time we pulled our convoy into the parking lot of the ER. The police had set up a blockade with the few officers they could spare. They probably assumed the worst when they saw a convoy with PLA vehicles rolling toward them.
"We've got at least fifteen injured civilians in that RV, some of them don’t have much time left" I said, as I walked up to the blockade. The cops didn't know what to make of our outfit.
"How the hell did you manage to get their jeeps?" One asked, clearly puzzled and worried.
"We fought our way out of the Mega-Mart, they seem to be trying to set up some kind of base there"
"No shit, I heard dispatch say that the Chinese were taking fire from the roof, that was you guys?"
"Yeah, we managed to take out about two dozen Chinese inside and then made a break for it" I said, growing impatient. People were dieing, I didn't have time for chit chat. "Listen, I’ve got one EMT in there tending to people who could die any second, are you going to let us through or not?"
"Yeah, of course." The cop said embarrassed, "I don’t know if bringing their vehicles in here is such a good idea"
"Don't worry, we'll get them into the parking garage after we remove the guns from the back, you guys could probably use some better fire power out here in case we were followed."
With that, the police pulled the barrier to the side to let us pass. It was chaos inside, people were laying all over the triage room, some with gun shot wounds and others suffering from panic attacks. Sarah, our EMT, went in to try and find some help. She worked out of the non profit across town, but had a professional relationship with some of the ICU physicians here.
"They're only allowing surgery on patients who are going to die without it, I need some help getting them organized enough to come in." Sarah said to Liz. "There are three free rolling beds, we can each take one out and start bringing them in"
Moving a hospital bed by yourself is easier said then done, but Jesse and some of the guys were waiting to help as soon as we got back outside.
McDonnell was the highest priority, luckily the bullet didn’t hit his jugular, but he was still in bad shape. He had maybe an hour if he didn't get into surgery, he had already lost a staggering amount of blood. Sarah had wrapped a t-shirt around his neck to help stymy the blood flow.
"Sarah," Jesse said, clearly worried about something "umm, i think... that lady with the little girls.. can you come here?"
"Jesse, take the girls inside ok?" I heard Sarah saying from the back of the RV. "Listen girls, we need to try and help mommy, go with Jesse ok? He's in charge for now."
The girls reluctantly agreed and Jesse led them away. "What's going on back there?", I asked as I was strapping one of the older rednecks down, to move him inside.
"She's gone," Sarah called back "Let's get her in, we can try to revive her, but I don’t think it'll do any good. Those poor little babies...."
These girls had lost their mother, their home and their innocence all in a few hours time. Life would never be the same for any of us, but for them the sacrifice was greater. Maybe the only person they had in the world had been torn from them.
Charon would be busy today, ferrying the lost into the after life. Most beginning their journey much too soon. Clearly God had turned his head away, ashamed at what we had become.
After everyone was safely inside, Liz and I headed back to the RV to move it. "Hun, why don’t you take a look around and see if you can find anything we can use" I said, as I headed toward the parking garage. The cops had already set up the machine guns at their blockade, they were looked thrilled to have something bigger than a rifle. They might actually have a chance if the PLA moved on the hospital.
"Wow, these people were set. They've got maps of every National Forest in the country and what looks like six months worth of freeze-dried food." She said excitedly "Look I even found a satellite notebook!"
"No shit, see if you can get it running." I said "We'll see just how bad this attack is"
"CNN is down, so is MSNBC." she said a few moments later, "I cant find any news sites that are working"
"Try AP or BBC, they may have some updates from overseas.", I suggested as I found a safe place to park the Winnebago.
"Hun, you need to see this, they’re calling it World War III," she said with a hint of panic in her voice, "It's not just us, the entire east and west coasts are being attacked"
She wasn't lying, the entire world was at war. Reports of attacks by the Chinese were coming in from every major city within 200 miles of each seaboard. Even worse, were the reports indicating that somehow they had crippled the entire military's ability to mobilize. Hundreds of military bases had been hit with some kind of chemical attack. They were suffering massive casualties without a single shot being fired. The pentagon reported that Ft Hood, the nations largest base was the first to be hit and it was believed that there were little or no survivors. Within hours hundreds more were hit, the soldiers didn’t have time to evacuate and many couldn’t get to their gas masks.
