Mountain Home

[DirtPirate]

Who needs enemies...with "friends" like that???

I think Ms. Mayor is actually Hillary Clinton... a.k.a. "The Anti-Christ".. :lol:

[mitunnelrat]

One word. Wow.

[Christian for Israel]

jack didn't go to europe to bring people in, the town did.

[DocOutlands]

Ah, ok - I misremembered that part. Dumb townies.

[Christian for Israel]

Chapter 31

When the majority of the security force failed to return, Sylvia called an emergency meeting of the council. She sent for Jean and told him to be there also, determined to get to the bottom of this. When everyone had arrived and settled down she turned to the colonel and said “it appears that your security team has deserted, what do you intend to do about it?”

Looking exasperated, Jean responded “I don’t know what to do. I can’t bring them back by myself, even if I did know where to look. I need more men to be able to do anything.”

“You know,” Jim said, “they’re not the only ones to leave either.”

Turning to face him, Sylvia said “what do you mean?”

Seeing the suddenly serious look on her face, Jim hesitated before continuing. “Well it seems that since the election most of the children, those under twenty-one, have simply picked up and left. Also many of the older people are gone, leaving us with almost no pilots, and very few people to work the farms.”

Staring at him icily and speaking in low tones that made the councilman nervous, she asked “where did they go?”

“Uh…we don’t know…they seem to have just wandered off. They didn’t take much with them, no more than they could carry, and it doesn’t appear they left in a group…no more than two or three at a time at the most…”

The rage grew within Sylvia at this news. She waited a second to make sure she was in control of her voice as she knew it was more intimidating if she remained outwardly calm. Finally she spoke “and WHY didn’t you tell me about this earlier?”

Beginning to get nervous, Jim replied “I-I thought you knew…”

Turning to Jean she said “Colonel, hand me your pistol.”

Caught off guard by the request, Jean paused before complying. The look in her eyes convincing him that he didn’t want to get on her bad side just now. Unstrapping the top of his holster, the colonel withdrew the pistol and handed it to the woman.

Taking the gun loosely in her hand, she looked off into space and said to no one in particular “I consider withholding valuable information from me a traitorous act.” Then she turned quickly, bringing the gun up as she did. Before he could even voice a protest she pointed it at Jim and fired. The sound of the shot was deafening, it echoed off the walls of the large room. Looking at her in growing horror, the others decided the woman before them must be evil incarnate. They also decided that upsetting her would not be a good idea, and resolved to do whatever she asked, no matter what.

At the sound of the shot one of the few security guards that had actually returned rushed into the room. Stopping and staring in confusion at the sight of a dead councilman on the floor and the gun in the Mayor’s hand, he was unsure what to do. Seeing him arrive, the mayor ordered, “guard, get a detail together and clean this mess out of the council chambers immediately.” Hearing the tone of her voice, the guard turned away to comply.

Sylvia had expected the reaction she’d gotten from the others in the room, what she did not expect was the feeling of ultimate power the killing of another human being had given her. She decided right then that she would always keep a gun on her, and even get Jean to show her how to really use one. Turning to him once again she ordered him to go out and find more people to replace the men he’d lost. She didn’t care where he found them, or what they were like, as long as they were willing to take on some…extreme jobs…and would remain loyal to her.

Backing nervously out of the room, Jean already had an idea who he’d get. Over the summer they’d brought in a number of rough and tumble characters from Eastern Europe, along with some American criminals. They had spent their time in town getting into trouble and fighting, and would be the perfect replacements for the security force, if his suspicions about the mayor’s plans were accurate. He’d noticed the look in her eye when she’d shot Jim. He’d seen it many times before, and always before, destruction had followed.

After the colonel had left the room, Sylvia looked at April. “As soon as he gets the new security force together, I want you to take charge of directing them to secure the town. You will issue the passes to allow people to leave, and you will be responsible for them coming back. If anyone else disappears, your life is forfeit…do you understand me?”

