2020: Emergency Exit (46 page)

Again, in approaching Teec Nos Pos he learned the Americans had been diverted by another explosion. He’d even lost some of his own men. These were unusual events to be sure. Whoever was setting off these explosions was either a complete failure or was helping the Americans.
Was that possible?
When the general turned onto Highway 191, he learned of yet another explosion north of him, and he decided to take the Americans head on. He turned up 191 with the rest of his force and had closed to within a few miles of them when his radar showed them cutting west on another country road.
How were they anticipating his moves so perfectly?
Now he was furious.

Just before the river there was a huge explosion, and a couple of his vehicles were reduced to rubble. He ordered all of his men out, and they began pursuing three men on foot through the park. They were firing at the men but were also taking fire from someone near the building ahead of them. The general watched as more than a dozen of his men fell, including one of his officers and one of his dogs. The three men they’d pursued through the park climbed into a boat and pushed off down the river before the general’s men caught up to them. His men managed to hit one of them, but he’d fallen in the river and had been sucked immediately downstream.

The general’s men waited for him by the boathouse. Four of the nine boats left stacked were damaged beyond use. The general ordered two of his three remaining officers to take the other five boats down the river with twenty-three other men, paddles, vests, and weapons. “Try to find the body, too,” he ordered them as they pushed off.

He took his other officer and the remaining thirty-one men back to the vehicles with him to radio the nearest command base. He wanted four helicopters here before dawn. They were going to find these Americans. They’d evaded him once. Never again. And whoever was helping them was going to beg for a bullet when he was done with them.

An hour later as the general drove west, he started to make sense of what had happened. His men’s every move had been telegraphed the entire route. He was certain some of his own men had betrayed him. They had tipped the Americans off and essentially escorted them through the danger zones. Since most of his men had been with him, that meant it had to be someone else who had known exactly where they were going. Probably someone from the Buena Vista camp.
Probably Eddie.
But how? And why? For personal revenge? Why would he help the Americans?

When General Roja arrived at the nearest base, he established contact with the post in Delta to see if any Qi Jia soldiers had passed through there recently. They informed him that some officials had come from Denver to recognize them for their heroism. Since that didn’t sound anything like The Seven commanders he knew, the general asked for descriptions of the men, and all he needed to hear was “giant African” to know he’d been correct in his assumptions. But then he was back to “
how?” How could Eddie have known where they were and what they were doing?

It didn’t take him long to realize there was only one possible answer. One of his men had to have something on them, a tracker of some sort. He had every man’s pack brought to him and searched, including his officer’s, and sure enough, he found a tracker in the officer’s pack. No other chips were revealed, but he suspected his officers on the river had them too. Only one man had access to those packs beyond the general and his men.
Amadi
.
So he was with Eddie the whole time. Clearly the man wasn’t as stupid as he seemed.

As the pieces fell into place, the general figured out a way he could use these developments to his advantage. He called the Flagstaff base, as it had the nearest long-distance radio, and asked to speak to the base commander. “Colonel Dominguez,” he said. “I need a favor.” He couldn’t call it in himself with their lower-range radios. “Call Commander Vasquez in Denver. Tell him the general needs ‘the package’ in Page, Arizona. I need it right now.”

An hour later the Flagstaff base commander radioed back. “The package” was on its way from Puerto Rico. It would be there before noon tomorrow.
Perfect!

SEVENTY-NINE: “Answers”

The Kevlar in Danny’s uniform had slowed the bullet, but not stopped it. It was embedded below his left shoulder blade. Danny had managed to take out all but three of the closest men to Eddie, Lazzo, and the other guy before Lazzo had shot him. Danny knew he was in a tough position because yelling at Eddie would give him away to the others, and they’d know for sure he was American, but not yelling and just firing left the possibility he too could be taken as an enemy. Eddie seemed to recognize Danny was helping them, but Lazzo must have seen him as a threat. He was fortunate Lazzo hit him where he did. It hurt like crazy, but the bullet had missed his shoulder blade, head, and every other potentially fatal target. Nonetheless, the bullet spun him onto his back and sent his night vision goggles flying.

