“Do you think anyone will do what it says?” she asked.
“You mean surrender? I hope not. If they do they’ll go right to one of those camps.”
She broke eye contact. “You mean the one Gregory and Brandon are at?”
“Maybe, but more likely somewhere else. Either way it won’t be pleasant. Listen, Emma, I know I’ve given you a hard time about sitting in your room all day. I won’t bore you by going over it again. I think you already know where I’m coming from, but these leaflets got me thinking about a way you could help us out. Put your artistic side to good use.”
“You want me to make propaganda stuff?”
“I want you to create something we can drop into the concentration camps,” John told her. “Something that will give the people inside the reassurance that they haven’t been forgotten, that we know what’s being done to them. That we’re coming to set them free.”
“You wanna give them hope,” she said, her eyes watering with tears.
“Exactly.”
He knelt down and pulled his daughter into a firm hug at about the same time that Moss appeared.
“Sorry to bother you, John, but you better come quick. Reinforcements just arrived.”
John stood. “Reinforcements?” he asked, confused. “From where?”
“Huntsville… Winfield… Jamestown,” Moss told him, shaking his head in disbelief. “You name it. Not only that but they’ve brought food, supplies and weapons too.”
“All right,” John replied, his eyes dropping to the Chinese propaganda leaflet. “See that they’re set up in the community center for now.”
“You don’t understand, John. This ain’t a few families. There are hundreds, maybe thousands of them.”
Chapter 40
Two thousand, three hundred and twenty-five to be exact. What had seemed at first to be a blessing was quickly becoming a curse. Not only was the Chinese army fast approaching, snatching up more and more American territory as they pushed east, but Oneida was still suffering from a cholera epidemic. According to Dr. Coffey, the Pioneer Community hospital was bursting with patients. They had had to resort to having people sleep on wooden tables cut with holes to allow for the nastier parts of the sickness to wash away. All told, well over a hundred people had been infected and a quarter of those had already died. The report John had received from Dan Niles, the waste management guy, was even more disturbing. After extensive testing, the cause of the outbreak did not appear to be runoff of human waste. Although sabotage couldn’t be proven just yet, it was looking more and more likely every day.
Now on top of everything, a horde of people had showed up requiring a place to sleep. The logistics alone of logging everyone in by hand to Oneida’s town registry were a massive headache.
“We’re gonna need to transform the high school into a temporary dormitory to accommodate all these folks,” John said, rubbing his temples.
“No can do, boss,” Moss replied. “I’m afraid the army’s already using the school as a makeshift barracks.”
“Then what about the Wal-Mart?” John threw out on a whim.
Moss thought about it. “It’s pretty much been stripped bare. There may not be enough washrooms, but I suppose for now it could work.”
“Good. Then pass the message along to Ray Gruber. Have him lead them over there and see that they’re set up. They’ll need to get creative to find bedding until we can take care of them properly.”
“Roger that,” Moss replied and went to leave.
“Moss, one other thing.”
He planted his feet and turned. “Shoot.”
“Go through the new arrivals and pull out anyone who’s fired a weapon before. Although we expect the enemy armor to stick to the roads, the infantry can attack us from anywhere, so those perimeter rings need to be beefed up.”
“Understood.”
As Moss left to carry out his orders, John glanced up at the Highland veterinary hospital building next to them. Square, red-bricked and with a terrific line of sight down Alberta Street, it offered a strong defensive position. A handful of Captain Bishop’s men were busy knocking out the windows and reinforcing the firing holes with sandbags, installing a .50 cal machine gun recessed from the opening for concealment.
Similar work continued frantically for the next few hours. By dusk, the refugees were settled and the troops set to defend Oneida were dug in. John returned to the mayor’s office and made his way around to the back door that led directly into their living quarters. John was about to pull the handle to go inside when George squawked at him. He glanced back, letting the handle go. George waddled up to the edge of his enclosure, peering back at him with his beady little eyes.
A strange kind of calm settled over John. Surrendering to fate was the best way he could describe it. They’d done everything they could to prepare for an attack. With any luck, the enemy would simply ignore the town altogether in its mad dash for the capital. Sometimes protecting the ones you loved meant pulling up stakes and running for your lives and sometimes it meant standing your ground. John’s conscience was clear. He reached out and stroked George’s tiny head, praying the price wouldn’t be too high.
The door opened and closed behind him.
“I think he’s lonely, you know.” It was Diane and he couldn’t help but notice the slight tremble in her voice.
John smirked. “You think he needs a girlfriend, is that it?”
“Maybe.”
“Don’t you think that’ll make him soft?”
Diane stifled a laugh. “I think you’ve already managed to sap whatever guard dog George had in him. Maybe it’s best to just accept the fact that you’ve turned him into a wuss.”
John cupped George’s head with both hands. “Don’t let her speak to you that way, George.”
Walking up to him, Diane slid her arms around his chest. He turned and held her.
“Have you seen Emma lately?” she asked.
“Why?”
“I found her in the center of town with her sketchpad, working on a flyer of some kind.”
“It’s nice to hear she’s out of her room,” John said. “I think she just needed to find something she excelled at.”
“You didn’t have anything to do with that, did you? It’s got John Mack written all over it.”
John shook his head. “I wish I could take credit, but it was all her.”
“Don’t you think it’s dangerous, John, giving hope to the poor souls imprisoned in those concentration camps? I mean, we don’t have any way yet of helping them break free.”
He contemplated Diane’s comment for a moment. Frankly, it wasn’t an angle he had considered before—the disappointment they would experience if the good guys never showed up.
“You speak to anyone who’s ever done time in any kind of prison,” John said. “They’ll be the first ones to tell you that hope is a dangerous thing to lose.”
Chapter 41
John lay down to sleep, his armored and tactical vests draped over a chair by his bedside. Next to that were his AR-15 and the tactical holster with his S&W M&P .40 Pro. Walking around town with his pistol by his side, John couldn’t help feeling more like a lawman from the Old West than the mayor of a twenty-first-century town.
He glanced next to him, awed by how soundly Diane was always able to sleep, even on the cusp of danger. The same had been true on Willow Creek Drive just as it was true this evening. It was normally on nights like this that the bad memories came back to play. John closed his eyes and let himself drift off into the past.
Back in Iraq, John was going over a mission checklist for a series of armored spearheads into Baghdad. They were calling them thunder runs and several of his men weren’t thrilled with the prospect. The concern was they were going to be targets in a shooting gallery. The strategy was to test Baghdad’s defenses before committing the entire force. If they were successful, it would demonstrate to the Iraqi people that Saddam was no longer in control. State-run media was reporting that U.S. forces were being repelled on all fronts and the top brass was anxious to prove otherwise.