Overrun (12 page)

"Every loss we sustain puts
us that much more at risk of losing this godforsaken war. That is the situation
this country is in. Right now. Every explosive you set will take us that much
closer back the other way.

“If firebombing runs are our
only resort, they will also be launched from high altitude to ensure at least
some of them get in. Meaning the ignited fuel and explosives we dump will
blanket the area. Coming from that far up, the destructive force will be less
severe. Many won’t be killed outright. Thousands will be horribly burned. And
they will wish it happened a different way. And you and your daughter will
still be inside.”

"And my son," Kirken
heard himself say.

"And your son," Tuttle
repeated back to him from the holovid. "You will alleviate much by doing
this. You have to understand that. It really will be so much worse if you don’t
at least make the attempt.”

Kirken returned from his
thoughts and brought his full attention back to the holovid. He made no effort
to conceal his glare from the face in front of him. He pondered for a moment
just switching off the device.

"Yeah," was all he
said and dropped his head. His arm ached, his eye bled and he felt like he was
going to throw up.

"We’ll drop the necessary
maps, equipment and target locations for what we want you to do. Specific
location coordinates and instructions for the drop-off will follow this
face-to-face transmission.

"We will prepare the
firebomb unit along with the drop team,” Tuttle’s tone relaxed slightly. “If
you are unable or unwilling to complete what we ask, we’ll launch the full
firebomb assault tomorrow at this same time.

“Do you understand, Commander?”

Kirken did not reply.

“Commander,” Tuttle’s voice was
quiet.

"Are you really expecting
to come in and get us…?"

Tuttle didn’t answer right away.

"We don’t see it as
likely,” Tuttle finally answered after a long pause. “Troop concentration is
extremely high in your quadrant. We need you to do everything you can to help
us get in there.”

"Hymph…," Kirken
mumbled quietly.

“But, if you do survive and we
take the town, I swear to Christ that I'll fly that chopper in myself to get
you and your family out."

Kirken looked away from the
holovid towards the blank wall behind it.

"You've run out of
opportunities to make a choice, Commander. Every dome has been sealed and
security shielded by cloak to hide their locations. You gave up the right
to be protected within them when you didn't report back for the recall."

Kirken brought his eyes back to
the screen.

"The shields will not be
turned off to let anyone inside. No one will go in or out until this war is
over. The people you are with are already dead. By them. By you. By us. It’s
been put into motion. There is nothing that can be done to change that.

“I’m offering a thread of a
chance to get you and your children out. If you refuse, you won't even have
that. By attempting what we ask, you will at least have an opportunity to fight
to the end against something that may or may not already have been decided by
fate. You will know that you did everything you possibly could to save them. No
matter what happens, nothing can ever be done to change that.”

Kirken felt the same horrible
choking feeling rising up and clogging his throat.

"I'll meet the drop,"
he whispered and switched off the holovid.

He slid himself further into the
corner and continued to stare at the wall. Mel came back from where she was
speaking in whispers with the children and rested her hands on his shoulders.
He sat there for a long while with her at his back trying to let everything
sink in. He tried to hide the sickly white he felt his face had become.

Mel gently stroked her fingers
through the blood crusted in his hair. While she did, Kirken pulled out the
last few of his out-of-dome medication packets and threw them listlessly in
front of him. Radiation poisoning was the least of his worries now.

He slowly reopened the holovid
to receive Tuttle's transmission of instructions and target orders. While the
numbers, maps and tactical details flew across the screen in front of him, he
prayed God would forgive him for what he was about to do.

Kirken leaned back and tried to
lose himself in the comfort of his daughter's touch.

They would leave. Very soon. Mel
would stay behind. It would be safer for her to remain underground with the
others and wait for them to come back and get her. Despite the protests she
would obviously make.

When night came, he would take
Brandon and meet the supply drop. From there they would head to the first
assigned target.

Kirken stayed there against the
wall for another few minutes listening to the air quietly go in and out of his
lungs. Finally, he picked himself up and walked slowly over to Brandon.

