Invasion USA 3 - The Battle for Survival (38 page)

“How many living?” was the President’s next question.

“Colonel Friday, U.S. Army, reporting on living civilians, Mr. President,” the second colonel spoke up. First, U.S. Military Troops: 1,467,550 alive and accounted for. Second, Military Families: we calculate there are approximately 4,500,000 spouses and children of military personnel eating military supplies from the five Chinese container ships. That food is now nearly used up, Sir. We haven’t managed to document the entire number of military spouses and children yet, but have 3,000 men working on it. Next, Food Rations for Civilians: 9,670,250 civilian men women and children have been given food rations from MRE rations and/or the Chinese rations. The fourth and last group includes mostly farmers and civilians working in or around the military bases who do not need aid, 3,950,900. We have taken this last number into account and this amount represents 30 percent of the possible farmers, or crop producers in the whole country. This number could increase to 10 million food growers. We are assuming that a total of between 80 to 130 million people will survive the winter conditions, but we cannot get an idea of how many of these will die due to gang- or other human-related violence. End of my report, Mr. President.”

Everybody in the room felt sick to their stomachs.

***

Many civilians, like Captain Mallory and many of his crew, worked nonstop helping to set up food stations across the country. He had John, his copilot, Pam Wallace and many others flying food across the country 24/7. On the 20th of March, the food nearly ran out. There were not enough rations to feed fifty more people in one of the food distribution points when flights of the food, arriving on the 747s, reached him in the middle of Tennessee. The system was struggling to keep up.

***

Thousands of soldiers cleared snow and collected frozen bodies in more than a dozen large northern cities. Civilians, also by the thousands helped take identification out of wallets, cars, pockets, and sometimes in the most unlikely places. One guy had his ID on the collar of his dead dog, lying stiff next to him in a Chicago suburb.

The cremation pits grew in numbers and by the 25th of March the Manhattan team was within two blocks of Times Square. They were working with heavy machinery clearing the snow with dozens of old dump trucks taking whole blocks of ice and snow, and human limbs sticking out of the blocks. On March 28th, they were digging in ice fields forty to fifty feet deep when they began to uncover piles of dead bodies nearly thirty feet high, one and a half blocks from Times Square. Another group coming in from the opposite side found the same. They had three blocks of human bodies thirty feet high. The numbers were staggering.

***

For Preston and Carlos the next several days were spent watching the airfield transform itself. Carlos flew out once to Salt Lake City to pick up Lee Wang and family. Their work was done at the Observatory and with the Hughes Net working through thousands of two-way satellite dishes around the country, the same satellite commands could be filed for delivery from any computer at Carlos’ headquarters, or at Andrews, or the one he had put together at Preston’s airfield. One of the smaller hangars had an office built for Carlos and its communication system was six Hughes Net satellite dishes, three pointing west and three pointing north, on top of a pole towering fifty feet over the hangar roof. It looked ugly, but nobody cared.

Preston heard from Martie twice and spoke over their satellite phones. She was working hard with her father, missing everybody and she would fly her Mustang with Sally in her Pilatus to the farm, as Preston suggested they needed a larger family vehicle. Their flight plan was to fly into Denver International, now an Air Force base and then nonstop into Andrews for the April meeting at the end of the month. Her father, Michael, was now happy to continue flying his Beechcraft. With Grandpa Roebels gone, he didn’t mind stopping to refuel every 700 miles.

Both men missed their girls, but Preston enjoyed having Little Beth and Clint around. The two quickly became inseparable; Little Beth was often seen pushing Clint’s wheelchair around the hangar and down the old runway with the dogs always tagging along around them.

The second runway was completed on March 22nd. It was left to harden in the sun for a couple of days and then a truck arrived and painted all the needed lines and markers. Preston was very impressed with the finished job.

Joe and his team often got Preston involved with construction of the President’s Mansion, as Joe called it. The single-story log cabin was only 2,000 square feet in size, with three bedrooms and three bathrooms. The trucks kept bringing in supplies on a daily basis from the bases to the south and by month-end the finish paint and trimmings were being applied. Preston told Joe that the house looked like one of those make-over projects that used to be on television. One day there was nothing and the next day there was a house.