As he tried to get up, a strong arm pulled him up and dragged him to the river, throwing him into a boat like a doll. It was pretty easy to figure out that was Eddie. Another man jumped into the boat beside him while Eddie and the third man pushed the boat off. Eddie rolled into the boat as the man in the water took several shots in the back and never got in. Lazzo fired back at the other boats, striking a couple of them. They’d be useless in the water, but several had escaped damage. Soldiers would be in those rafts and pursuing them shortly. Danny was trying to sit up, but the heavy weight of Eddie’s knee held him flat. “Stay down,” Eddie hissed.

They were well down the San Juan River before they saw lights in the water behind them. They’d disappear and reappear periodically as the river goose-necked its course. Finally, Eddie took his knee off Danny and waved Lazzo over to help him. “Sorry,” Lazzo said, pulling out a small medical kit. Danny nodded the apology off. Lazzo put a small flashlight in his teeth and pulled the fabric away from the wound. “Gonna hurt,” he said. Danny winced and nodded again. The bullet wasn’t in deep, and Lazzo’s first poke hit it. “That’s good.” Lazzo grinned.

“Yeah. Good,” Danny replied, shaking his head.
Flippin’ wonderful!

Lazzo grabbed the scissors, poked them into the bullet hole, and pulled the bullet straight out. Blood pulsed out as he rinsed the wound off and covered it with gauze. “Hold,” he said to Danny, and Danny held the gauze. Danny had better first aid supplies in his pack, but that was somewhere down the river ahead of them.

“Why again?” Eddie finally asked Danny. “Why come back to help us?”

“Better question,” Danny replied. “Why’d you help us? You could have let us die easily and never been involved in any of this.”

Eddie nodded but looked away and didn’t say anything. Lazzo answered for him. “We were fooled.”

“No, I was a fool,” Eddie cut in. “I is a fool?” he asked, checking for the correct phrase.

“Either way,” Danny replied.

But Lazzo repeated, “We were fooled. Our government. They told us our family was dead. That Americans kill them so we attack America then. We figured out. They lied.”

“They killed your families?” Danny asked, searching Eddie’s face. “Or we killed—”

Eddie looked at him coldly. Lazzo whispered, “Yes. Someone killed our families. But after America was attacked.”

“So they told you your families were dead so you would fight? So you’d want to kill us?” Danny asked, already knowing the answer.

No response from Eddie. Another confirmation from Lazzo.

“So why chase us all the way across the country? What did our family do to you?” Danny whispered.

“You killed Eddie’s good friend, Markus, in Dakota. And more of our men,” Lazzo replied. “Eddie’s very loyal. We take that all personally.”

“He was a good friend,” Eddie spoke finally, looking at Danny, referring to Markus.

“Sorry,” Danny replied, shaking his head. “I lost my best friend too.”

“Me?” Eddie asked, his face relaxing a bit.

“No. You didn’t do it.” Danny shook his head. “Mountain lions.”

“Essex Park?” Lazzo asked. This time Danny just nodded.
Essex, Estes…

“Girl with the bow?” Eddie asked, mimicking firing a bow.

“My sister,” Danny replied.

“Same sister?” Eddie inquired, referencing the girl he’d pulled out of the river.

“Yes. Same sister,” Danny confirmed.

Eddie chuckled. “So you have little girl too?” Another nod from Danny. “You were the four white suits at the hotel?”

“Uhhh…” Danny struggled to figure out what he was asking. “What?”

“On video,” Lazzo offered. “In room under floor. White Russian suits.”

Son of a gun. They didn’t even think about being taped.
“Oh,” Danny muttered. “Yeah, that was us.”

“You’re a good soldier,” Lazzo told him. “How you survive the cold?”

“Cave,” Danny answered. “Big cave.”

“You kill vice president?” Eddie fixed his eyes on Danny’s.

The guy was direct
. It wasn’t something Danny was supposed to answer, but the circumstances merited a reply. “Kind of,” Danny admitted.

“You visited him in tent?” Eddie followed up, clearly checking Danny’s honesty.