Mel dropped her arms from his
shoulders when he stood.

Kirken relayed Tuttle’s
instructions to his son. They readied themselves to leave as soon as darkness
fell.

Mel stayed sitting on the ground
and quietly watched. A tear made its way slowly down her cheek.

"How long have you known
about all this?" Brandon panted breathlessly trying to match Kirken's
quick pace.

They moved at an almost dead
sprint through the invaded town.

Soldiers patrolled the roadways
in trucks and jeeps. Troop stations and observation towers were at the corner
of every block. Fallen bodies rotted where they were gunned down on the
sidewalks and in the center of the street.

"I didn’t know,” Kirken
said stopping to catch his breath and waiting for Brandon to catch up. “I never
knew. Not until now. I swear that to you.”

They stepped into an alley away
from the dim streetlights.

"You've been military for
years…," Brandon accused. His eyes and expression reflected his disbelief.
“You’ve been a part of them all that time. How could you not?”

At that moment a strong odor
from the alley reached them causing them both to gag. They looked down around
to see a pair of bloated corpses wedged grotesquely against the side of the
building they stood beside.

"Brandon, I swear…,” Kirken
said and moved back away. “…I've never known about anything like this. I
honestly still can’t believe it myself."

He peered cautiously around the
side of the building looking for signs of the soldiers they had just left on
the street. Brandon took a step closer to the building and eyed up Kirken from
the back of his head.

"C'mon," Kirken said.
"Let's get moving."

He stepped around the corner.
And came back again when Brandon didn't follow him.

"Brandon," Kirken
whispered.

Brandon remained in the alley
looking down at the bodies.

Both were women. Neither could
have been more than twenty years old. Their eyes stared wide. Their mouths were
fixed open in still bloody screams.

"Brandon," Kirken said
pulling again at his arm. "We've got to go. Right now."

Brandon turned to him then. His
eyes flashed through the dimness lit briefly by the nearby streetlight.

It was then Kirken saw his rage.
Desperate rage. And the same hopeless anger he felt himself.

Also in that instant, much to
his horror, he saw something more.

There was also fear. Brandon's
face was ghostly white. His expression was set like rigid stone. Completely
empty of emotion or compassion, Kirken had never seen anything like this from
him before.

While Kirken watched, the rage
became one with the fright. The evil Kirken feared he always held in his own
heart he now saw in his son's face. It was in the wildness in his eyes. And the
set in his jaw.

"Brandon, let's go," Kirken
said pulling him again.

Brandon turned from the rotting
bodies and silently followed Kirken back into the street. Kirken turned and
started to run. Brandon got in pace behind him and did his best to keep up.

About an hour later they were
almost halfway across town. They stopped to rest at the side of the street when
two J.G.U. soldiers walked from the shadows of the dark storefronts.

The soldiers stepped through the
many rotting bodies strewn about the center of the street. They prodded them
roughly with the tips of their assault rifles and the toes of their boots
looking for signs of life.

Kirken grabbed Brandon by the
arm and pulled him away from the beams of a single streetlight.

The soldiers moved slowly about
the dead.

Standing close to Brandon,
Kirken sensed his son’s breathing grow heavier at the sight. He could feel his
anger seeping through his clothes.

A dog barked from the shadows
breaking the eerie silence. With fangs barred and a snarl rising from its
throat, it lunged at the closest soldier and buried its teeth into the center
of his knee.

The other soldier quickly raised
his weapon and fired. The dog dropped dead with the rest of the bodies along
the ground.

Even across a distance and in
the dark, Kirken caught a glimpse of the fear they all felt behind the
soldier’s startled eyes. Satisfied the dog was no longer a threat, the two
soldiers continued to search the rest of the lifeless forms.

Kirken turned around to see a
line of trucks moving up the roadway towards where they stood.

It was no longer possible to go
back from the direction they had come. Buildings and dead end alleys surrounded
them on every side. The only way out was past the two soldiers ahead.

Kirken pulled Brandon along next
to him and jogged closer to where the soldiers carefully stepped.

