Billy nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“All right. Get there as quickly as you can, but don’t let anyone else see you.” Billy turned and headed out, walking carefully. The crowd parted before him like the Red Sea before Moses.
Ken called after him, “Be careful, boy.”
Billy grinned nervously. “I will.” With that, he turned his full attention back to the delicate task at hand.
“Who else?” The rest of us raised our hands at once, shamed into volunteering by a boy who was a slave, who couldn’t even claim he was fighting for his home.
Ken distributed the packages to twelve individuals. “Get to the warehouse as quickly as you can. Be careful, but be fast.”
He turned to the rest of us. “The rest of you divide up into five-man groups. One group leaves every five minutes. Make sure every group has someone in it that knows where their objective is. I don’t want anyone getting lost and giving us away. I also don’t want anyone seen! Understand?” We all nodded.
“Good. Now, we don’t know when, or even
“Group Two, you wait ’til you hear from us. You don’t make a move until I tell you to. This hit has to be synchronized, or it’s all wasted effort. Do
When no one piped up, he turned. “Group One with me. Group Two with Eric. We stay in touch by radio.” He looked around one last time. “Okay, folks, let’s go.”
I was in Group One since I’d had the most recent experience with the setup at the stadium and knew the route we’d taken to avoid contact with Larry’s boys. Going in was actually anticlimactic compared to all the excitement I’d had helping Sarah get into the stadium. There was no gunfire, no yelling or screaming. We snuck in like proverbial mice, quiet as….
It took us twice as long to get in, and I felt strange as we passed by the volunteers making their way, step by careful step, into town, but not one of us was spotted, and we all made it without incident.
Chapter 15
Cris, pleurs, larmes viendront auec couteaux,
Semblant fuyr, donront dernier assaut,
L’entour parques planter profonds plateaux,
Vifs repoussez amp; meurdris de plinsaut.
Cries, weeping, tears will come with knives,
Seeming to flee, they will deliver a final attack,
Parks around to set up high platforms,
The living pushed back and murdered instantly.
The Regency Warehouse was two buildings down from where my group had holed up the night before and turned out to have much nicer accommodations, considering the fact that there were plenty of chairs, sofas, and even a few mattresses in stock. We put a half-dozen people on rotating guard duty, and the rest of us, myself included, slept as much as we could.
I awoke slowly to the familiar feel of someone shaking my shoulder. “Leeland, wake up!”
I saw upon opening my eyes that the sun was beginning to set. Ken stood over me smiling. I had slept the day away. Considering how exhausted the last few days’ activities had left me, I wasn’t terribly surprised. Even after all the sleep I had just gotten, I still felt a little groggy.
“Good grief,” I growled. “Don’t you ever sleep?”
“Not when I’m surrounded by bad guys.”
That got my attention. “What’s going on? Is it starting?” I grabbed my gear, scrambling to strap my weapons in place.
“Calm down, Lee. No need to panic. Just thought you ought to know. Billy spotted Sarah.”
“Where?”
“Come on, I’ll show you.”
We headed to the third floor, where Billy and three others knelt just inside one of three windows to watch the activities around the stadium. Ken and I carefully crept over to join them.
Billy handed Ken a small pair of binoculars. “She’s still out there at the front fence.”
Ken peered through the window. A moment later he offered the binoculars to me. “Just at the edge of the chain link near the entrance.”
Sure enough, there was Sarah at the front of a crowd of people. She had worked her way to the edge of the refugees and now stared out through the fence at a tank that barred her escape. She wore a desperate expression. She had no way of knowing we were there. “Anyone signaled her?”
Ken shook his head. “Thought maybe you should do it. She knows you best.”
“Okay, what do I do?”
He handed me a small mirror. “Don’t let anyone else see you. Catch her attention, then we hold up this sign.”
They had managed to cut a piece of plywood to fit inside one of the windows. Painted on it in black lettering, large enough to be easily seen, was the short message: “10:45 — GO TO VOGLER FERT.”
Ken indicated the setting sun. “You have to get her attention before the sun goes down.” He took back the binoculars. “Get to it.”
Ken turned to watch her through the binoculars while I tried to capture the last rays of the sun in a two-inch square mirror. I played with the angle for a few seconds, shining the reflection on the wall in front of me until I got it right. Then, trying to hold the same angle, I slowly stepped to the opened window and swept the tiny beam of light toward Sarah.
Almost immediately, Ken stopped me. “She sees it. Hold up the sign!” I tucked the mirror in my pocket, while Billy and another man held up the sign.
Abruptly, Ken laughed. “Okay, put down the sign. She got it.”
We dropped back behind the wall. “What’s so funny?” I asked.
“She’s a smart lady.” She saw the sign and signaled back. Two full hands of fingers, followed by four on the right and five on the left. She didn’t want there to be any doubt she’d gotten the message.
“Good,” I responded. “But now we’re on a schedule.” I looked at my watch by the fading sunlight. “We have just over four hours ’til things get crazy here. So how do we get the Astrolite to that tank?”
“I wish I knew. Only thing I can think of is going in through the sewer system and trying to get over to that gutter near the stadium.”
I peeked over the edge again. “That’s still a good ten or fifteen feet away from the tank. We’ve got to get closer than that!”
He sighed. “I know. I’m open for suggestions.”