Danny nodded again.
Impressive
. “Who was the other guy?” Danny asked Lazzo, pointing back in the direction they’d come from.

“A good man,” Lazzo replied. “But we be dead without you.” He put his hand on Danny’s good shoulder.

“Again,” Eddie whispered.

The conversation answered many things for Danny. For one, he now knew for sure they were aware of his role in their survival in Cheyenne. Clearly, these men had found out they’d been lied to by whatever government was running this country now, and when they’d found out the truth they’d rushed to help Danny and his family escape. Scorn had been a powerful force in that decision as it put Eddie and Lazzo directly in harm’s way, but they didn’t seem to regret it or resent Danny for it. It also told him why they’d chased us in the first place. Initially, it had just been payback for Eddie’s friend, but then they’d been outsmarted one too many times, and Eddie had taken it personally.

“Can you tell me what this is?” Danny asked. “What’s going on here?”

“Soon,” Eddie replied. “Must move now.”

Danny accepted that reply for now. He pulled his flashlight out and began flashing it ahead. As Eddie and Lazzo paddled through the river towards Lake Powell, Danny continued to flash his light forward whenever they couldn’t see the lights behind them.

Up ahead, we saw a light flashing behind us. It seemed to be relaying some sort of message but we couldn’t decipher it. Nonetheless, we figured it was Danny, so we flashed back. We rowed backwards against the water to slow down and wait for them, and they caught us about ten minutes later. We were shocked to see who was in the boat with Danny.

EIGHTY: (Ryan) “Decoy”

We decided to dump Eddie’s raft in the rocks at the next set of rapids. Hopefully that would slow the search party behind us. They’d been gaining on us the past few hours, and it would be light soon. Jenna focused on Danny’s shoulder right away. She had him patched up in no time. Our two rafts were loaded with people and supplies, which did slow us down, but also seemed to allow us to travel the rougher sections better.

Eddie and Hayley had spent a great deal of time in conversation since we’d merged. Eddie seemed quite impressed with her, and Hayley obviously had a unique place in her heart for him as well. For the most part the rest of us just watched and listened. We didn’t know what to think of Eddie and Lazzo being with us now. Besides, we had enough other things on our minds. The water was getting rougher, and the sky was starting to lighten. We had to be coming up on the Colorado River soon.

Just before dawn, the San Juan River converged with the much bigger, much rougher Colorado River. A few years ago this river had almost completely dried up. A few heavy rain seasons had reversed that drought and then some. We were adjusting to the roughness when the helicopters made their first pass overhead. I’m not quite sure how they missed us—maybe it was the sun coming up behind us—or perhaps they saw the boats behind us and were distracted. Whatever the cause, we certainly didn’t miss them.

We had hoped to make it to Lake Powell and its many coves and channels, but the helicopters were going to make that impossible. They’d be flying back overhead any minute now. We paddled the boats into the nearest channel, wedged between two enormous canyon walls, and found a small inlet where we figured we could hide out for the day. It had an even smaller beach and several awkward trees that appeared to have been planted sideways and upside down into the canyon wall. It was cover enough, at least. We pulled up under the trees, flipped and covered the rafts with sand, and then walked up into a narrow crevice adjacent the small beach.

We hid ourselves in the cool shade of the overhanging rocks and spent the day listening to Eddie and Lazzo, mostly Lazzo, fill us in on the enemy’s plan and everything else they knew about the current state of America. It was easy to tell they were somewhat confused themselves. They knew there were seven countries involved in the attack against the United States, including Mexico, which surprised us all—that’s where the general was from who was hunting us right now. The seven leaders of those countries were now orchestrating the new government they called Qi Jia. Qi Jia knew surviving Americans were trying to get to Hawaii and Eddie confirmed it was indeed the only safe haven left in America—as the Secret Service agents had shared. Eddie did add that there may still be Americans alive in NORAD’s Cheyenne Mountain bunker, but Qi Jian forces were still trying to break in. Who knows how long it would be before either they got in, or the survivors inside died. There really wasn’t much of this country left. It turned out everything we’d heard and feared was true, and in some cases even worse than we could have imagined.