The interior wasn’t very luxurious. Most of the furniture came from the storage depot at Fort Bragg and was reserved for the higher brass, but was used for the President’s House and the Officers’ Mess. The same quality furniture arrived for the larger building, the completed and operational control tower, and the several hangar accommodations.

On March 30th, two days before the next meeting was to be held at Andrews and a second meeting at Preston’s airfield, the hundreds of men began to clear up and return the farm to the way it was before the work had begun. Even bushes suddenly appeared on the dirt incline, separating the President’s House and other accommodations, and also in places out on the airfield where the two dogs weren’t used to finding a bush to mark.

That evening when Preston, Carlos, Sergeant Perry, Little Beth and Clint were enjoying a meal in the hangar’s lounge, Carlos’ satellite phone rang.

Carlos listened for a second; it was Admiral Rogers telling him that he had his uncle with him in Norfolk. He also had some very interesting people with him.

His uncle came on the phone and in rapid Spanish sent greetings, relayed the news that he had sailed the three Frigates to Norfolk as planned, and also that they had picked up somebody who seemed to know a certain Señor Carlos Rodriquez!

They were on a very interesting ship belonging to a powerful political figure from Colombia and the admiral had saved them from an attack off the coast of Florida. He told Carlos that the gentleman in question was a Chinese fellow, a Mr. Mo Wang, and that he sent his regards to Carlos and that everybody could meet him and his entourage at Andrews Air Force Base in two days.

Carlos couldn’t believe this Mo Wang fellow. He was like a bug that just didn’t go away, and Preston laughed at Carlos when he completely rolled his eyes, listening to his uncle.

Mo Wang – Florida and Virginia

Mo Wang called Pedro on the satellite phone at midnight as planned. It rang for less than a second before Pedro answered, breathless.

“Is that you, Pedro?” Mo asked.

Si, Señor Wang, this is Pedro. We have a big problem; the owner took the money for the boat and then the money for the gas. He pumped me twenty gallons before his fuel tank was empty. He shrugged his shoulders and left in his car. We do not have enough fuel to leave, so we went to our neighbors to purchase another forty gallons. We do not have enough to reach Cozumel, Señor Wang, what do we do?”

“Is diesel any good for you, Pedro?”

No, the engine is gasoline and diesel is no good, except for a small generator. We have no diesel, Señor. We are waiting for you to call.”

“How big is your boat?” asked Mo.

“Nine meters, twenty-seven feet long, Señor Wang. Shall we leave to meet you?” asked Pedro.

“Of course, leave immediately. We have enough power to pull you, Pedro. I want you to head towards Cozumel in a straight line to save gas. We can come around the end of the island and catch up to you. I have radar, understand?” asked Mo.

“I am casting off quickly, Señor, there is shooting very close and we are heading out to sea. I have a compass on the boat and I will go directly towards the Cozumel Island. I have a fisherman’s map with a direct line drawn on the map. It shows 410 miles. I have ninety gallons of fuel in the tank, the gauge shows one quarter. I think that this boat will travel at five knots, but I’m now at full power to get away from the shore.” There was silence for several seconds. “Señor Wang, we are out of our cove and about half a mile from our farm. There are lights to the west and a small fire. It looks like one of our neighbors’ house or barn is on fire. There is lots of shooting. My neighbor had many guns and many unlucky gangsters will die at his and his seven sons’ hands tonight. They picked the wrong guy.” There was silence apart from Mo hearing Pedro’s orders being shouted to his family in Spanish.

He heard the engine’s noise die down to a low murmur, and then Pedro came back. “We are safe enough now, Señor Wang. I have the boat going forward at five knots. I think I have enough fuel for about three hundred miles. I will keep in a straight line and wait for you to call me at dawn, OK?” Marie was next to Mo with a map of the area on the table.

“Ask Pedro what his compass reads,” she told Mo. Mo did and Pedro told them that the needle was halfway in-between north and northeast.