Looking at her with horror, April only nodded. Inside she was thinking that, if she were smart she would join those who were leaving. But she had always craved power, and this position would be more power than she’d ever had in her life. Now she only had to figure out a way to keep anyone else from escaping.

Next, she spoke to the newest council member, Richard “and I want you to begin organizing patrols to bring in more outsiders. We’ve had contact with many groups who’ve refused to join us, isn’t that right?”

“Y-Y-Yes ma’am, there are a lot of smaller clusters who said they were just fine and didn’t want to come here.”

“Good. Well, that is no longer an option for them. I don’t care what you have to do, or what means are necessary to accomplish your mission, but I want this town full again, and you will take care of that.”

Richard looked at her nervously. When he’d agreed to join the council it seemed like a wonderful opportunity to get his own agenda passed, but the events of this evening made him realize that the only agenda that mattered was Sylvia’s. He’d always been a liberal. His biggest concerns were to get the town to understand the evils of burning oil for electricity and hurting trees. They had a chance as he saw it to start over right this time, and not hurt nature anymore. One of his most secret desires had been the legalizing of relations between people and animals. He’d always had a few pets he’d been involved with, and felt there was nothing wrong with it. But now, with the way Sylvia was acting, he was afraid to even mention it. Who knew if she’d get upset and shoot him also if she found out what he liked to do with animals.

Thinking about his desires, he told the Mayor he’d take care of it, but that extreme measures might be necessary. He was well aware that, if he could get their inhibitions down in other areas, they wouldn’t care so much about his particular fetish.

The Mayor told him to do whatever was necessary, but that she wanted people willing to work, not beaten down. He said he understood, and with that, the meeting ended.




Jean had good success, and over the next few weeks was able to recruit more than fifty ruffians to act as the core of his new army. These were men without conscience, men who delighted in inflicting pain on others. Most had some fighting experience of one sort or another, and several had been in various military organizations. Three were pilots and they were assigned the job of training others to fly as well. Since the departure of the teens had stripped the town of qualified pilots, replacing them had become top priority.

Checking out what kind of aircraft they had to work with, the pilots were delighted to find the A-10’s. Quickly mastering the craft, they started training others in their handling as well, knowing they would be useful in forcing other groups to bow to the will of the town. One of the pilots had experience in helicopters, and had workers start prepping one of the remaining Black Hawks for his personal use. This particular craft was the armed ‘Pave Low’ variant, and had stubby wings which held additional weapons. It was equipped with .30 caliber machine guns and carried eight ‘Hellfire’ anti-tank missiles. The pilot thought they were the most beautiful things in the world, and almost wept as he caressed them.

Jean had also recruited other guards to work with April as town patrols. The people he looked for didn’t have much if any experience, but he could tell instinctually that they were willing to do whatever was asked of them. April had immediately conscripted several hundred citizens to begin putting up a fence around the town. She figured it was the only way to ensure that no one else escaped. Her work force didn’t have any experience in things like this, but she didn’t care. How hard could it be? All they had to do was put in poles and string barbed wire, right?

When they were done with the project it sure looked impressive to her. Sylvia even commented that no one would be able to get through it. The fence was ten feet high, and had wire running along every six inches, all the way up. On top there was what Jean had called ‘razor wire’, and if you even touched it the stuff would cut deep. What she wasn’t aware of was, you could still lift the barbed wire between two posts enough to slip through, but they wouldn’t learn that until later.

The fence did stop most people from simply wandering off, but as the weeks went by and only certain people were allowed out, more and more citizens managed to get through the sloppy excuse for a barrier, as there weren’t enough guards to watch the whole perimeter, the migration away from town hardly slowed. April was aware that not everyone was being stopped by her fence, but she made sure Sylvia never found out. After all, she valued her life.

What she did do was increase patrols in town and institute a curfew. Anyone caught out at night was severely beaten and many were raped, both men and women. If that indignity wasn’t bad enough, they and anyone else caught doing anything the new government said was wrong were forced to work the farm as punishment. The people left in town had for the most part never done hard physical labor in their lives. But with the loss of strong young people to work the fields, someone was needed to plant and harvest. Few of the new laborers protested the treatment either, not after seeing examples of what happened to trouble makers. The first few were hanged, but after a while the patrols simply beat or raped them to death. This served to thoroughly cow the people who hadn’t have the courage to escape and soon protests ceased entirely.