When they were less than twenty
feet away, Kirken put his hands against Brandon’s chest and pushed him back
behind the large concealing frame of the streetlight. Kirken then moved further
up the street.

The soldiers continued to walk
towards them still looking down across the ground.

Kirken glanced back once more to
where Brandon stood behind the light and then darted out behind the front of a
sun scorched pickup truck.

He held his breath and waited
for them to slowly come.

The soldiers continued to walk
closer to the truck when the sound of jet engines drew their attention
overhead.

Kirken reached around the front
of the truck and broke a headlight with his fist. The screaming engines above
completely drowned out the sound.

Pulling the largest piece of
broken glass from its frame, he slowly walked out from behind the truck towards
their turned backs. He raised his hand and was about to rip the glass across
the closest one’s throat when the second soldier suddenly turned around.

With only a bored expression on
his face, the soldier raised his weapon towards Kirken's chest.

Kirken kept his arm in the air
and waited for the shot to come when Brandon appeared silently behind them in
the dark.

He raised a tire iron that he
had snatched from the rear of the pickup truck Kirken had hidden behind and
smashed it violently against the backs of their knees. One of the soldiers
fired his weapon in the air in pain and surprise. Kirken dropped quickly to the
ground.

Kirken leapt back up and
sprinted the short distance to the screaming soldiers. He hurled his body
through the air hitting both in the chest and sending them crashing backwards
into the dirt.

A weapon fell loose from one of
their hands and skittered across the pavement out of reach. Kirken rolled
quickly away from their writhing bodies. When he was clear, Brandon clubbed the
closest one viciously across the back of his neck.

The J.G.U. soldier rolled on his
side along the sandy ground and was still.

His eyes blank and his breath
coming in heated gasps, Brandon bent down to look at the man he had just
killed. He still held the tire iron tightly in his hand.

"Brandon! Goddamn it!
Brandon!” Kirken’s cries brought his attention back around. “Augggghhh!
Brandon!"

The second soldier had quickly
stood again. With two crushing blows to his chest and head, he knocked Kirken
from his feet. He jumped across his chest and wedged an elbow across his neck.
Kirken struggled fiercely beneath his weight.

"Brandon! Goddamn it!"

Even in the dark, Kirken’s face
was a brilliant red. He thrashed violently side to side like an animal caught
in a trap trying fiercely to pry the soldier’s gloved fingers from the base of
his throat.

Finally looking away from the
first soldier’s body, Brandon sprinted over. Raising the tire iron high over
his head, he brought it down hard across the back of the second soldier’s head.
The soldier’s body tensed briefly like a statue and then fell limply across
Kirken’s chest.

Kirken blinked away the blood
that had sprayed across his face and gasped to breathe. He pushed at the
soldier’s body trying to roll it off next to him when Brandon brought the tire
iron down again. A sickening crunch of destroyed bone followed the second blow.

"Brandon!" Kirken
screamed trying to get up from beneath the body and back on his feet.
"Brandon, don't! Stop!"

With a blank look in his eye,
Brandon brought the tire iron down again. Thick drops of blood splashed across
his own face.

"Goddamn it! Brandon
no!!"

Before he could swing another
time, Kirken jumped through the air and grabbed him from behind his back.
Holding him around his waist, he struggled to pin both his shaking arms to his
side.

"Brandon, you have got to stop!!"

Brandon continued to stare at
the bloody soldier on the ground. His expression remained fearless and enraged.
As if he wasn’t even aware he was being held, he tried to bring his arm up
again.

“Brandon!”

Kirken threw all his weight into
the small of Brandon’s back slamming them both hard into the side of the pickup
truck. With a loud breaking of glass, their shoulders smashed through the
passenger window.

Despite a large piece of glass
that wedged in his skin when their arms went through, Kirken managed to keep
his grip. Brandon continued to clutch the tire iron tightly in his fist. For
several long minutes, neither made a sound.

Kirken released his breath
loudly and lowered his head against the back of Brandon’s neck. Brandon didn’t
move and just stared at the dead soldier at the edge of their feet.

