Teams make their way to the Humvees. The building heat and humidity makes it feel like we are in a hot tub; each inhalation like breathing water. We check our gear and load additional equipment in the vehicles and, with a last look around the desolate ramp, drive the short distance off the tarmac and start through the small base.
The drive past the buildings is much the same as the other places we’ve been; deserted and empty with a touch of emanating malice. I’m tempted to reach out to verify the feeling but I’m still not all that comfortable with my seemingly being able to. I’m still not entirely convinced that it’s not just a product of my imagination but I think that’s just my not wanting to fully come to terms with it. Again, I think it may be a handy thing to have but I’m thinking they can “see” me as well when I do. Last night they definitely looked directly at me when I opened up so I have to assume for now that they can. What I don’t know is if they can always see me even if I tuck the images in the back of my mind.
We pull to a stop at a large intersection just before the main gate. Older and newer aircraft are mounted in a circle to the left; the usual array of aircraft on display that is associated with the base and found on all installations. Well, that is if they had smaller aircraft. It’s very difficult to mount a C-5 on a pedestal. The covered security guard shacks of the gate are blockaded by security vehicles. Uniform-clad, mummified bodies lie on the ground near each vehicle. The hot, dry summer has rendered it difficult to see if they were night runners or not but my guess is that they were. It’s a smaller version of the scene at the McChord gate.
I turn and proceed on a bypass loop around the visitor’s center. Looking over to the guard posts, I see a couple of bodies lying just behind the vehicles there. They are in the same uniforms as those out in front. It must have been a confusing scene in the last hours; your seeming comrades attacking and it being difficult to distinguish friend from foe in the dark.
The entrance road crosses over railroad tracks and we take the off toward highway 60, or 84 depending on the signs. We enter a freeway with two lanes in either direction separated by a brown grass median. I look out of the side view and see Horace drive through the median and swing onto the other lanes on the opposite side; our vehicle vibrations making the soldier manning the gun of the other vehicle a blur. Horace stations herself and her team about thirty yards behind us on the left side of the highway.
The highway is mostly clear on the drive towards Clovis. There are a couple of cars parked to the side of the road; some with their doors open and others sealed. We occasionally pass groups of houses but it is mostly brown fields stretching to either side and into the distance. The edge of a town begins abruptly; one moment it’s the brown fields and the next houses abutting the highway. The green “Clovis City Limit” sign stands by the side of the road looking as forlorn as the houses that line the freeway.
Horace moves closer as the highway comes together and begins to thread its way through the town. I glance to Gonzalez to see her looking pensively out of the windows. Paper is carried across the street as the gusts from the building clouds picks up. Many of the doorways of the houses and small businesses lining the street are partially filled with sand and debris. Very few cars are parked along the street but the tires of the few that are catch the debris carried by the winds, forming little piles beside them.
We drive through most of the town without seeing a soul. If there is anyone about, I would think they would have ventured out to the base upon hearing our arrival or come out with the sound of our vehicles crawling through town. The sound of our vehicles echoes off the walls and darkened windows of the structures. There should be some people out foraging unless they’re hiding from us, I think watching the town slowly pass as we progress further east.
Gonzalez’ head is on a swivel looking around her home town. Tension is very apparent around her eyes. She points to the left off the main street and we enter a residential district. Another turn and we find ourselves on a narrow street partially covered with sand blown in from the outlying fields. The houses lining the street are in need of fresh coats of paint. The yards are bare of any vegetation with the occasional house having a chain link fence encircling it. Cars line the streets, are parked in driveways, and in open air garages. Toys and bits of junk are scattered in the bare front yards. Several screen doors swing open and closed as the blasts of air blow through. One screen door hangs only by its bottom hinge. It won’t be long before a flurry of wind tears it off and carries it to join the other debris in the yard.
“Bring it up a little and stay alert,” I say to Horace.
Our engines and the banging screens are the only sounds in the neighborhood. We drive slowly up the crowded street. Looking closer at the houses, I see that some have their doors fully open or slightly ajar. That’s not a good sign, I think associating any open door with night runners.
“That’s it right there,” Gonzalez says pointing to a rundown house with peeling white paint. My heart tightens noticing it’s one of the houses with its door ajar.
I pull up front and park the Humvee at an angle blocking the street but still able to drive away quickly if we need. I see Horace park in the same manner behind us. We stay in the running vehicles a moment longer to see if we’ve drawn any attention. Nothing but screens slamming against walls or door frames. The brown fields in the far distance, beyond where the street ends, blur and sharpen as heat thermals rise from the ground and are blown away.
I shut the Humvee down and step outside. The heat and humidity become more intense as the day warms. Looking skyward, the billowing clouds continue their slow build. It looks like there will definitely be thunderstorms in the area by mid-afternoon. The wind feels good as it occasionally sweeps through, wicking the quickly accumulating beads of sweat away, but begins to die down meaning the heat will increase and lend its energy to the overhead cumulus clouds. The slamming of vehicle doors behind me brings my attention back to the teams emerging into the sandy street. With the guns manned, the remaining team members gather around me.
“Horace, I want Blue Team outside in a perimeter. Make sure both guns are manned. Red Team will go inside and search,” I say.
“You got it, sir,” she replies. She orders her team into covered positions directing two onto the top guns.
“Gonzalez, this is your show. You know the house,” I say.
“Okay, sir,” she responds and describes the interior of the house.
“Everyone stay alert but watch itchy trigger fingers. Remember, there might be Gonzalez’ parents and sister inside. Make sure of your targets before you fire. We’ll call out once inside. One last thing, the door is ajar and I don’t have to tell you what that possibly means. I’m sorry to have to mention that,” I say patting Gonzalez on the shoulder, “but we have to keep ourselves safe and alive.”
“I understand, sir,” Gonzalez says with a sigh and an increased tightness in her eyes.
We arrange our gear and grab NVG’s from the Humvee before heading up the concrete steps leading to the front porch. The overhanging eave shelters us to a degree from the sun. The clouds, although building, haven’t blocked the sunlight that is creating a furnace. Standing before the slightly open door, I feel a tickle in my mind.
I open a touch and the tickle becomes a series of confused images. Not that the images are confusing but that the source appears confused. With Henderson and Denton on each side of the door and McCafferty behind her, Gonzalez reaches for the door handle. Forcing the tickle into the depths of my mind once again, I reach out to Gonzalez’ shoulders. She turns.
“There’s at least one night runner inside,” I say feeling bad for what that may mean. What I don’t tell her is that I think I’ve woken it, or them.
Settling into the passenger seat of the Humvee, Gonzalez feels the apprehension of what they are about to do. She is very anxious about what she will find but holds a sliver of hope that her parents and sister are still alive. The nervousness makes her want to turn around and head back. It might be better if she doesn’t know and she can keep the image that they are okay a reality. The smells bring back memories of her time growing up in the area along with the feel of the heat and humidity. It brings the comfort of being home.
They journey along the remembered fields and vast openness of the area. The green circles of the watered crops are no longer a part of the landscape but replaced by an endless brown. The highway she travelled many times in the past rolls by. Her stomach clinches as the welcome sign and the first houses of Clovis come into view. She feels like time and the surroundings are passing in an out-of-control fashion. On one hand, she wants it to slow down so she can assimilate it. On the other, she wants this to be done one way or the other. The unknown and what she may find is eating her up. Their coming into the city and nearing her parents’ house feels like an onrushing freight train and she isn’t able to get out of the way.