During this time Jack and the others in the complex had been virtually cut off from news of what was happening in town. The flow of refugees had stopped and they had no way of finding out what was going on. At the time of the assault he’d considered torching the security team, but his Christian morals wouldn’t let him do it without issuing a warning first. To his surprise, they had heeded that warning, preventing him from having to kill them. Jack was well aware that sometimes fighting and killing were necessary, but he hated the thought of it. Only if he had solid evidence of wrong doing, or if he and his people were in imminent danger would he consider taking such action. As it stood, besides the rumors and stories, and the arrest attempt, he had nothing firm to base an attack on the town on, and the last thing he wanted to do was start a war. He was well aware that while he did have some weapons, to get into a shooting war with outsiders was pretty close to suicide. After all, they had the whole world around them to use for resources, while all he had was what was within the shelter itself.

Praying that everything would work out, and feeling a leading to stay put and rest in God’s presence, he and his people tried to get on with their lives. Hopefully soon either God would act Himself, Jack thought, or at least give him guidance as to what to do to make things right again.



After six weeks the new assault teams were ready for their first raid. Looking around the town, Sylvia was impressed with how far they’d come. The fence was up and seemed to be keeping people in, and her patrols were roaming the streets. The people were obviously frightened of the patrols, and that delighted her. She knew that the secret of control was fear, and felt the town was well on it’s way to becoming a great seat of power. Now they were reaching out, and soon would control a much larger area. Looking ahead she could imagine every person in the whole world bowing before her, worshipping her as a god and doing whatever she commanded without a thought. The idea filled her with an almost sexual excitement, and in that mood she watched as the team boarded two helicopters in preparation for the start of her conquest of the world.

The team consisted of nine men, more than enough for the job ahead. Besides the pilots there were six troopers and Richard, who was acting as commanding officer and would be conducting the negotiations. The troops were aboard the slick Black Hawk, with the Pave-low along for fire support. They quickly flew to an area about seventy-five miles away, where there was supposed to be a group of eleven people trying to run a small farm. Arriving within the hour, they flew low and assessed the situation. The farm wasn’t very big, there was a small single story house and a barn, with about thirty acres planted. As they came in over the place they saw a couple of people running into the house, and after that, nothing. Instructing the pilot to land in the front yard, Richard got ready to negotiate with the leader of these people.

As soon as they touched down he got out, walking to a point about halfway between the ship and the building. After a minute an old man appeared in the door, and called out “who are you and what do you want?”

The man appeared to be past seventy, and Richard decided this was going to be easy “we’re here to let you know that by order of the United States government, you and your family are to be relocated to an area where you can be supplied with assistance. This area is now restricted and that’s why we’re ordering you to move.” The idea to claim authority of the government had been his, All his life he’d looked to the authorities to provide everything he needed, and the thought of anyone actually not WANTING the government to get involved was foreign to him. That was why he was so shocked when the man refused.

“We don’t need anything, thanks. Now, if you’ll be on your way, we have to get back to the fields.”

“Maybe you didn’t understand me,” Richard tried again, “but you don’t have any choice! You and your family will immediately get on the helicopter or we will gather you up by force!” maybe a little intimidation will work, he thought.

As he finished, the man raised his hands above his head. Unknown to Richard, that was a signal to the people inside that these visitors were hostile, and they opened fire immediately. Shocked beyond belief that anyone would actually shoot at what they thought was the US government, it took Richard a second to realize that he needed to get back into the helicopter before he got killed. Fortunately the shooting had been poorly aimed, and he made it back safely. Getting on the radio to the other chopper, he ordered the pilot to destroy the house. As his bird climbed into the air, the Pave-Low came in behind them, lining up on the front of the house.

