A flabbergasted Sergeant Hal Rickson had stumbled out of the S-ATV during these orders, a com-set still dangling under his helmet’s chinstrap. His mouth worked a few times toward the end and when he finally managed to say something, it was, “What? Captain, fuck’s sake, welding on this will be suicide, and she’s packed to the gills with materiel, our strict orders are to bring them in for process—”
“Whose orders are you taking tonight, Sergeant?”
“Captain Murphy’s. Sir. He told us twice, until we’re back on—”
“My colleague Murphy’s orders,” said Captain Raaen, “amended by the Colonel’s superior understanding, is that we are all to exhibit sound judgment in the field pertaining to our advancing perimeter, potential hostiles, and discretionary interception of friendly or neutral disease carriers, correct?”
“Well, yeah. Yes, sir. But—”
“And this elderly black man back here is clearly diseased. Can’t you smell him? Hal, you know damn well, we can’t yet admit Asian civvies or even officers of any kind without Bryce’s face-to-face approval at gate HQ.”
“Asian?” Hal looked in at Sophie again, did not even notice Petey behind him, hopping off the back of the S-ATV and unbundling supplies as a matter of urgency. “This woman ain’t Asian, all respect. She’s whiter than—”
“You been drinking again?” Captain Raaen took half a step forward, Hal took three backward and ended up backed against his armored vehicle’s hood. “We need to talk to Murphy one last time about your little eyesight problem? She’s clearly the most Asian woman I’ve ever seen. Surely even you can see it? That pallor is nothing but the glare of our headlights, man.”
“Of… course,” Hal offered in reply.
“You seem doubtful, Sergeant. Do I need an officer? Some Ranger Lieutenant? You’re almost making me question my choice of field second for patrol and special procurement.”
“No, Captain,” said the Sergeant. “No. I’m not doubtful.”
“And I think,” Captain Raaen continued, “we have a serious re-procure and rescue to mount down south with a hundred of Murphy’s men, Pearson’s Corner, tomorrow A.M. if not sooner. The Colonel will be dying to hear about what you and you alone discovered about our ‘lost’ fuel bays down there without ever risking a life. Assuming, of course, you can show a modicum of discretionary silence here to justify my faith in you. Two go loose, sixty are ours. Pearson’s, that’s materiel. I’m making this call.”
“Of course I’m your man. Sir. She’s… he… at least, you can’t weld on this mess, it’s just—”
“It’s what?”
“It’s nothing,” Hal answered. “Sir.”
“That’s what I thought myself,” said Captain Raaen, “five fucking minutes ago. And so again, Sergeant, now that you’ve wasted all of our time, get back to Jal, tell him we got lost chasing headlights, but managed some questioning on Asian civvies and got semi-reliable recon on Pearson’s. And that’s all you say, the rest will be mine tonight. If you manage to do that, then let’s you and Petey patch some of the safer welds and get this unclassifiable Asian civvie and her Typhoid Mary colored friend on their way. If we ever see them a second time in the next 48, we re-procure by force, with you on point. Got all that?”
“Sir, yes, yes sir,” the Sergeant said at once. It was not comfortable, watching a man of Hal’s strength and stature swallowing his Adam’s apple like a drunken car-totaling freshman, thrown up against a wall and about to get pummeled by his uncle. But Sophie regarded him all the same.
“Well don’t just stand there,” said the Captain. “Get on the fucking horn with Jal again. This, Hal, is what happens when you form cross-units out of scraps. We’re already late back to the junction. God damn.”
And Hal scurried back into the S-ATV and slammed the door.
Captain Raaen turned and said to Sophie quickly, “Ma’am, I’m afraid we can’t take you in for questioning at this time due to the nature of a superior order. So we can fix you up a little, but no medicine and no physical contact. We cannot resupply you. And we can’t disclose our HQ location, nor the nature of our mission at the interstate junction. But you’re almost in contested Chinese territory so you stop for no one, get yourself back northbound on I-25 after ten miles more out here in the grass and you cannot, under any circumstances, drive east on your way out of here. I’m certain you understand me?”
“I do,” said Sophie, smiling and almost crying. “Thank you. Yes. Of course.”
“Don’t smile. Don’t even thank me. Make certain you never see me again.” The sternness, the paranoid cruelty in his voice, was being cast in grit and gravel for Petey’s sake — and for that of Hal, if he was stupid enough to be eavesdropping. But Captain Raaen then gave Sophie a wink so subtle she questioned its existence the moment he turned away.
He turned and pounded on the roof over the back door, then tested one of the last secured bungees. He looked down, Sophie watched him in the mirror. “And Captain?” He scowled down at Silas, in case Petey was watching, and then he whispered: “To you as well. Don’t let me ever see you again. Good luck.”
Silas was too weak to answer.
Sophie whispered back, “Captain Raaen?” He turned to scowl at her, but said nothing. “If you…” she leaned her head away from the glare of the S-ATV’s headlights, turning away from Petey and Hal who were still rummaging in the back. “If you know of anyone, named… named Chris? Who works communications? A NOAA intern. Nineteen. Please tell him I’m very sorry I never said goodbye.”
Captain Raaen halted. His eyes went wide, his chin trembled. Tears almost came but he turned away and growled, “Ma’am, our little Christopher passed away three nights ago. He insisted on trying to help in exterior med and triage before we got holed up, we had next to no nurses, no surgeons, and none of those boys survived. But I do thank you. No more words, now. You take care of yourself and you go.”
The Captain checked his cigarettes, threw something away. He walked from the H4 to the S-ATV, ready to work on calibrating his welding equipment, yelling something at Petey about the proper handling of oxygen tanks on a black and windy night.
Bless these men. We never would have made it. You saved me, Silas, Sophie thought and closed her eyes. How you managed to say so much I’ll never know. You saved me. One last time.
After that hour, the welding, Sophie never did see Captain Raaen again.
VI-4
Beyond the Road of Dawn
All the rest of that night, Sophie drove northward on I-25 until she was far from Loveland. She finally found a passable way east on something called Crossroads Boulevard, passing a warehouse yard of endless and sand-filled wrecks, Caterpillar dozers, RVs and Wal-Mart cargo trailers, until she found a strange, sapphire-hazed roundabout in the middle of nowhere. Some developer in recent years must have vainly tried to recreate suburbia in the middle of nowhere, and the misty roundabout was the only evidence.