“Was Mr. Green still in the caves when we arrived?”
“Yeah, he was there. I don’t know where he is now, but he survived. Why?”
“Just curious. Do you know if there are other similar complexes close by?”
“Mr. Bear spoke about others in the mountains. I know he had a map of where at least three other cave complexes were. I only saw it once over a year ago, I’m sorry I don’t remember much about the locations.”
“That’s okay.” Jon made a mental note to tell the Colonel about the other complexes. The convoy slowly drove forward.
@@@@@
Gary Stier rode with one of the scout teams, they were in a special Bradley which was called an M3 scout Bradley which was a modified version of the Bradley fighting vehicle. There was only a total of six people in the vehicle as it crunched through the ice and snow. They used thermal sensors to search for life along the snow and ice-covered freeway. The sensor sergeant said, “I’ve got something, three o’clock, around a mile ahead.”
Gary looked at the paper map, he had unfolded. “Rest stop and gas station on the right. Are we going to stop and check it out?”
The Bradley commander, a staff sergeant nodded, “Yup, those are our orders. You’re here because you’re supposed to be an expert. What do you think we’re going to find?”
“Be on your toes. There were a lot of very independent people in this area. They may not like us very much nor trust us.”
“Okay. We’ll be on our toes. Thank God our boots are insulated enough to keep us from losing our toes.”
The sergeant watching the thermal sensor yelled, “MISSILE LAUNCH!”
The Bradley commander yelled “Gary, red toggle to your left shoulder, hit it! It’s our anti-missile system.”
“Huh?”
“Hit it!”
“I did, I did. What happens next?”
“If the system isn’t frozen over, it will use millimeter wave radar to track the incoming and fire large shotgun shells to destroy the incoming. Pray it works.”
“If it doesn’t?”
They heard and felt the shells firing. “If it doesn’t work, we’re all dead.” They heard the explosion in the front of the Bradley. “We got it. Now we have to find out who fired it and if they have more of them.”
Gary asked, “Are you going to call it in?”
“Radio doesn’t work remember ionization of the atmosphere?”
“Sorry I forgot. I assumed you guys figured out how to get around it by now.”
“Yeah, no. We were told to wait until the atmosphere cleared. We’ve been waiting over two years.”
Before they could continue their banter, “Missile launch!”
“Here we go again. Pray the self-defense system continues to work.”
Bang, bang, bang. The self-defense system fired three times. The missile exploded only 50 yards from their vehicle.”
Gary shook his head, “Who the hell is firing at us?”
“We’re going to find out. We got a lead on where they were when they fired. We’re heading there right now. The road is covered in very deep snow. It’s going to be a rough ride so hold on. We’re going to use the automatic CROWS system to fire the .50-caliber from inside so we don’t have to stand up in the wind.”
They heard rifle rounds pinging off the armor. Gary shook his head, “Someone out there doesn’t like us very much.”
“They’re not going to like us in about ten seconds.” The .50-caliber on top of the Bradley opened fire. They watched the large bullets kick up snow. They saw three shapes stand up and then the .50-caliber opened fire again, this time it knocked down two of the three. One of the shapes got away.
Gary looked through the main gun periscope to search for their attackers. “I’m switching to thermals, if there’s anything above freezing we’ll find them.”
The vehicle commander shook his head, “Unless they’re wearing thermal masking suits.”
Gary asked, “Where the hell did these people get RPGs and thermal masking suits? Did you guys have a going out of business sale?”
“One would think so, but it was the Guard who left tons of their equipment behind. They were tasked with helping the population move south. No one figured they needed to be armed to the teeth in order to escort caravans along the freeways. So they were supposed to lock up the armories and their weapons lockers and not worry about it. It was assumed no one would be able to break into the armories.”
Gary slowly shook his head, “Yeah, look at how well that worked out. We’re getting attacked with our own weapons. How the hell did they break into the vaults? I thought those things were sealed better then bank vaults.”
“Yeah, we thought so too until the Colonel sent us to check out one of the armories. We discovered someone had used a torch to cut through the damn locking mechanism. If they did the same with the armories then they have everything from mortars, shoulder fired missiles, full auto assault rifles, our own uniforms and who knows how much fuel they got.”
“Food?”
“All of the Guard’s MRE’s were supposed to have been taken by Guard for the civilians they were escorting. They were also supposed to take the fuel in tankers, but as we’ve seen a lot of fuel must have been left behind.”
“What about the snowmobiles? Where did they come from?”
“We’re in upper New York State. The Colonel estimated that one in five or six homes owned snowmobiles and the Guard had been equipped with them in case the snows came early. The President ordered the Guard to assist the locals to move as many people as possible south before the conditions worsened to a point the roads couldn’t be kept clear. They brought thousands of buses and trucks to carry everyone who wanted to leave. Most didn’t
