State of Alliance (11 page)

“Can we go inside the church?” I ask.

Devin nods.

I take the path back to the front of the building and stop at the doors. Two guards stand at the entrance. It is amazing to me how the military presence here is so strong – and yet so silent. No one has said a word to us since we arrived.

This place is sacred.

I stop and turn to the security detachment behind me.

“Wait here,” I say.

I walk through the doors and step into a long, ornate chapel. Old wooden pews stretch from here to an intricately carved backdrop with statues of Jesus and the Virgin Mary. The chapel is lit with dozens of flickering candles.

I pause at the front. A large basin sits on a pillar, filled with holy water.

I hesitate, unsure of how to proceed. Is it a sin to walk inside without washing? I don’t know.

I dip my fingers into the liquid before walking further. Devin remains at the door, watching but never moving. I slowly walk down the center aisle between the rows of pews. The ceiling is lovely, vaulted. It
towers above my head, reminding me of the vastness of the sky.

It’s as if this entire place is from another world.

I stop at the end of the church. There are graves marked into the floor here, below the huge iconic carvings. Jesus’ blood runs down the side of his cross, and I swallow.

I am a soldier, and I have killed many men, and yet I have the nerve to stand in a church.

I look at the graves. One of them is marked with the name
Junipero Serra
. I remember his name from history class, back in elementary school. He was the Father of the missions on the California coastline. I had no idea that he was buried in this place.

I suddenly feel very unworthy of being here.

I take a step backward, overwhelmed with the events of the past few weeks. The Battle of the Grapevine, the rescue mission into Los Angeles, the journey to Sacramento, the carnage of the bombing of the Capitol Building, the disappearance of my father, the Negotiations and the assassination attempts.

I have so much blood on my hands. But I fight for freedom, so am I justified in what I’m doing? Why is standing in a church messing with my head? Hot, salty
tears burn in my eyes and I fold my hands together, staring at the Jesus carving.

I whisper, “God, I’m just trying to do the right thing.”

I slowly drop down to my knees and bow my head, overcome with emotion and sadness. I’m not really sure how to pray, so I just stay there, unmoving, silent. Just feeling.

If there’s a God, I pray that he forgives us for this war.

And I pray he lets us win. Or all hope will be lost.

When I turn around, Devin is no longer standing at the entrance to the church. Chris has taken his place. I stand up, going rigid. Like I’ve been caught doing something highly private. I mean…isn’t prayer sacred?

“What are you doing here?” I ask.

“I was about to ask you the same thing.” Chris begins walking inside the church, pausing at the basin of holy water. And then he passes it and continues to stalk toward me. “What’s
wrong
with you Cassie?
Leaving
the compound without telling me?”

“I’m a Commander,” I reply. “I go where I want.”

“I
noticed
.” Chris stops at the tip of the front pew. A muscle is ticking in his jaw, a sign that he is very, very angry. “You have a reason for running off in the middle of the night with your security detachment?”

I swallow, choosing my words carefully.

“I just had to get out for a second, Chris,” I answer. “I needed…
this
.”

“What? Prayer? Faith?” Chris shakes his head. “You don’t need to leave to find that, and you certainly don’t need to leave with
Devin
to figure out where your head is.” He stops. “If something was bothering you, why didn’t you come talk to me? You can
always
talk to me, you know that.”

I give him a look.

“You haven’t been terribly accessible lately.”

“I’m not the one who’s been having the communication problem,” he replies.

I open my mouth, a thousand retorts dancing on the tip of my tongue. I could tell him that yes, this whole thing is his fault. He’s keeping secrets, he won’t tell me he loves me, and he’s been cold since I cornered him about his marriage on the train to Monterey.

But I say nothing, because sometimes that’s the best thing to do.

“So what’s the issue, Cassidy?” Chris demands.

His eyes are ringed with red, a sign of sleepless nights and crushing pressure. He is not himself. The Chris I fell in love with is patient and kind, gentle yet firm.