They stayed there in the dark at
the side of the truck with their arms extended through the pieces of shattered glass.
Kirken held his son tightly waiting for his muscles to relax. They both
listened to the echoes of the battle fading up the street.

Finally Brandon moved his head
and gazed over the top of the truck to the sidewalk.

"Brandon…," Kirken
whispered in his ear trying to choke back his sobs. "Brandon, please stop.
You have to stop."

Brandon turned around slowly in
Kirken's arms.

Blood covered his face, and his
eyes stared open brightly in the dark.

Kirken let his arms drop and
cautiously stepped back. The back of his shoes bumped against the body lying on
the ground.

Brandon stood next to the truck
lost in his own furious thoughts. He lowered his arms slowly and rested the
tire iron loosely at his side. A drop of blood followed by another slid along
its length and dripped slowly from its tip.

Kirken reached out and took it
from his hand. Brandon barely moved and only slightly relaxed his grip.
Silently, Kirken walked to the next car up the street and slid it underneath in
the dirt.

"We have to go,"
Kirken whispered again. "It's almost time for the drop."

For another few seconds, Brandon
did not move. His eyes followed Kirken as he walked away. When he was about a
block ahead and far enough away where he couldn't see, he walked to the car and
crouched to his knees.

He reached below its rusty
decayed tailpipe and pulled the tire iron from underneath. Looking back at the
two dead soldiers, he slowly hooked it to his belt. He then broke into a run
towards where Kirken waited for him almost two blocks ahead. They exchanged
wordless stares when he jogged up.

Kirken glanced briefly at the
tire iron hanging from his waist. The reflection from a streetlight flashed
across its surface off into the night.

They sprinted another six blocks
through a sickening labyrinth of sand, blood and bodies until they finally
reached the outskirts of the town.

When they finally stopped,
Kirken rested his back against the petrified cinders of a sun-scorched tree
jutting from the ground. Brandon dropped next to him and rolled over onto his
back.

Kirken glanced again at the tire
iron resting near Brandon's knee. He looked only briefly before wordlessly
turning his gaze away. They waited there for more than three hours. Neither of
them spoke during that time.

Kirken turned his eyes toward
the blackened heavens looking for signs of the airdrop and trying to push from
his mind everything that had just occurred.

Brandon rolled over on his
stomach across the sandy ground and stared guardedly towards the street leading
into Beuford.

"We never should have left
her,” Brandon finally said flatly with no emotion in his voice. “We should have
brought her with us. We have no idea what’s going to happen.”

Brandon’s eyes didn’t leave the
street. Kirken could hear his breath coming slow, hard and controlled into the
dark night. He dropped his eyes to him for a second and then skyward again.

At that moment a black parachute
floated into view. The wind caught it briefly and carried it further away from
the town.

Brandon stood quickly, and they
both chased after it across the burning sand. It landed with a muffled crash in
a small cluster of decayed trees about a quarter mile away.

"Do you see any more?"
Brandon asked pulling the chute from the jutting branches of a disintegrating
tree.

"One,” Kirken said
rummaging through the fluttering chute Brandon worked to flatten across the
ground. “I only saw one.”

Its windswept material singed
his fingers and hands. In large jagged patches, it burned straight through
where it touched his clothes.

The chute carried three gigantic
crates with enough supplies and equipment to outfit a small platoon. Kirken dug
into them hurriedly and began loading himself up with weapons, assault gear and
food.

At the same time, Brandon
scurried to gather up the chute. Kirken threw an empty pack to him when he had
finished so that he could do the same.

"Take everything you
possibly can," Kirken told him. "We're going to need it. We’re going
to need it all. We probably won’t be able to get back here for more."

Brandon nodded back.

When Brandon was through
readying his own gear, they dug a large hole and buried what they couldn’t
carry deep within the scorched earth.

Kirken checked his equipment one
last time before they turned and headed back to town. They left the empty
crates and parachute behind them in an open area away from the blackened trees.