As soon as he was in position the pilot fired one of the Hellfire missiles at the front door. The explosion was huge, lifting the roof right off the house. As the shooting stopped, he held off on firing anymore, and they waited for the smoke to clear. After a few minutes the first ship landed again, but this time it was the strike force that approached. In the rubble that used to be the house they found seven survivors. Four of them were teens and one was a boy of about six. There was a woman in her early twenties, and she was holding an infant. Everyone else had been killed in the blast, and these were shell shocked and bleeding from multiple cuts. The woman was holding her baby tightly to her chest when the men got to her. One grabbed her arm and tried to drag her to her feet, but she resisted, trying to shield the child. Angered, the man ripped the baby from her arms, dropping it on the floor. Drawing his pistol he shot it through the body then turned to the woman and said “if you resist anymore, you’ll get the same…now let’s go!”

Screaming hysterically, the woman clawed the man in an effort to get away and return to her murdered child. Clubbing her on the back of the head, the blow stunning her, the trooper dragged her to the waiting helicopter. On the ride back to the town, the man leered at her and said “don’t worry about the brat pretty thing, I’m sure some of us will be more than happy to give you some more.”

Overcome by grief and horror at the situation she and the rest of them were now in, the woman just sat there weeping for her dead child.

Over the next several weeks the town sent out raiding parties every day. The people they brought in were usually in bad shape, having tried to put up a fight before being captured. When they got to town they were immediately put to work as slaves, first at the farms, then later at other jobs no one wanted to do. The young women and the children were often claimed by citizens of the town, with the raiders and town officials getting first choice. Most of these became live-in mistresses and the children playthings of those so inclined, but others were simply forced to act as household servants. When they invariably acted up or tried to escape, they were abused severely, a few even being killed either through beatings or intentionally, for sport among the citizens.

By this time, anyone who had any decency had managed to escape and the town was full of people who’s only desire was the pain and degradation of others. Although this had united the town in depravity, it hadn’t really served their main purpose, that of getting more people. All told, they had brought in less than a hundred people from the local area, and more than half of these had died since arriving. What they realized they’d have to do was travel beyond the range of the helicopters, and to do that they’d need to figure out a way to get fuel where they needed it.

Faced with the problem, the pilots informed the council that there was a C-130 equipped with the army’s drogue refueling system. The helicopters already had refueling nozzles installed, and it should be simple enough to learn to refuel while in flight. This would extend their range to more than a thousand miles, and bring within range several larger groups that had been beyond their abilities to deal with before. The council gave their approval to the plan, and the next day they started training.

Refueling a helicopter in flight was easier said than done, they found out. With the chopper flying at full speed, the airplane going so slow it was close to stalling, and the prop wash knocking both the drogue and the chopper about, trying to stick the needle like probe into the tiny drogue basket seemed impossible at first. After several near collisions and failed attempts, they finally figured out the trick, and then spent a couple of weeks perfecting the technique.

Among the larger communities now within range was one village in northern New Mexico. The group had reported having more than a hundred people when contacted by radio, but had admitted that half were children. From what they had said, their defenses consisted of rifles and a few light machine guns, and the raiders were confident they would be easily overawed at the sight of the Pave-Low. Apparently the raiders still hadn’t learned anything.

The flight down to the village was uneventful, the refueling going off without a hitch. After more than seven hours in the air they arrived and the large plane landed at a local airport. Leaving it, the choppers arrived at the village, now well used to seeing people scurrying for cover upon their arrival. Landing, the representative was sent toward what appeared to be the main building. They no longer risked their own people on such dangerous duty and instead sent one of their slaves. As the man approached, he was hailed by someone from within the building. Stating that the town was supposed to be relocated north and everyone here was going to be taken prisoner, the slave quickly dropped to the ground as the villagers opened fire. Of course that wasn’t what he was supposed to tell them, but by this time he was beyond caring what happened to him, simply wanting his wretched life to be over.

The shots from the buildings weren’t unexpected, but their accuracy was. As the first ship lifted back into the air the gunship circled around and prepared to launch a missile. But this time, as he was lining up to take the shot, someone from within the buildings fired a single round from a salvaged .50 caliber high powered rifle. The well aimed shot penetrated the wind screen of the helicopter, hitting the pilot and nearly severing his neck.

