by Geoff Wolak
The Rifles main body, moving through the forest, dropped down towards the rear of the militia’s position, and entered the edge of the suburbs north of Provo, spread in a long line stretching a mile from north to south. They came across the main body of the militia as it snaked slowly south towards the barricade, snuck up close, and opened fire from less than a hundred yards. What followed was a house to house campaign, small unit tactics employed, the Rifles supported by snipers further back. Grenades were tossed by the Rifles - the militias had none, and RPGs hit militia trucks.
The Rifles aggressively moved house to house and yard to yard in small teams, covering each other, smoke and grenades used against the ill-disciplined men of the militia. Reaching the main road north-south, the Rifles halted as planned. A sniper duel ensued for several hours, and before dawn the Rifles withdrew to the forest, the militia having lost half its strength.
During the day, several groups of gunmen moved towards the forest, were allowed to get close, and were cut down by members of the Rifles hidden in the brush. At dusk, the Rifles again moved north, dropped down to the suburbs again, and had found many of the militia vehicles driving north. The vehicles were hit by sniper fire and RPGs, the road soon blocked by abandoned or burning vehicles.
The action lasted all night, but by dawn there were few members of the militia left alive, the women and kids being held by the Rifles, wounded militia men being tended to. The Rifles mopped-up during the day, many of the militia men holding out in houses. Lobster lost twenty men in close-up action, thirty overall, their kit salvaged. He withdrew his men, threw a cordon around the area, and sniped at small groups for several days, stealthy night actions killing many of those militia members still defiantly holed-up in houses.
Survival of the fittest
Captured women and children from the group were led away as the fighting eased, and south through the vast and sprawling Rifles convoy, a few of the women questioned by Lobster and his officers, their individual stories recalled.
Linda, the wife of a rich banker, had lived in suburbs of Salt Lake City after moving there from Dallas. She had started out as a showgirl in Vegas, something that she had kept from her new - and older - husband. His move to Salt Lake City was not by choice, but an assignment from his bank. That move had saved her life.
The couple had lived the high life in a ten bedroom mansion, ran three new cars, and wanted for nothing. Linda caught pregnant at about the time they had arrived in Salt Lake City, a year after they had married. When the child, a girl, was three years old, Linda was sat at home watching the TV when the emergency message appeared. Her husband was in Dallas, and had probably been killed by a nuclear strike.
The phones stopped working almost straight away, the local TV and radio stations were no longer broadcasting and - when the news of the war reached her suburb - most of her neighbours packed up ready to go. Most had no idea where to go, a few considered the hills, and many considered Canada.
Linda had a three year old daughter to care for, and drove straight around to the nearest supermarket, her daughter locked inside the house. What Linda found was organised chaos, as everyone tried to buy more than they could carry. Linda grabbed what she could, but her credit cards failed to work – as had everyone else’s. She was about to hand back some of the items and pay in cash when the frustrated cashier was shot in the face by the next customer. He did not wish to queue up, nor needed help with packing his chosen items.
Linda took her meagre supplies home, checked the fridge and the freezer, and then sat on the carpet with her daughter, the child oblivious to what was happening outside. Later, with her daughter in bed, Linda opened a bottle of red wine and sat on a ten thousand dollar rug, a fire crackling. She flung away each credit card in turn, as if throwing a Frisbee, laughing and crying in equal measure. Picking up a magazine, she flicked through the pages, useful tips on decorating ignored, offers of speedboats passed over, expensive holidays on Pacific Islands smiled at.
Wandering around the large house, in a grey half-light created by moonlight penetrating the windows, Linda ran a hand over many surfaces, caressing the structure and texture of her fine house as if stroking a recently killed family dog. That was how it felt; it felt as if the house, and her life, had died. With tears in her eyes, she marvelled at how far she had come, only to lose everything, and now - at the very end - she appreciated what she had gained more that at any other time.
Stopping at the top of the stairs, she took in a portrait of her husband in the dim light. Her husband, her security, was in another city, maybe dead or dying, his job gone - their income gone.
She ran a hand over a ten grand watercolour that she had bought, a moody twilight image of dated sailing ships in some New England harbour. In her bedroom she sat at the dresser, her own image bathed in a grey hue, and caressed many silver photograph frames; their wedding, a holiday in Hawaii, a trip to Rome, the birth of their daughter. They were images of places in time that had gone, and would never come back.
Gunshots could be heard from time to time throughout the night, the next morning quiet. She woke to find herself clothed and lying on the bed covers, spilt wine staining the white duvet, a wine glass on the floor. For a split second she felt normal, but reality and fear returned quickly, like a kick to the chest. Stepping to the window, she peered down the avenue.
She had not really spoken to her neighbours since moving here, and now she found a house down the road to be on fire. No fire trucks would be coming. She had made one friend in the street, and so journeyed down to that particular house with her husband’s gun tucked away. She found the door open, the house ransacked, her friend dead on the floor, naked and covered in blood.
