The Last Stand (Book 3) (The Repentant Demon Trilogy) (15 page)

“They were already gone anyway,” said Cal, sadly.  “The Diablo Two and the San Onofre sites cover almost all of southern California—all of Orange county.  San Francisco, Oceanside, San Clamente, Luis Obispo—they suffered hydrogen bomb explosions hours ago.  The Richland, Washington and Portland, Oregon plants managed to overcome their attackers.  The terrorists are all dead though.  The ones that weren't shot in the scuffle swallowed cyanide capsules and committed suicide before they could be interrogated.  If those two attacks had gone as planned, we would have been surrounded by desolate destruction.  Look at the map,” he said, pointing to the big screen.

She gazed upon a tranquil yellow blob shaped like a beach ball that two puppies had stretched into opposite directions.  The pregnant middle was their location in Wyoming with Montana above and Colorado below.  Bits of the northwest and southeast formed the only safe areas left in the United States.

“This is so frustrating, Abby,” he said, exasperated.  “I know I'm needed to translate, but I wish there were two of me.  I want to be in on the strategy.”

“What strategy?” she asked, confused.

“That's just my point,” he exclaimed.  “Is there one?  I need to talk to whoever is running things.  Hopefully it's not the jerk president that refused to ground the planes on Christmas day, that didn’t warn the population of the imminent danger.  There are things we need to be doing.

“See all that darkened area on the map?  All the parts of this country which have been attacked?  Well there are pockets of life all throughout that area where people are huddled together in darkness wondering what's happening.  We need to communicate with those people, get supplies to them.  A whole army is out there to help us fight, if we don't just ignore them to death.  They'll eventually die, all of them, just for lack of information.  They need to be told where to go, what to eat or not eat, what procedures they should take to make safe shelters.  You know what I think, Abby?”

She waited for the answer.

“I think the government has just written them off.  How can they do that?  Not only are these people, and people who deserve to live, they are soldiers able to fight.  Look at Kansas and Missouri, most of Iowa and Arkansas.  They dodged the bullet.  I think for a reason that only God knows.  And since the government just waited, did nothing, and let it happen, they're not even part of our infrastructure.  We can't communicate with them.”

“Cal, maybe you should call Agent Foley.  Tell him what you're telling me.  I don't think he's the Master Commander or anything like that, but he's at least one wrung up on the totem pole.”

“He just strikes me as someone that goes by the book,” Cal replied, “follows orders, and doesn't much listen to ideas from peons like myself.  I'm here to do a job, and I'm sure that's what he wants me to keep doing.  For Christ's sake,” he said, never having sworn before now, “people we talked to at the Loop, students you had in your class, the Greenfields, their little girl and their dog Lexy, all of these people are going to die.”

“Cal, I've got it!” she exclaimed with excitement.  “Like with a prayer circle, we just call them.”

“Call them?” he asked, “you mean like on the phone?”

“When they delivered these military phones to us, they said we could call anywhere in the world,” Abigail said quickly, convicted of her idea.  “I have the Greenfields in my cell phone contacts.  I could call and tell them to head this way.  Or I could tell them a place to go that might be nearer for them.  Surely the military bases have survived and have supplies in store.  Mike probably has lots of contacts in his phone, too.  Then those people could call other people, who will call even more… like a daisy chain.”

“You need to get back to the others,” he said.  “Hold on while I check something in the computer.”

After a few minutes, Cal had located the list of military facilities where emergency food and equipment were stored throughout the east.  He printed the list.

“Take this with you,” he said like he was talking to a fellow soldier, “show it to Mike, and get everybody involved in making calls.  They are probably headed out of here by now.”

“You know,” she said with a warning tone, “when Agent Foley finds out we're doing this, he's going to be upset.”

“Screw him. What's he going to do, fire me?” laughed Cal, sarcastically.

“There is a prison here at the facility,” she reminded him.  “He could lock us up.  Or all of us except you, since he needs you.”

“I'm thinking that if the plan works,” he said solemnly, “if we save lives, it will be worth facing the consequences, and I won't let him arrest you, Abby, if I have to shoot him myself.  Count on that.”

Cal stood to kiss Abigail passionately again before she left.  Although he felt confident that they would win in the end, it was only because of the words of an angel, not for any encouragement from his situation.  He saw nothing but fear and uncertainty in all the faces surrounding him.

“I want to look into the system to see if I can learn what is going on in the rest of the country and the rest of the world,” said Cal.  “I don't know when I'll be joining you at the cabin.”

Abigail was permitted to leave, although Agent Foley seemed to question that she didn't want to stay with Cal.  He had thought the two of them inseparable.  He had actually bent the rules a bit by allowing her to be with him.

She drove her car at top speed to the McFarland's, realizing she was leaving Cal stranded.  The rest of the family had taken the government van which had brought them there, assuming she would stay behind with Cal.  He would need to call, and she would drive back and get him, she thought.   Traveling over the roads, she now saw that the fencing had been erected around the whole facility.  It was good that they no longer needed to fear wild animal attacks.  But the miles and miles of chain link made it seem eerily more like a prison.  They were trapped inside the compound now, almost as if the enemy had put them there, and in a certain sense they had.

From the comfort of her cabin, which had become home, Abigail called Mike Edwards and explained the plan.  He decided to meet there with Jerry and Nathan so that the rest of the family could continue Christmas festivities.  The men arrived carrying all their old cell phones, as well as a box of chargers so they could access all the family's address books.  Abigail managed to get into her old Washington University email account on the Internet and decided to randomly call as many as she could from the list.