It took Marie and Beatrice a couple of minutes to discuss his course. Lu was asked to come in and show them where Pedro’s farm was on the island map. She didn’t know for sure but she showed them where she thought it was, Mud Cay, and she added that it couldn’t be more than two to three miles out.

The two female sailors plotted a course and asked Mo to increase speed to high cruise. The ship increased speed to six knots and the radar decreased its time from four hours to two hours before they would round the island. They had to sail past a couple of small islands and Mo didn’t want to go through the shallower waters between them. He did close the course distance to the last piece of land, as Lu told him that it was uninhabited. They could turn northwards close to shore and that would save them 30 minutes.

He made a new dot on the radar as close to the shore as he thought safe and Marie showed him how to set a second marker several miles north of the island and then after several calculations, a third marker where she thought that they could pick up the fishing boat up on the radar. The distance was forty miles and would take them eight hours to reach the third dot.

Since Pedro was moving as fast as they were Mo suggested that to catch up to them he would need to start the big engines during the third leg, but he wanted to have no land in sight and full daylight before he would do that.

Marie suggested that he should rest, but Mo was having the time of his life. It was the first time he had ever had such authority over something of this size and the excitement would certainly not bring sleep.

He replied that everybody should bed down for the night and he would be fine. He would have no trouble staying awake to turn the boat onto the next two legs, the first one in an hour’s time.

“You don’t have to turn the ship, silly,” admonished Marie. “Everything is plotted into the autopilot. It will run the course we set and will reach the third marker with no help from any of us. The maximum range for auto cruising is 60 miles. At that range the radar might not pick up such a small boat, but set at a 15-mile range, we should see Pedro as a blip pretty easily. Somebody will relieve you of your watch at 0600 hours, Captain Wang. I haven’t delegated who yet, but if the relief watch finds you asleep, you will be given six lashes with the cat of nine tails.”

“There is a cat with nine tails on the boat?” asked an astonished Mo. He did not understand, but Marie was gone and he was left alone to work out where this darn cat was. Did it want food or something?

He looked over the dials: depth 167 feet, one hour, ten minutes to first radar marker, engine at high cruise at six knots, temperature outside 67 degrees and the island’s coastline over six miles to his north. There was nothing blinking or blipping as Marie said, nor was there a cat under the table of the captain’s chair he was sitting in, and he felt at peace with the world.

Mo gently pushed the engine to full power to see what it could do. The speed increased a paltry half a knot and he then reduced it back to high cruise. The four fuel tanks still showed full, even the one he was running on. The red indicator still hadn’t moved.

He searched around the bridge; it was the first time he actually had time to look around. There was an old American coffeemaker in a corner with a large bag of unopened Colombian coffee. Underneath he found a small refrigerator; it was stocked with bottles of liquor, beer and Cokes, all printed, it seemed to him, in Spanish. He found a cup of coffee creamers; he liked his coffee strong and with cream, the American way. Next to the machine was a small washing-up sink with a high faucet. Upon turning the tap, water poured out. He brewed a pot of coffee and continued to look around while the coffee machine made its gurgling noises.

Behind the table was a couch built into the rear wall and above the couch were bookcases. Here he found boxes of bullets. Normal for a gangster to have bullets instead of books, he mused to himself.

The bridge was still semi-dark; he was working from the lights on the console which were ample. He turned on the main light switch which had a dimmer and he pulled the side curtains closed and increased the light in the bridge so that he could see more.

He returned to the bookcase and found several books steadied by dozens of boxes of 9 mm and 7.62 ammunition.

“That’s strange. I haven’t found any guns that would fit these rounds,”
he thought. There were several sailing books in the bookcase and he spied a 9-mm automatic machine pistol in each corner of the four-foot long bookcase. Both had a long magazine and Mo thought that the senator had these as backup pieces, easily accessible if he needed them.

The bookcase was completely checked. He left everything where it was and closed the smoked-glass sliding bookcase doors. He sat down on the couch and thought for a moment.