Immediately the ship went down, exploding into a ball of fire as it hit. No one from the crew survived, and the pilot of the other bird quickly became aware of the serious trouble he was in as the same .50 caliber opened up on him. Finally moving outside the range of that gun, he tried to assess the situation. His co-pilot was dead, along with the leader of the raider squad. Several of the troopers were injured also, and the helicopter was handling roughly. Climbing above the surrounding hills, he raised the people left to stay with the plane on the radio. Informing them as to what happened, he felt the ship lurch, then become uncontrollable as all power died. Going down, the pilot had never been taught how to auto-rotate and therefore could do nothing to prevent a crash. They hit the ground hard, stunning everyone aboard. Before any of them could get his wits back, the craft caught fire, exploding seconds later.

Seeing the smoke from the crashed chopper, the pilot of the C-130 made his decision. Starting the engines he quickly took off, headed back towards Mayfield.

[mitunnelrat]

Holy Cow, the Antichrist is a woman!?

[PyroUSC]

Yes, her name is Hillary Clinton.

[Christian for Israel]

Chapter 32 part 1

The pilot climbed to altitude quickly, heading home as fast as the plane would go. When he was within radio range he called the town and reported what had happened. Waiting while the message was relayed to someone else, he was distressed to hear the radio operator inform him that Sylvia had demanded that he report to her as soon as he landed. Suddenly breaking out into a cold sweat, he wondered if he were in trouble.

A couple of hours later he landed at Boise. There was a hummer waiting for him at the end of the runway, and when he got in he became even more nervous as the other occupants looked at him as if he were an insect. They refused to answer his questions or even speak, and in silence they rode towards the town. Twenty minutes later they arrived in front of the building, and he was told by one of the guards to report directly to the council chambers. Walking into the room he saw that several people were already there, waiting for him.

Sylvia was in rare form, actually foaming at the mouth. The pilot suddenly knew this was going to be bad, and hoped he’d live to walk out of that room again. The mayor had been screaming at anyone she could since finding out the assault team had been killed. As she got worked up, spittle began to fly from her mouth with every word she spoke. Everyone present had been showered as she ranted on, her face blood red with anger, the veins popping out and pulsing along with her words.

Turning and directing her considerable wrath on the pilot as he walked into the room, she screamed at him “WHAT DO YOU MEAN THE ASSAULT TEAM WAS KILLED?” Continuing in a slightly lower tone, she said “how could you let this happen!? Nobody does this to me, do you understand! Don’t they know who I am!? Don’t they know I’m the leader of the civilized world!? How DARE they attack me like this!? YOU! It’s YOUR fault! You’re a traitor…a rotten TRAITOR!”

Suddenly she drew her pistol. She’d spent a considerable amount of time each day practicing with it, and was now quite good. What’s more, she was completely comfortable with it, it was almost a part of her now. Raising the gun and resting the sights on the forehead of the pilot, she pulled the trigger. Again and again she fired, until the gun was empty. The face of the man was practically gone by the time she’d emptied the weapon, and all his blood had poured out, covering the floor behind his corpse. Finally, she lowered the weapon, quickly changing the magazine and re-holstering it, her rage spent. Turning to Jean she said in a more normal voice “I’ll show them. I’ll show them all! The whole world will see what happens to those who oppose me! Get your pilots ready. I want those planes they love so much to bomb those people into oblivion. I don’t want a single one left alive…DO YOU HEAR ME?!

Nodding quickly, Jean said he’d take care of it immediately. He didn’t point out that, without radio or TV services anymore, there was no way anyone would know what they did to the village, and therefore no one else would learn anything. Considering her mood, he thought it best to keep that tidbit to himself. One thing he did realize now however was that his leader was crazy. More than that, she was stark raving mad. Deep down inside he’d always known that, but her actions lately had made it obvious. He didn’t know when it had happened, if it was the plague and the deaths of everyone that drove her insane, or the sudden rise to power that had done it. All he was sure of was that she was getting worse, and if someone didn’t do something, and soon, she’d be the death of them all. Of course, he also knew she had the loyalty of the raiders, as she had taken pains to give them anything they wanted, ensuring that they stayed true to her. Because of that it wouldn’t be easy for anyone to get close enough to remove her, not without forfeiting their life in the process. Thinking these things, he thought for the first time that the idea of just leaving maybe wasn’t so bad after all.