Uma and Brady joined the group but decided that they could be more helpful by fixing food and entertaining children.  They would bring the rest of the family to the lodge then divert the children to Cal and Abigail’s cabin for movies and treats.  That way, the women could add their efforts to the team of callers. 

Brady gave them his phone which contained only a few personal numbers, but hundreds of stored business contacts from Pinedale as well as all the people who had stayed at the cabin for vacations. 

He sat staring out the cabin window as the kids occupied themselves watching a funny Christmas movie across the room.  When he came to this place five years ago, he had broken all ties with the people in Saint Louis, or anywhere else for that matter.  This had been his dream come true.  Something in his heart of hearts that even he himself had hardly dared to imagine, such a paradise in the mountains. Now it had turned into a nightmare almost overnight.

“You okay, Brady?” asked Abigail, noticing his demeanor.

“No, I'm not, but neither is anyone else, I guess,” he answered glumly, speaking to Abigail who had come back from her post at the lodge briefly to make sure the kids had been set up comfortably.  “Have you looked at this place?  It'll never be the same again.  That peaceful lake full of trout now looks like it's sitting beside a subdivision.  All this fencing makes the whole place look like a concentration camp, which I'm not so sure it isn't.  And roads everywhere.  Where am I gonna go to now?” he said stifling a sniffle.  “Where am I gonna end up next, now that this place has been taken from me?  I think I'd rather just die here now rather than go on in this world.”

“Brady, you bite your tongue,” said Abigail, with a sharp tone.  “Who knows if any of us are ever going anywhere again?  I don't know where I'll be either, but it will be with Cal by my side.  Don't you think Uma feels the same way about you?  Wherever you are, Brady, it'll be with people who love you.  We all at least have that much.”

“Christ, you're right,” he said, shamefully.  “Time for me to get off the pity potty right now.  I'll go fix us all some sandwiches or something, then bring them up to the lodge.”

“You're going to be the best grandpa for little Jonah,” she smiled, giving him a hug.

When Abigail called the number for the Greenfields, he came to the phone almost immediately.  At first, he sounded happy to hear from the Abigail Fitzgerald who had both helped rescue his wife from embarrassment and their dog Lexy from certain death.  She was now calling to rescue his whole family.

“But we're fine here,” he argued. “Life is normal, except for the newscasts of all the devastation east of us and elsewhere.  We still have power.  Businesses are open. The stores are well-stocked.  I see no reason to pick up and move.”

“Things aren't going to stay like that, Mr. Greenfield,” she tried to tell him, “in a week or two there won't be food on the shelves.  Rioting and looting will start.  You may not be able to get out if you don't leave now.”

“The local stores have assured me,” he said, “that they're shipments are going to arrive on schedule.  The whole Midwest is nearly untouched, Ms. Fitzgerald.” as he called her since he didn't know about her marriage.  “We had a close call there, with the attempt on Callaway, but those guys were caught.  I'm sure our military is already on top of whatever hit us on Christmas day.  The president spoke to the country with a televised message.  He is fine.  He can't come out yet because of the radioactive fallout, but in a few days the Washington crowd will get itself pulled back together, although it won't be in D.C.  You are just panicking, my dear.  Like he said, we simply need to stay calm and wait this out.”

He ended by saying that he appreciated her concern, but that Wyoming was pretty far to go for no reason.   Nathan and his father had very similar responses to their calls for urgency.  The people in Saint Louis were utterly complacent about their situation.  Abigail felt surprised that people did not accept warnings from Mike Edwards, at least.  But even coming from him, the advisory fell on deaf ears.  The group of them stared at each other in disbelief.

“Even when I called Father Andrews,” said Mike, shaking his head, “he assured me that they had dodged the bullet.  I didn't really expect him to leave his parish, but I thought he could at least spread the word to others.  He used the same words, Abby—stay calm and wait this out.  Do you think they've all been hypnotized or something?”  Then Mike's phone rang.

“It's Cal,” he said, looking at the caller id, “he must not have been able to get you while you were talking to Mr. Greenfield.”  But he was calling Mike deliberately, and for good reason.  He turned pale listening to Cal’s rather long explanation, then he said he would inform everyone of this information and hung up.

“Cal has been surfing the government computer,” he said, “and he came up with some interesting facts.  He's emailing them to Abby's laptop so she can print some files for us to see.  Basically, what he did was compile a map of all the nuclear plants that were hit and overlaid it with a map of all the military installations—and they coincide very nicely.  Half our military enforcements have been disabled. Cal thinks we're about to be invaded.”

“They'd have to be crazy to try that,” said Nathan.  “Once inside our borders, we still have enough missiles and jets to wipe them out.”

“But would we fire missiles and drop bombs on heavily populated areas?” asked Abigail, “I wouldn't think so.  Collateral damage is one thing, but that would kill hundreds of thousands of our own people.  If they make it onto our soil, we have no alternative other than hand-to-hand combat.  We've never been faced with war in our own back yard.”

“That's right,” Nathan reconsidered, “we'd be fighting a ground war.   I still see them as significantly outnumbered, unless they come across the southern border.  They could come by the thousands that way, especially if they used the old drug cartel networks going through tunnels and across the deserts.  That would be an environment with which they would be familiar.  They could cover a lot of ground really fast if we aren't prepared, and it sounds like Cal doesn't think we are.”