“What’s
not
the problem?” I say. My voice echoes in the church. “We’re at
war
.”

Chris considers this, then holds out his hand.

“
You and I
don’t have to be,” he answers slowly.

I lean on the wall, flickering candles throwing shadows across our faces.

“I don’t want to fight with you,” I say. “But I don’t want to force you to tell me things that you don’t want to share. I can’t be everything to you all the time. I get that. I just want to be your friend again, at least.”

As the words leave my mouth, I get a bitter taste in the back of my throat.

“We’re a little more then friends, Cassie,” Chris replies, and he smiles nervously. “You don’t have to be dramatic.”

And that’s when I see it: fear.

There is fear in Chris’s eyes.

“Why are you afraid?” I ask. “If you don’t want to lose me,
tell me
. If you love me,
tell
me! Keeping secrets and holding back words that need to be said will
never
help anyone, Chris. Sometimes you have to
say
something, or the moment will be over, and it will be too late. ”

He doesn’t move, seemingly frozen in place.

I wonder if I’ve said too much – gone too far.

Chris shakes his head, as if laughing at a private joke, and takes several steps forward, hooking his right arm around my waist, sliding his left hand behind my neck, into my hair. It seems like it has been an eternity since he has held me, and I press against him, forgetting the argument for a moment.

I just want to
be
.

Chris’s body is warm, and I feel comfort in his embrace. A thrill rushes down my spine. My fingers and toes tingle with the excitement of being so close to him – it has been a long time.

He kisses the side of my neck, a soft, warm touch. I wrap my arms around his neck and he draws me into a sweet, slow kiss. It’s the kind of kiss that eats you up. The kind that you feel in the pit of your stomach, in
the bottom of your heart. The best kind of kiss; real, true and perfect.

It’s Chris.

He hooks his fingers through the belt loops of my fatigues and holds me closer. I taste the coffee on his breath and feel the stubble on his jaw, scratching my lips.

“Cassie,” Chris breathes, kissing my cheek. “My marriage – all of that. It’s in the past. I’m not married anymore. My wife…she died. A long time ago.” He takes a great, heaving breath. “It’s just hard for me to talk about.”

First, I feel relief:
This woman doesn’t present a threat to our relationship!

And second:
I had no idea Chris’s heart had been so broken in the past
.

“What happened?” I ask softly.

Chris closes his eyes, kisses me again.

“She…” he begins, and trails off. “It’s a long story, Cassie. Not a pretty one.”

“You can’t protect me anymore. Not even from your past.”

He looks surprised to hear me say that. I press a deep kiss to his mouth, smiling gently. “Don’t hide
from me,” I say. “We need each other. We’re a team, remember?” I hold up my hand, reminiscent of a gesture of loyalty we made to each other long ago, in a cabin in the woods… “We’re in this
together
.”

Chris takes my hand and kisses each knuckle, green eyes never leaving mine.

“If that’s the case-” he says, but he is interrupted.

Devin appears at the front of the church.

“Sorry to break up the love fest,” he says, his voice echoing loudly in the sanctuary. “But we have a situation.”

Out of habit – and a little bit of embarrassment – I step away from Chris. I immediately miss the warmth of his body. I feel cold already.

“What’s up?” Chris says, flushed.

“Omega ships are inbound off the coast,” Devin replies.

I stare at him, still racked with emotion.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” I mutter.

Devin shakes his head.

“I wish I was, Commander,” he says. “I really wish I was.”

Chapter Ten

We do not go back to the Naval Postgraduate School. It is still early morning when I get into an armored truck with Chris, Devin trailing behind us in the Jeep. I wonder, briefly, if Devin took me out to the mission, knowing that Chris would follow.

Hmm…

I push the thought away. I feel more at ease sitting beside Chris in the passenger seat. We are silent, but we are comfortable. And our minds are both elsewhere. I would like to know how his wife died – what’s the story there? But I will wait. At least I know that Chris is not currently married, and I no longer have to worry about the possibility of another woman ruining my relationship.