Quickly calling the raiders, he told them what she had ordered. They, as opposed to himself, were delighted with the idea. They were tired of bombing empty buildings, and longed for real, live targets for their weapons. Getting together, they discussed just how to pull this off. After a bit they decided to take six A-10’s, loaded out with an assortment of bombs. The problem was the range was too great. They’d barely have enough fuel to get there, and none at all for the return trip. What’s more, the air refueling set-up for the planes was configured for the Air Force system, and wouldn’t work with the drogue refueler they’d used with the Black Hawks. As there wasn’t time to find an Air Force refueler and they had no experience with that system anyway, they decided to simply load a couple of large fuel tanks into a C-17 and fly it to an airport close to the village. After they refueled they could attack the town, then easily return home.

Deciding on how to pull off the raid, they contacted the airport and ordered the planes readied for the mission. An hour later they arrived and found everything ready to go. Getting into the planes they were soon in the air headed southeast, looking forward to kicking some butt.

A couple of hours later, with very little fuel remaining in the tanks of the attack planes, they landed at the airport in Santa Fe. They were now less than a hundred miles from their target, and this was a perfect place to refuel. As the crew of the cargo plane got out and brought out the fuel tanks, the A-10’s taxied up one at a time and were refueled. As soon as the last plane was full they took off again, the C-17 remaining to top off their tanks on the return trip, before they headed home.

Forming up, the attack group turned toward the village, and a few minutes later they spotted it. Coming in at treetop level, they made one pass to get an idea of which buildings were likely to contain people. The site looked to have been some sort of industrial park before the plague, and there were a dozen or more large metal buildings clustered together. Also the flight leader noticed there were a bunch of mobile homes in the parking lot of the main building, likely housing for some of the villagers. Deciding on how he wanted to hit the place, he ordered his group to attack in pairs. The first two planes were loaded out with five hundred pound general purpose bombs. As they circled the area, the first two leveled off and made their run. The bombs dropped in salvo, and the effect was more than they’d hoped for. The trailers were flattened by the concussion, and all of the metal buildings were severely damaged, collapsing in on themselves. As he’d hoped, the leader saw that the effect had been like kicking an anthill, the occupants, those that could anyway, were running out of the buildings into the open.

Calling to his wingman to follow, he started in on his run, these two planes were loaded with CBU’s. CBU’s, or cluster bomb units, were thin walled bomb casings filled with hundreds of small bomblets. About the power of a hand grenade, they were scattered in a cloud by a small bursting charge within the casing, raining the bomblets down to explode on the ground. The shrapnel produced was devastating, and after dropping his load he looked back and saw that nothing moved anywhere in the target area. Climbing out again, all of the aircraft began strafing runs with the big GAU-8 30mm cannons on anything that looked as it might hide a living person. Finally, as the guns were exhausted, the leader told the final two aircraft to drop their load. These planes were carrying napalm, jellied gasoline. As the planes crossed the remains of the village he saw the tanks of napalm drop free, tumbling to the earth and erupting in massive balls of fire. That last run started a firestorm over the target, ensuring that nothing could survive. Happy with the results of their work, the flight gathered up and returned to Santa Fe to refuel, before heading back to Boise.