In every major city, the Chinese had encountered some degree of resistance from civilians and paramilitary both. Most had surrendered, but there was still hope. Seattle had managed to completely fend off the PLA and the USMC boot camp in San Diego has successfully regained control over the airport next to it. New York was heavily engaged with the PLA attacking all three major airports outside of NYC. NYC, home to the largest police force in the country, was doing well containing the Chinese at the airports. They had not broken through to the city yet and it looked like they wouldn't be able to. Reports were showing that the PLA was mobilizing toward New York from Boston, which had been taken within two hours of the first attack.
D.C. was all but destroyed, the casualties were estimated at well over a million for the metro area near the Capital alone. Every major state building had been destroyed in simultaneous attacks, hundreds of large trucks had been used as mobile bombs. In most cities, the PLA was still facing pockets of fighters, but had began establishing a military lockdown of all major highways. Reports indicated that they weren't killing civilians if they didn't have to.
As bad as the attacks on the United States were, we were probably better off than some of the others countries around the world. Russia had begun an all out assault on former USSR territories in an apparent attempt to reclaim their former land. The EU issued a unanimous declaration of war toward China and Russia. The UN security council had begun mobilizing all available troops to the closest cities that were under siege.
India had launched an offensive against China only to be rerouted by Pakistani forces. About 100,000 troops remaining in Afghanistan were headed to rendezvous with Indian forces, but the Chinese had already set up a massive guard along their southern border in anticipation. Japan and the pacific island nations were mobilizing in anticipation of an attack. Japan vowed to assist the few hundred thousand marines stationed throughout the pacific, if they were to take the fight to China's soil. China hadn't been able to breach any of the joint bases on Japanese shores.
No solid evidence of the fate of the President and his cabinet had come down the wire. Both Congress and the Senate had been in session when the attack began, most were thought to be dead. The only cab
inet member accounted for was the Secretary of State who had been in Copenhagen for an environmental summit. Without contact with the President, she was the assumed head of state and acting commander in chief. An announcement on the U.S.'s course of action was expected within hours.
Very little help would be coming from our neighbors who were also under attack. Venezuela and Cuba had begun an assault on Mexico City, sources said the drug cartels had allied themselves with the corrupt governments, Meanwhile, Russia had over run military forces in Alaska and began funneling into Canada. There were reports of a naval battle near the arctic circle. The Canadians had managed to help recapture Buffalo and had pledged to route forces into New York state to help fend off the PLA.
Seizing the opportunity Iran had invaded Iraq, hoping to crush their long time enemy once and for all. Nearly all of the countries in the middle east declared outrage at their audacity and vowed to help Iraq. Africa had plunged into pure melee, with warlords from all over the continent outright attacking former enemies and allies both, in order to seize valuable land and minerals.
"Christ, this is ridiculous," Liz said to me, trying to take all of it in "Why the hell would China choose to outright attack us with so much at stake in our country?"
"Well, honestly" I responded, "that's probably why they attacked us. Over the last ten years, they've grown increasingly powerful and their rhetoric has become more and more ominous. Remember a couple of years back when their prime minister made that outrageous comment that they would not stand by and let us default on loans just because we're the United States?"
"Yeah, I do," she said, no one had forgotten that China was the country we borrowed trillions of dollars from in order to pull our selves out of the great recession. We all knew we hadn't made good on those loans either. "You think they would try to take over our country because of the loans?"
"Yeah, at least as a blanket excuse." I said, shaking my head in disbelief "An attack on this scale would take years and years of planning, I guess we now know why they PLA has been ramping up its numbers for so long."
"Let's go in and check on Jesse and the kids" Liz said, changing the subject. We headed back inside to see how everyone was doing.
"Hey General!", someone called as we walked through the lobby. Who the hell were they talking to?
"Hey! Hey! slow down, can I talk to you please?" A small Hispanic man said as he tapped on my shoulder when he caught up to me. "You're him right? The guy that saved all those people from the Mega Mart?"
"I didn't save those people," I said somewhat irritated at this stranger "They saved themselves with a little help."
"Don’t be so modest, man" said the nosy little man, "They're calling you the General, they said you single-handedly saved all of their lives. I heard you killed over a hundred Chinese yourself!"
"Who are you and what the hell are you talking about?" I snapped, this guy was pissing me off.