“No Omega ships have been brave enough to get close to Monterey since the EMP, according to Devin,” Chris says, breaking the silence in the car. We are driving back through the mountainous highway. Coming back, I can see the entire city, sprawling in every direction over the tips of the coastal firs and pines.

“Something’s changed in the game,” I reply.

Chris doesn’t say anything. His pensive expression says it for him:

There are rough waters ahead
.

I take a deep, steadying breath as we get closer to the city. Devin takes an exit and we find ourselves on a boulevard that is fairly crowded with military vehicles.

“If this town wasn’t secured…” Chris mutters, leaving the sentence hanging.

I know what he is thinking. Being in an area filled with traffic is making him just as nervous as it’s making me. Anything could happen. There could be Omega spies or assassins hiding anywhere…

And then I tell myself to relax. I cannot control everything.

I have to trust that we’re going to be okay.

“Where is Devin taking us?” I ask at last.

“The harbor.”

His reply is simple and short. The emotional moment that we just had in the church seems to have passed, and we’re back to business. Back to the war.

The girl in me sighs. The soldier in me says,
It’s about time, woman
.

We take the boulevard for what seems like a long time, passing by empty seaside hotels and motels, restaurants and the occasional gas station. Most of this city is abandoned, aside from the military presence roaming the streets, making sure Omega doesn’t try to push through.

“How long are we going to stay in Monterey, Chris?” I ask.

Chris thinks about this.

“As long as they need us here,” he replies. “We’re part of the Alliance now, and we are part of the leadership that represents California. We’ll go where we need to go to stop Omega.”

“It seems like Monterey has got it pretty much together – aside from the assassination attempts,” I say, smiling wryly. “I think we would do more good back in the valley, protecting our agricultural resources and the mountains.”

“Well, it’s possible…” He shakes his head. “Forget it. We’ll go where we need to go. Right now Omega’s trying to get the west coast. I want to stop them. If we can keep the Pacific seaboard out of their hands, we’re going to be doing pretty good. We’ll actually have the upper hand.”

I don’t say what I’m thinking: What if Omega just decides to nuke us all?

What’s stopping them from doing that
now
?

As if reading my mind, Chris says, “They haven’t wiped us out yet because of two reasons: One, the Pacific Northwest Alliance
will
retaliate. We
do
have nuclear warheads on our side, but not as many as the enemy. We want to save those as a last resort, and Omega knows it. They also don’t want their countries wiped out by atom bombs.” He pauses. “The second reason is that they’d rather the rest of the healthy, contributing members of society be enslaved. They’ve already eliminated so much of the population – the elderly, the disabled, the very young – that they’ve got an entire country to build from scratch.”

I shudder.

Omega is evil. Through and through.

Chris touches my knee with his hand, and I wrap my fingers around his, taking comfort in his touch. Something about his presence calms me – always has, probably always will.

“So how long have you known Devin?” I ask as we take a right.

“About a decade. Before you were even in Middle School.” Chris grins. “We started in SEAL training together at the Coronado Naval Station. Wound up coming here for a postgraduate program. And Devin was a great linguist – better than me. He went to the Language Institute, where we were yesterday. That’s his strong point. Communication.”

I almost make a sarcastic comment about it
not
being Chris’s, but I don’t.

I know better.

“Small world,” I say.

“Not small enough,” Chris replies, sighing.

More silence. Then,

“Do you think my dad is alive?” I ask. “Be honest with me.”

Chris takes his time answering the question, glancing sideways at my expression – which I’m trying very hard to maintain.

“There’s a chance,” he replies, his voice quiet. “But don’t count on it.”

I nod. I have known this since the day the Capitol Building’s dome collapsed. I just didn’t want to admit it. Hearing it said out loud is a form of closure, of meager acceptance.

Chris continues to hold my hand.

What can you say to fix something like this, anyway?

Nothing. There are no words. There is only sadness.

“Cannery Row,” Chris says suddenly. “Haven’t been here in ages.”