I start eating, my gaze on the two of them. I hardly taste the food. In fact, it’s a little dry and pasty, now that I think about it. It sticks to my throat and settles in my stomach like a lead weight.
Chris returns with Vera and they sit at our table.
“So Chris tells me you’re from Los Angeles,” Vera says. Her voice is smooth and light. Feminine. “I was in San Diego when the pulse hit. I’d love to hear your story, though.”
I shrug.
“If you’ve heard one story, you’ve heard them all,” I say, stabbing a potato.
Sophia kicks me under the table.
“My mother and I escaped on foot,” Vera continues, leaning her fist against her cheek, looking sideways at Chris. “Everybody in our apartment building, actually. We call ourselves the Legion now. My mother was stationed in San Diego. She was in the Navy. It was only natural that she take over.”
She takes a bite of food, watching my face.
“Oh,” I say. “That’s interesting.”
Sophia kicks me again.
“Vera just got back from a scouting mission,” Chris tells me, picking up a steaming mug of coffee. “She says Omega is still on red alert trying to locate our militia groups. Until the heat dies down, we’ll lie low here and work with the militias in camp.”
“Oh, you’re a scout?” Sophia asks Vera.
“In my spare time,” she replies, smiling.
“Your spare time?” I say.
“Yes. When I’m not scouting I’m helping my mother manage the Legion.”
“The family business, huh?”
This time it’s Chris who pinches my leg.
I shut my mouth, knowing that I’m acting childish and jealous. But I can’t help it. I have zero chance of competing against a girl like this, and if Chris ever realizes how great he could have it with another woman, I’ll be left alone.
I shudder and push the thought away. I’m an adult. I need to act like one.
Feelings of teenage insecurity have no place in war.
After an awkward breakfast with Vera, Chris informs me that we’re supposed to show up at another meeting in the Headquarters building. This time, Vera comes with us. Sophia stays behind, since her presence wasn’t requested. We leave the chow hall, Chris and Vera trading stories about their militias… while I walk beside them in silence. What I really should do is interject with a few stories of my own. I certainly have a lot of them…
When we reach the Headquarters building, Angela is waiting at the front door. She smiles broadly at the sight of Chris and Vera walking together.
I cross my arms.
“Good morning,” she greets. “Thank you for coming. I see you’ve met my daughter.”
Her words are directed at Chris. Not me.
I pick up on this immediately.
We walk inside. The commanders are waiting around the table, and once again, I wonder why I’m here. I’m not a big time leader…then again, neither is Vera. We’re more like assistants to our militia commanders.
Dad is seated at the table, clean-shaven and dressed in crisp military garb. We lock eyes for a second as I sit next to Chris, Vera on his other side. Angela — who I’ve realized is the spokesperson for the board of commanders — shuts the front door and takes a seat at the head of the table.
“Well,” she says, casting a glance at me, “shall we begin?”
“What exactly are we discussing?” I ask.
“Our next move,” she answers. “Where should we start, gentlemen?”
“I say we start right in the thick of the thing,” Commander Buckley suggests. “We’ve got a lot of new men here now that the Fighters have showed up. Our numbers are growing. We can send out militias for longer periods of time because we’ll have more people that can stay behind and guard the camp.”
“So you’re suggesting that we send out a couple of militias at a time,” Dad says, “and leave a couple behind to guard the camp? That’s what we’ve been doing already.”
“Yeah, but now we have more men, so…”
“Excuse me,” I interject, taking a deep breath. “Who’s in charge?”
Nobody answers.
“I mean,” I correct, “is anybody in charge?
Or is everybody here equal?”
“Everybody’s equal,” Angela answers, looking irked.
“So… there’s no leadership structure in this camp?” I ask.
“Each militia leader looks after his own men.”
“But what about the people who aren’t fighting? What about straight up refugees?” I point out. “Who do they take orders from?”
“They don’t. They’re just here to survive.”
“And what if they decide to do something stupid?”
“Like…?”
“I don’t know. Mutiny or something.”
“We would stop that from happening,” Commander Jones says.
“Because you’re in charge?”
He blinks.
“All I’m saying is,” I explain, “there’s no clear picture of leadership going on around here. Nobody knows who’s in charge of what, and the bigger this camp is, the more differing opinions you’re going to get, and you need to divide responsibilities up more evenly. People need to know that somebody’s in charge.”
Chris folds his hands under his chin, gazing at me thoughtfully.
“She’s right,” he says. “We’re in charge of our own militias, but nobody’s really running the camp. Anarchy could sweep in fast if it has the chance.”
“The real issue isn’t this,” Dad snaps. “It’s what we’re going to do when this fight is over. Then what? Do we start rebuilding? Where’s the federal government? Do we come up with our own governing body?”
Good question. I hadn’t really thought that far ahead.
Angela looks at Dad. “Personally, I believe that we should build on what’s already in place,” she says. “The laws, the division of powers between the branches of government. We just start where we left off.”
I tap my fingers against my forearms, considering. I guess the militias everywhere would have a responsibility to start rebuilding the country if we succeeded in wiping Omega out. And then we’d have to decide how. We’d have to make sure that what we built wouldn’t collapse.
“Why start with a flawed system?” Commander Buckley demands, dropping his fist on the table. “Our government was corrupted beyond all comprehension before the EMP destroyed our infrastructure. This is our chance to wipe the slate clean and start over fresh, just like the original founders did.”
“And do what?” Dad growls. “Rewrite the constitution ourselves? Come up with a new system of democracy?”
“Technically, the United States is a republic,” I mutter.
“You know what I mean,” he says pointedly. “If we manage to push back this invasion, we’ll need a form of authority. We don’t want to become a military state, and we don’t want the population to have total free reign — that’s anarchy.”
“I’m aware of that,” Commander Buckley replies. “I’m also aware that there are a lot of things we could do better because of what we’ve been through.”
I look at Chris, gauging his reaction to all of this. I didn’t mean to start an argument about rebuilding the entire freaking government. I was just wondering who was in charge.
Personally, I think Commander Buckley has a point. A really good point.
Why build a rebirthed nation on a system that crumbled apart?
“We know what needs to be done,” I say suddenly, before I can stop myself. “We need a solid form of authority and structure, right? Anarchy will get us wiped off the map. The old system of government will collapse on itself, because it was too corrupted. But the idea of what we had was right on. You can’t argue with that. We were the most powerful, most creative, most free nation on earth. So we take what we know and come up with our own version. Like a purer version of what this is all supposed to be. Maybe this is our chance to fix everything that was ever wrong with our system. We could make sure something like this never happened again.”