"Relax, I’m a journalist," he said, showing me what appeared to be some kind of press ID "Raul Castronova with the Willamette"
"Well, isn’t that special," I said, I didn’t have time for this twit " You still haven’t told me what the fuck you want."
"I'm sorry man, I know you must be stressed out," he said, looking like I had hurt his feelings. "Listen, I’d like to interview you. I think it'll be good for people to hear your story"
"You know what, you stu..." I barked, but Liz grabbed my shoulder, as she often did to let me know to dial it down a little.
"Hun, maybe you should." Liz said as she rubbed my shoulders trying to make me just a little less tense. "People are going to want to know what happened, it'll give them hope and maybe they'll be able to fight back if they know it's possible."
"Fine, you're right" I said reluctantly "Not right now though, we need to check on Jesse and those girls"
"I don't think you have much time," Raul said, there was something he hadn't told me. "The dispatchers said they found the PLA's radio signal and are having it translated, they're pissed. They want to bring the wrath of whatever god they pray to down on the motherfucker who was in charge of the fight at the Mega-mart. They want to make you an example man."
"Liz," I said, realizing just how right he was. "Go find Jesse and the girls, we need to go. Make sure they're ok and tell Jesse we need to take his car."
"Ok, I'll be back as soon as I can," she said "I've got to make sure someone is going to take care of those kids."
"Alright , you've got until she gets back," I said to Raul who had already pulled out his tape recorder. "Then we're out of here, so that no one else gets hurt. Oh and don't use my name or anyone else's. The last thing we need is family and friends getting killed because of me."
"Ok, sounds good," Raul said with a glimmer in his eye, "I'll use the nickname they gave you. We'll call you The General, that ought to shake those bastards up a little."
"Fine, where do you want to start" I said, giving in to his absurdity.
"Give me a little background about yourself." He said.
"Well I like long walks on the beach under the moonlight," I said jokingly as I started telling Raul a little about myself and my training. Liz came back about half an hour later, I had almost finished with the entire day's events.
"Hey, what took so long?" I asked as she walked up with Jesse. "Whoa, where do you think you're going?"
"I'm coming with you guys" Jesse said excitedly.
"I’m sorry hun," Liz said looking slightly irritated, "He wont take no for an answer."
"Listen Jes-" I began before he interrupted me
"No, you listen. I don’t have anyone left, what the hell am I supposed to do?" He said, obviously he wasn't going to back down. “My mom is dead man, she is fucking dead and I have no where to go. You have to let me come."
"Well, you're gonna have to learn how to handle a gun" I said, he was right. It was the least we could do. As much as he had done today, surely he would become a target as well."
"Good, let's go" he said almost skipping away.
"Liz babe, take him to the RV and grab us three bags, put all the dried food you can find in there, with the laptop. I'm going to finish up with Raul and have Sarah stitch my arm up real quick. She's going to grab a needle right now. Ill catch up in a few minutes."
"Ok babe," Liz said and gave me a kiss.
Luckily the bullet had just grazed me, so it only required a few stitches. When I told Sarah we had to leave she gave me some cleaning swathes, a few changes for the dressing, and some medicine to deal with the pain and antibiotics in case they got infected.
"You know I could lose my license for this," she said jokingly "but at this point I don’t think it matters anymore."
"Thanks Sarah," I said as I got up to leave. " and again thanks for agreeing to look after those girls, they need someone like you right now"
I couldn't help but to stare at the sky as I walked out of the ER toward the RV. Bombs were lighting up the night sky like it was the Fourth of July, occasionally shaking the ground with the force of their explosions. In a way it was eerily beautiful, the sky was clear and the stars bright, mortar shells and ground to air missiles lighting streaking through the night sky. It was a tragically beautiful night that i would remember for the rest of my life.
We needed to find out what the closest safe city was, we had to get out of the Portland area. If all else failed, there were thousands of hiking trails through the cascades we could take to stay off of the roads. We might be safe for now, because the PLA had no idea who they were looking for, but how long until someone identified us? What if the security cameras at Mega Mart were still active? We were as good as made if they were.
This morning I woke up thinking I would be cooking steaks right now. Instead I was now targeted by the world's largest military. Within days there would be millions of PLA soldiers looking for me. Ready to break the spirit of the American people, who still thought they had a chance of se
eing this thing through. To think, this whole thing started when I was filling a shopping cart with beer, only hours ago.