Back at her house she barricaded herself inside, sobbing, and soon sat staring at a TV with no working channels, her daughter’s needs a pleasant distraction that helped to ground her. The electricity cut out around midnight, and she found herself alone and afraid in the dark, little in the way of hope. A noise woke her in the early hours, and she crept downstairs with the pistol prone, expecting the worst. Finding two men trying to get in through a window, she shot both in the face at close range.
In the morning, she peered dispassionately down at the two dead men from a first floor balcony, birds picking at the bodies. The air was acrid with burnt rubber, smoke rising from three or four points on the horizon, and it was time to go. Checking the street, she loaded up her SUV with all the food and water she could, and had the presence of mind to drain gas from the two other vehicles. She poured the gas into soda bottles and covered them in plastic bags. With a glance back, she drove down her posh suburban road of million dollar houses, swerving around abandoned or burnt out vehicles.
What her rich community had done with the news of the war was to panic; every man for himself. What her community had failed to do … was to organise – and to help each other. Few people in the street knew their neighbours, few regarded their neighbours as friends, and few trusted strangers.
Linda drove north, not stopping when people tried to flag her down, the streets like some bad zombie movie. East of the city she climbed up into the hills, and figured that Canada was an option. At dusk she ran into a roadblock, the second vehicle in a queue that had been stopped by an impromptu militia of local ranchers and farmers. When a man armed with a rifle approached her car, she shouted, ‘What gives you the right to stop people?’
‘This is our area, our land, and we don’t like strangers.’
‘This is a public road, paid for by the taxpayers – not you, asshole!’
‘This road crosses our land. Got a problem, file a complaint with Washington, lady.’
The men ahead raised their rifles at the car in front, a burst of automatic fire taking down many of them. Linda aimed and fired quickly at the man who had spoken to her, as that man made ready to fire on the car in front. She killed him. The first car powered through the roadblock, and she followed, firing her pistol wildly as she steered with one han
d. A few miles further on, and the car from the roadblock waved her down. A smartly dressed man got out, but left his weapon in his car, approaching her as she held tightly onto her pistol.
‘Thanks, lady, you helped back there,’ he offered.
‘Fucking Rednecks, they must be happy as fuck all this has happened.’
The man slowly nodded, his hands on his hips as he took in the nearby hills. ‘Yep. They can do whatever they want now, no police or prison for them; survival of the fittest.’
‘Where you headed?’
‘North, away from the population centres. Canada maybe.’
‘Me too.’
‘Then let’s stick together for a while, be safer for both of us. I have two kids in the car.’
That evening they made a camp, the man’s daughters adopting Linda’s child and playing happily, oblivious to the state of the world around them.
Two days later they pulled up next to an Army patrol, National Guard. The soldiers casually stepped up, smoking.
Linda approached them, her gun left in the car. ‘Just what the fuck is the government doing?’
‘There ain’t no government anymore, lady,’ a captain offered her. ‘There’s some general in Pennsylvania who’s assumed control of the Army, a few Navy admirals organising things in a few places I heard, but every major city has gone.’
‘There must be an emergency plan for this shit!’ Linda barked.
‘There probably was, lots of them,’ the captain casually remarked. ‘But it’s easy to make a plan before a war, after it … well, people just drift off. Most of our guys stayed with their families or are heading for Canada. Towns are best avoided, lady, looters an all.’
‘So that’s it, it’s all over, no government, no rebuilding!’ Linda barked.
The captain shrugged.
‘What will you lot be doing?’
‘Staying together, because it’s dangerous out there.’
‘Aren’t you supposed to police the streets or something?’
‘Sure, but the banks don’t work, we can’t buy food or fuel, so … we’ll try and survive … just like you.’ He thumbed over his shoulder. ‘There’s a mall back down that road, still plenty of useful stuff in there. Approaching it at dawn is best.’
Linda and her travelling companion did approach the mall at dawn, stepping past dead bodies, dozens of them. The mall was a wreck, but they found tinned foods lying around, a few blankets grabbed, a few soda cans carried. And then it was back on the road.
In Montana, a burst of fire killed her travelling companion, his vehicle careering off the road. Linda accelerated, crying in desperation, her vehicle hit from behind, the fate of the man’s daughters unknown. She made another ten miles before rounding a bend and finding a roadblock, armed men manning it. Looking over her shoulder, she considered using the gun on her daughter, then on herself. When the men approached, she shouted, ‘Don’t shoot, you can fuck me. I’ll suck you off, I’ll suck you all.’
‘Yes, ma’am, you will,’ casually came back from the first gunman.
In the weeks that followed, Linda became a sex slave on a farm, along with twenty other women. She made a point of always giving the leader a good blowjob once or twice a day, and she secured extra food, her daughter fed well enough and whiling away the days playing with other kids. When that leader was killed in a fight, Linda started to suck off the next strongest man, sometimes giving ten or more blowjobs a day. It kept her alive, but – more importantly - it kept her daughter alive.
Weeks later, and the group headed south for the winter, a large convoy formed, that convoy picking up recruits as it progressed. Those not wishing to join would be killed, those joining the ranks assured of some protection, a hierarchy evolving, although being the main man was not a career that could be considered long term. Linda had ended up living in a camper van with another family, parked less than a mile from her million dollar dream home, her daughter often asking, ‘Mummy, when are we going home?’
