“Or they have an inner perimeter,” James added.
“If we’re not here to get them out, why the hell are we here?” Jacob said.
“Recon, maybe take a head.”
“A head?”
“Sure every enemy has a leader; maybe we can kill or capture one. James, see if you can sneak around that wall; travel east and look for a secondary entrance. I’ll take Jacob to the west. Don’t engage; we need to see what’s in there.”
James nodded, pulling his gear in and stuffing it into pockets on his vest. “Back here in four hours then?”
“Wait no longer than that. If we aren’t here, fall back to the bunker.” Rogers rolled to the right and sat up. He folded the poncho liner then opened a small pack and removed four grenades still in the tubes, handing two to James before placing the other two in pouches on his chest rig. He stuffed the blanket into the small pack and readied his rifle. “Go ahead, James, I’ll give you a five-minute start before we move. If you hear shooting, don’t try to back us up, just bee-line to the bunker.”
James grinned. “Understood, but I can’t make any promises.”
Before Rogers could argue, James was on his feet moving down the hill with the dog close by his side. Jacob watched the man glide down the hill and disappear into heavy vegetation at the base. Soon there was no sign that he’d ever been there. Rogers looked at Jacob. “You ready?”
He nodded and signaled a thumbs up. Jacob stood and fell in line behind Rogers. They moved away from the gate, staying just below the hilltop, careful not to profile themselves against the rising sun. Jacob felt good to be back on his feet, the movement helping to warm his cold and cramped muscles. They passed down a draw and toward a thick batch of vegetation. Rogers set the pace, cutting back and forth over easier-to-travel terrain. They moved around a low, open area, sticking to the shadows of the hill.
Jacob looked back at the high ridge behind him, its high grass now swallowed in shadows. Looking further east, he could see a sloping face that overlooked the west wall. Rogers pointed to it and dropped to his knees then slowly leopard-crawled into a batch of low grass.
Jacob could tell by the growth patterns of the vegetation that this is where the field would have been cut to before the attacks. The grass went from a tall, brushed clean appearance to more wild and mixed with weeds and scrub brush. Looking closer at the high walls as the sun hit the surface, Jacob suddenly could see that it was different. “Rogers, that material, what is it?”
Holding the binoculars, Rogers scanned the fence. “A type of carbon fiber maybe? This has to be a base, why else build a wall?”
Rogers pointed to a batch of playground equipment surrounded by a small walking path that led into an open slot on the wall filled with a narrow gate. Jacob put his rifle to his cheek and scanned the low ground ahead. No movement, the area appeared completely unoccupied. The pedestrian gate hung closed and a broken sapling slapped against the surface of the nearby wall.
On the far side of the walls, shingled rooftops glistened in the morning sun and the shadow of the hills behind them receded. Clouds of smoke in the distance drifted lazily on the horizon. Using the binoculars, they spotted a road that meandered through the small community. Rogers tapped Jacob’s shoulder then indicated an elevated mound near the edge of the clean grass. It was higher than the rest of the nearly flat ground that ringed the fence, but they would have to cross open terrain to reach it.
Jacob nodded a reply and followed his leader toward the position. Wading through high grass, Jacob could feel the pace pick up. He felt the urgency; they needed to get set before the sun completely broke the high ground behind them and washed them in daylight. As the shadows pulled toward them, Jacob instinctively swallowed at a tickle at the back of his neck. His muscles tightened. “Rogers,” he whispered above the labored breath of his movement.
“I feel it too, just keep moving.”
Rogers scrambled ahead and dove into high grass as the vibration intensified. Jacob low-crawled, following Rogers’ boots up the incline of the mound. He could hear the sound of the vehicles; the whooshing their engines made, defying gravity as they forced away from the ground.
He crawled up until the ground leveled out then they turned and pushed their weapons in front of them, faces down in the earth, taking labored breaths from both exhaustion and adrenaline. When he dared, he slowly lifted his head just high enough so that he could peek through the tall grass. They’d closed the distance to the pedestrian gate to less than a football field.
It was in easy firing range now. The sapling no longer swung with the breeze. Beside it stood a tall, red-sleeved soldier. The creature carried a weapon at the low ready, while a larger group of them were forming up inside the wall with the vehicles inside the now open gate.
“You think they know we’re here?” Jacob whispered. “What made them rush out like that?”
“No, if they knew, we’d be dead, just stay cool.”
Jacob’s eyes met Rogers’ stare. “Okay, what do we do now?”
The hardened soldier pressed closer to the earth and dipped his chin. Jacob’s eyes followed the motion and saw them—a large group of people, mostly women and children, walking two by two in a long column on the path. They were flanked on both sides by the red-sleeved aliens. As they got closer, Jacob could see they were being followed by Deltas. Moving differently now, they marched in straight lines, their black eyes locked straight ahead.
Jacob began to speak, but Rogers silenced him with a finger to his lips. The civilians carried no belongings. Women gripped the hands of children; those
