26. But What of the Meek?
At last, the army moved.
Metallic squeaks marked the crawl of tanks, the clack and clink of loose gear reverberated through marching ranks.
After freeing the blockage of New Winnabow, the 1 ^ st Mechanized Infantry Division gushed forward with incredible speed.
Bogart, the General’s aide, took charge of the vanguard. By noon they reached the crossroad town of Supply, North Carolina where they established a strong point guarding the intersection with Rt. 211.
Shepherd would normally remain at the lead of his column, but he felt a higher responsibility called that day. His command vehicle and a handful of transport trucks arrived at New Winnabow where they found the streets patrolled by K9s.
Residents-survivors-huddled inside barricaded homes or surrounded on street corners.
Robert Parsons had built his community on the premise of avoiding violence. In a sense, he had been proven correct. Only those who did not fight survived.
As Shepherd’s occupation force arrived, the flood of K9s receded without any word from any handler, any human.
A chorus of misery rose from New Winnabow. Constant sobbing, cries of anguish, curses at fate, God, and most of all Trevor Stone.
Shepherd rode into town atop his armored command vehicle between columns of dazed people wandering the streets wondering what to do now that their town had been murdered.
He recognized some of the faces from his prior visits; a guard from a checkpoint, a baker, a woman who offered him a haircut when he toured the town that first time. They had welcomed General Shepherd then, despite what he requested.
Now they regarded him with contempt and fear. Probably the same way the people of Raleigh had regarded Hivvan soldiers when they occupied their city.
Jerry Shepherd had served in the United States military, as a Philadelphia police officer, and for the past five years he had fought to save humanity.
For the first time, he played a bad guy’s role.
The General’s vehicle stopped outside the council building, nearly blocking the thin street. Captain Cassy Simms approached her superior officer as he stepped out.
“Sir, what are your orders?”
Shepherd looked up and down the streets of New Winnabow. He knew there would be no snipers; no pockets of resistance. These people had not been merely defeated, they had been terrorized.
Cassy repeated, “What are you orders?”
Shepherd used the back of his arm to rub sweat off his brow.
“Medics. Get medics in here.”
Simms frowned. “General, Sir,” she whispered so no others could hear. “There aren’t any wounded.”
Shep understood. The Grenadiers killed anyone who resisted and ignored anyone who did not. Like everything else about New Winnabow, there had been no middle ground.
Nina Forest’s Dark Wolves spent the next day and a half reconnoitering Hivvan positions inside the closing pocket. They provided information used for artillery strikes aimed to break up the coalescing enemy army.
Shepherd pulled her team from the action on the afternoon of September 5 ^ th, as larger formations from both 1 ^ st and 2 ^ nd Mech bombarded the surrounded aliens, followed by a constricting band of infantry and armor. Command even found enough fuel reserves to fly a dozen sorties in support of the operation.
As her last act in the securing of Wilmington, Nina returned to the city to help with the transition of authority to civilian administration. Rumor had it that The Emperor planned a run at Columbia as soon as the pocket collapsed. If that held true, the Dark Wolves would be in action again soon.
Nina arrived at City Hall in Wilmington to meet with the Imperial Council’s Chief Administrator, Lori Brewer. She liked Brewer enough but the woman made her feel a little uncomfortable; she asked a lot of personal questions and spoke in a tone of familiarity. Still, she came across as a strong person, something Nina admired and of course she respected her husband, General Brewer.
The two met in the big conference room with the raised platform, the red carpet, the three large windows, and the balcony where Denise hid the day she followed Nina around town. Unlike that day, City Hall no longer felt empty. Lori Brewer brought a team of clerks, accountants, doctors, and engineers to Wilmington.
“The situation could be described as stable,” Nina reported. “We’re still finding lower-order nuisance animals in the old buildings, particularly basements, sewer treatment facilities, and near garbage dumps.”
“Predators?” Lori asked as she scribbled notes on a tablet.
“Occasionally, but most have retreated out of the city limits and into the wilderness but that’s pretty much the story all over. I’d be careful to the north of the city and the west.”
“Organized threats? Pack animals?”
“Nothing above animal sentience. We wiped out some Mutants when we first got here and a bunch of Gremlins. The dogs haven’t picked up a whiff of anything like that in four days, so it looks pretty good.”
Lori consulted a paper and remarked, “With the exception of the people at Wrightsville Beach, it doesn’t look like there are many survivors in town. I see there were some scattered people out by the airport and some more along the coast to the northeast, but that’s a surprisingly low survival rate.”
“We haven’t landed on the barrier islands yet. I heard some talk from Wrightsville survivors that a lot of people from Wilmington got out by boat in the early days. Good chance many of them headed for an isolated location that could be defended more easily.”
“Like an island?”
“Like an island.”
Lori Brewer reviewed her notes, glanced at a binder with more notes, then scribbled something else in the margin.
She said, “There aren’t enough people here to warrant keeping the city up and running, at least not until we’ve cleared all of the Carolinas. Then there might be people who want to migrate in from the rural areas. Until then, we’ll get the rail yards up and running, maybe the port, and set up check points.”
“What about the people?”
“I’m thinking relocation.”
“Relocation? Moving everyone out?”
Lori nodded and leaned forward; she sensed the officer’s interest in the topic.
“Yes. At least for the time being. Something on your mind? Do you think they won’t want to go?”
“No-I mean, yes. I think they’ll go,” Forest told the administrator. “I don’t think the people here, well, I think they’ve been isolated for a long time. I think they’re eager to feel safe and be a part of something.”
“Most are like that. There’s only ever a few who really want to stay exactly where they are and that’s usually in the larger settlements that we wouldn’t want to relocate, anyhow.”
“What about, well, never mind.”
“Never mind what?” Lori pushed.
The way she stared made Nina feel weird, as if Lori knew a secret.
Nina exhaled loudly and said, “Listen, there’s a group of kids. They’re orphans. They were all a part of a day care center at one point.”
“Jim Brock’s kids, right?”
It surprised Nina that Lori knew of Brock’s group; she did not think the administrator had had enough time to learn that much about the city and the survivors.
“Umm, are they going to get split up? You know, sent off to families?”
Lori nodded. “We’ll be looking for hosts for the kids. But you know we’re a little shy on your typical families. A lot of the orphans end up going to elderly groups or parents who are in the military. It’s tough to find perfect homes. In fact, we’ve given up on perfect.”