Magestic 3
Copyright © Geoff Wolak
www.geoffwolak-writing.com
Part 7
The Yellowstone crucible
Lobster had been furnished with a good briefing on what he could expect to find in Wyoming. Linda had asked to tag along, having been treated very well by black Africans, but could not be allowed to do so. The Rifles handed her food and water, a vehicle with fuel, a pistol, and a hunting rifle with plenty of ammo. After that, she was on her own again.
With no one left to shoot at around Salt Lake City, Lobster finally moved his main force north and towards Wyoming, advanced units clearing the debris littering the road whilst being covered by their colleagues in incremental tactical moves.
Reaching Wyoming, Lobster created a temporary camp well away from any principal towns or population centres, his captains each assigned a different geographical location – mostly grouped in the southern border area of the state. The various locations had been selected in advance, many years earlier, since the locations would be near known Zim camp sites, sites where the Zim would choose to live in the future – something about the suitable climate at the southern end of Yellowstone National Park. Seems that the Zim – like a great many others - appreciated a bit of scenery, and a lack of residual radiation.
At the dispersal sites, reached after a weeks’ travel subject to unfriendly small militia groups - and irate ranchers weary of strangers – the various Rifles units made a happy home and settled in. Irate neighbours were shot dead, their farms and ranches appropriated, cattle killed and eaten, each location for a base carefully chosen. Old steel mills were favoured, that or abandoned shopping malls, anything that could hide a large body of men.
No group larger than five hundred men was allowed, and abandoned out-of-town malls were a favourite with the Rifles because they could be easily defended. Barriers were raised, local starving citizens turned away if they approached; there was no rebuilding going in here, this was a stealth mission, and a long and difficult one.
Each day the Rifles would go about the business of day-to-day living of finding food, repairing kit, patrolling the perimeter, and keeping fit. Without meaning to, the Rifles were policing the area and removing the local gunmen, southern Wyoming becoming a safer place to live for survivors of the war.
Lobsters’ shopping-mall Rifles were deliberately low tech and EM silent, save basic radios, and those radio messages would simply appear to be locals chatting to each other. Messages went out in code - chickens, pigs and horses all having double meanings to the radio operators. Where possible, abandoned mines and underground facilities were adopted – and there were plenty of those in the area, and men and arms were duly tucked away out of sight, civilian clothes thrown over fatigues, hats worn, AK47s hidden. Green Wellington boots were not seen, but the Rifles did plant crops.
The Zim were about to adopt the area as a suitable home, not realising that nine thousand Rifles sat ready and waiting to welcome them. And those Rifles would have six months in which to study the land, to dig hides, and to observe the arrival of their guests.
As Hal and Hacker withdrew their militia in disorder, contact now lost by everyone - with everyone else across America, the Zim landed several medium ships in Nevada, their citizens trudging quickly through the portals, portals operated now by the Zim themselves – plus a few conscripted USAF personnel held at gunpoint. Around forty thousand Zim crossed during each twelve hour period, the Zim seemingly in a big hurry.
But they had done themselves a great disservice when they had destroyed the communications network of the American military. Now, if a portal opened somewhere across America, alarm bells would not be sounding off.
Baldy’s people keenly observed the Zim, intercepting comms traffic from probes orbiting the Moon, and over the next week they counted a total of sixty journeys made by medium ships, almost every mother ship visited three times by medium-sized craft. Baldy reported his findings to Jimmy, who now figured that a big enough porti
on of the Zim’s weary citizens had travelled through to where Lobster sat waiting, many of those weary Zim having been bussed north by now - from Nevada to Wyoming. A signal was sent to all American units on our linked worlds.
Across former President Clayton’s American nation, thirty-six portals burst into life, American soldiers and Marines soon pouring out. None of the portals were close to the action in Nevada, but some of their odd EM spikes were picked up by nearby Zim craft, which duly investigated. Shoulder-launched missiles screamed across the sky, forty Zim craft lost in the first ten minutes alone, a second forty hit at altitude. The Zim were alerted to the attack just as portals opened in Nevada, missiles carried through, aimed, and soon fired. Three medium Zim ships were hit in flight, two on the ground being struck.
Those medium Zim craft that were still at height aborted their landings, the Zim puzzling the attacks, additional small stealth craft dispatched. Within an hour, contact was lost with every Zim craft over America, medium craft climbing out of the gravity well.
The Zim leadership now had a problem, a big problem. A large number of their people were on the ground, moving through to the other world, or already encamped on that other world, the mother ships unable to get to them. We had cut their forces in half, as hoped for.
Within two hours we had hundreds of missile units in place, spread right across America, scanners set up, soldiers stepping through in a continuous stream. Two larger portals then opened, huge EM spikes issued for the Zim to ponder over, and a dozen of our orbital craft passed through. Without engaging stealth mode, the craft climbed to height, deliberately making themselves visible – a subtle message. The Zim got the message: the others had arrived.