Landing several hours later, the raiders made their way to town, having already calling in and announcing their great victory. As they arrived they found a huge party already underway, and the people treating them as conquering heroes. As they entered the community center, they were greeted by Sylvia. Smiling and congratulating them on a job well done, she informed them that tonight, the rules were off. Usually the raiders were restricted to raping and abusing only those groups who resisted when they went to bring them into the town, but tonight they were free to do anything they wanted, with anyone in town. Grinning with anticipation, the raiders looked forward to the nights’ festivities. Before they left however, Sylvia had one more job for them. “In the morning I want you to load those planes up with every bomb they can carry, and go up to that Jack’s place and bomb him to oblivion…do you understand me…I don’t want ANYONE coming out of his place alive. Now go and enjoy yourselves, you’ve earned it.”



Deep in his underground shelter, Jack and the others were aware that the town had attacked somebody, having heard the reported victory on the radio. They had no idea of who, or why, or where, and he was now in the dining room discussing the event, although he also had a deep sense of foreboding. Coming to the door of the control room, Robin, who was on duty there called to him and said there was someone on the radio asking to speak to him only. Surprised, as he’d not gotten any direct communications from anyone outside the complex since before the election, he got up and went to see who was calling.

Sitting in front of the computer screen, he acknowledged the call and identified himself. On the screen typed words began to appear.

“Jack, before I tell you who I am, let me first warn you. The people of that town near you attacked us earlier today, and the survivors here have retaliated. They found a bunch of cruise missiles at an Air Force base not far from here last year, and a couple of them had tactical nuclear warheads. They went to try and launch them at the town, and I just heard them fly overhead a minute ago. You only have about an hour, so get all your people inside that shelter of yours right now! You don’t have any time to lose, I’ll wait here until you come back.”

Staring at the screen in amazement, Jack suddenly reached over and hit the panic button. As the sirens went off, he spoke into the microphone “ATTENTION! ATTENTION! ALL PERSONNEL, GET INSIDE THE SHELTER IMMEDIATELY, A NUCLEAR ATTACK IS UNDER WAY. I REPEAT GET INSIDE IMMEDIATELY, WE’RE ABOUT TO BE NUKED!”

Turning to those around him, he began issuing orders to get everyone inside immediately and make sure no one was left on the surface. Then get the doors closed and make sure the air filters were moved into place. Reaching for the short range radio, he felt obligated to warn the town. At first no one responded to his calls, but finally an old man answered, though he sounded drunk. “Yeah…wha’da’ya want. And who is this, anyway?”

“This is Jack, there’s an attack on its way. Get all your people to safety, you’re about to be nuked.”

“Jack? Oh yeah, the perv. Listen, why are ya calling us Jackie, are ya ready to surrender yet?”

“Listen to me, the people you guys attacked today have launched a nuke at you. Get everyone under cover now, there’s not much time!” Jack ordered, exasperated.

“Huh? Them folks we bombed to h*ll today? Don’cha worry ‘bout them none, they’re all dead. Now, if’n ya wanna come on into town, we’re havin’ a little party. You might even get to have a drink before one of us shoots you!”

They could hear the man laughing in the background, until the sound suddenly ceased. Calling again, Jack wasn’t able to raise anyone, and figured the guy had turned off the radio.

“Well, I tried. I don’t know what else I can do.”

“Nothing that I can think of,” Robin said, “you did everything you could and more than they deserved.”

Saddened at the loss of life that was coming, he turned back to the long range radio and contacted their mysterious friend again.

“Thank you for the warning, all of our people are now safe inside. Now, if you don’t mind, would you tell us who you are?” he typed.

A few seconds later, more words appeared on the screen “it’s good to hear that you took me serious, warning you was the least I could do after what you did for me. Right after the plague, you took me into your shelter. You fed me and gave me a bed, and were kinder to me than anyone I could remember. And I repaid you by attacking a young girl and trying to kill you all and take over your shelter. You had every reason in the world to kill me for what I’d done, and no reason to let me live, but you did anyway. You flew me a long ways off and told me about God on the way. I didn’t want to listen and my heart was filled with hate for what you were doing, but that didn’t stop you. Finally you landed, and put me out. Before you left you gave me food and water, and something that became even more valuable to me, a Bible.”

Stunned at this revelation, Jack typed “Doug, is that you?”

“Yes, it’s me. I walked for weeks after you dropped me off, dreaming of getting even with you. But I was too far away to really do more than dream, and eventually finding food was more important. After a while the things you said to me began to penetrate, and my anger finally left me. I started reading the Bible you gave me, and before too long asked Jesus into my heart. I repented of all the terrible things I’d done, and from then on have tried to make up for some of them. Before I go on, I’d really like to apologize to the young lady I tried to rape, is she still there?”

“She’s right here next to me, she’s been reading along this whole time.” He typed

Robin was shocked when she realized who this was, remembering the attack like it happened the day before. But finding out that the man who did it was now a brother in Christ, and was asking her to forgive him, her heart went out to him. Turning to Jack, she said “tell him there’s nothing to apologize for, I forgive him.”

Typing again, he told Doug what she’d said. There was a pause, then the words started again. “Pardon me, her words brought tears to my eyes. From the time I finally realized the truth and turned to God, I have wanted to ask her to forgive me for what I did. Now that she has, I’m overcome.”

“Please go on Doug, tell us what happened.” Jack prompted.

“It was funny really, I guess God was keeping people away from me until I turned to Him, because as soon as I did I found a couple of others. I told them what happened to me, and what I’d done, expecting them to leave when they found out what kind of man I was, but they didn’t. Instead they wanted to know more, and soon both of them wanted to come to God as well.

After that more and more people showed up. We’d taken over an old factory and converted it into a home, and eventually we had to bring in trailers to house all the people here. We never bothered anyone and tried to just do what we felt God wanted us to do. When that town contacted us, I was afraid you’d kill me if I went there, so we turned down their offer to join them.

All was ok for a while, until a few days ago when a couple of helicopters showed up, and someone got out and told us they were there to take us all prisoners. Well, the folks didn’t take too kindly to that, and fired some warning shots. The guy that brought the message just hit the dirt, and didn’t try and get back to the helicopter, so we left him alone. Then the other helicopter attacked us, and we were forced to shoot them down.

After it was over the man got up and surrendered to us. He said he was a slave in the town they were from, and told us where it was, and all kinds of stories about what was going on there. He also said that, although he’d never met you, he’d heard that the leader of that town hated you with a passion, and had you trapped inside that shelter of yours. He said they were trying to figure out a way to get you out, but hadn’t come up with anything yet.

At first the others here wanted to attack the town and stop what was going on, but I stopped them and said that we didn’t have anything other than one man’s word to take. We couldn’t justify attacking a whole town on the testimony of only one, and should just wait and see what happened. I guess I was wrong to tell them to wait, but really there wasn’t time to do anything anyway, they returned before too long and bombed us really bad. The attack killed more than eighty people outright, and wounded about everyone else. I happened to be at the radio, which we kept in another building down the road from the village, which is why I survived.

When I heard who was attacking, and especially when I talked to Mark, the ex-slave, I knew you couldn’t have had anything to do with it, so I decided I had to warn you. I’m sorry this had to happen Jack, I hate that more people have to die, but the survivors here figured that if they didn’t do this, that town would be able to come back, or even do this to someone else.”

“I understand your reasons for launching the missiles Doug, and I don’t blame you.” Jack typed. “Thank you for the warning brother, we all forgive you for what happened before, and would be happy to meet you again someday, if we survive this attack, that is. I need to get the antenna down now so any electro-magnetic pulse doesn’t fry the radio. We’ll try and contact you again, as soon as it’s safe to do so.”

With that, he pushed back from the screen and reached over, flicking the switch that retracted the antenna. Shutting off the radio and disconnecting the wires to be sure, he got up to walk through and check things out, making sure they were really as ready as they could be.

In the town, while taking a break in the cool night air from the noise inside, one of the women heard the sound of a jet engine above her in the sky. Wondering who would be flying over them at night, she looked up. Seeing nothing at first, she was suddenly blinded by a flash of light that filled her world. A split second later, she and the rest of the town ceased to exist.




































[img]http://www.strangecosmos.com/images/content/106739.jpg[/img]

[DocOutlands]

Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind...

[DirtPirate]

Whelp...that solves one problem.....