Read HOMELAND: Falling Down (Part 1 of the HOMELAND Series) Online
Authors: R.A. Mathis
She held him close. Tears burned her eyes as Dillon began to choke and spasm. Then he was gone.
Betty coughed until her throat turned numb. She closed her eyes laying on the edge of consciousness, waiting to die. All was silent in the chamber.
She heard fans kick on, then huge chain-driven overhead doors opened on each end of the building, flooding the space with cold, fresh air. A cargo truck backed into the opening. She opened her stinging eyes to see men and women in chemical suits enter and begin loading the dead into the covered bed of the truck.
A man with a tablet and clip board entered. He ordered the others, “Hurry and get this batch to the incinerator. We got more busses arriving in ten minutes!”
One of the suited people, a woman, stood over Betty and looked down into her eyes.
Betty tried to speak, but her aching lungs just gurgled.
The woman yelled back to the man with the tablet, “We got a live one!”
“Then take care of it.”
“Yes, sir.”
The woman drew a pistol from a holster on her hip and pointed at Betty’s face.
Betty’s lips mouthed the only thing she could think to say. “Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy na—”
Pop!
A flash of light, then darkness.
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Preview of Part 2, Executive Orders
Undisclosed Safe House
Franklin, TN
20 Miles South of Nashville
Martha Jefferson sat by her sleeping husband’s bedside, holding his hand. The dim, suburban basement was lit by single antique hurricane lamp on a table in the center of the room.
“You’re going to be alright,” she said as she stroked her husband’s hair.
His breathing was labored and his skin was pale.
Martha felt lightheaded. She had escaped assassination two times in as many weeks. She accepted the risks of public speaking, but she never expected an attack on her own home—especially by her own government.
Martha and her staff had retreated to her home outside Nashville after the assassination attempt. She needed a few days to settle her nerves before hitting the campaign trail again. Her staff refused to leave Martha’s side in spite her insistence that she was fine and that they should use the time to be with their families.
They came the middle of the night. Martha and her husband awoke to the sound of shouts and breaking glass. Then the shooting started. Automatic fire, shotguns, even grenades.
Six of her staff burst into her bedroom and shut the door behind them.
Medhavin, her chief of staff panted, “You have to get out of here.”
Martha’s husband replied, “What in the hell is going on?”
“They’re killing everybody,” Medhavin replied.
Martha saw blood on Medhavin’s face. “Are you okay?”
Boots stomped up the stairs toward the room.
“This way.” Medhavin ran to the window and threw it open. “Hurry!” He looked outside. They were on the second floor, but it looked clear. “Let’s go!”
More shots rang from somewhere in the house.
Martha and her husband threw on their shoes and the eight of them jumped to the hard ground.
Crack!
One of the staffers, a young man named Riley, yelled and grabbed his leg.
Martha tried to pull him to his feet.
Riley cried out and fell back to the ground. “I think it’s broken!”
Dark uniforms ran at them from the corner of the house, faces covered, flashlights mounted on their M4 rifles.
“This way!” Medhavin led the group toward a garage across the frozen yard.
Martha’s husband grabbed her arm, yanking her grip from Riley’s arm. “Let’s go!”
“Run!” Riley shouted.
They sprinted across the open ground as bullets ripped the air around them.
Another staffer, an intern name Lydia, went down, lifeless.
“Ooof!” Martha’s husband doubled over.
“You’re hit!” Martha grabbed his arm.
“I’m okay. Let’s go.” He started running again.
The agents caught Riley as he crawled across the frosty grass toward the others.
“No!” he screamed.
Pop!
He fell silent.
Martha and the others finally reached the garage. The cold air tore at their tortured lungs. Medhavin led them around back to a car and grabbed a set of keys from his pocket.
He unlocked the doors with the push of a button. “Get in.”
Tires squealed as they sped off into the misty night.
Martha’s husband doubled over, grunting in pain.
“Let me see.” She felt his stomach. It was soaked with warm blood. “Oh, God. You’re hit. We have to get you to a hospital.”
“No,” he grunted, “That’s the first place they’ll look.” He took a shallow, agonizing breath. “They’ll find us and finish the job.”
“Any ideas,” Medhavin asked as he ducked into side streets, trying to keep distance between them and the DHS hit squad.
“Julia,” Martha said. “She’s been my best friend since college. She lives nearby and he daughter, Amber, is a nurse at Vanderbilt Hospital.”
“Will she help us?”
“I hope so.”
They showed up on Julia’s doorstep an hour later. She took them in, hiding the group in her basement.
The days since then were a blur of boredom, fear, and watching Martha’s husband slip away.
“Missus Washington, it’s time to change his bandage,” a voice said from over Martha’s shoulder.
“Thank you, Amber.”
The congresswoman stepped back to let the young nurse do her work, joining a small group of concerned staffers in torn business suits. All had the look of refugees.
Amber turned down the covers to reveal a large, blood-stained compress on the man’s stomach. She had gotten used to seeing such wounds in the weeks since the troubles started. She removed the soiled bandages and sniffed the wound. “It’s starting to putrefy,” she said gravely, “He needs more than I can do for him.”
Medhavin stepped forward from the group. “I can ask around the other houses for a doctor.”
Julia replied, “I already checked with my neighbors. Homeland Security picked up the only doctor in the neighborhood a week ago. Nobody has seen him since.”
Medhavin said, “I’ll go anyway. There has to be somebody who can help.”
“No,” Julia said, “You’ll be seen. You have to stay here in the basement.”
“The hell I do.” He pushed past the woman.
“No!” Martha ordered her subordinate. “This is Julia’s house. She took us in. She didn’t have to, but she did. She has shared everything she has with us and put her family at risk to do it. You will stay right here.”
Medhavin pointed to Martha’s husband. “He’ll die if we don’t do anything.”
“He would never sacrifice any of you to save himself. Neither would I. Enough people have already died because if us.”
“Then at least…”
“Shhhh!” Amber hushed the room and pointed upward.
The sound of heavy vehicles rumbled from the street outside.
“Another patrol,” Martha whispered.
The rumbling grew louder as the vehicles approached.
Medhavin extinguished the lantern.
The patrol approached the house. Amber closed her eyes, waiting for the droning beasts to pass, but it was different this time. They halted in the street just outside, their engines idling.
Harsh voices were followed by the sound of boots running to the front and back doors.
Doors crashed. Heavy steps tramped across the home’s upper floors.
The basement’s inhabitants froze, their eyes filled with terror.
“Jefferson!” A shout came from somewhere upstairs. “We know you’re here!”
Julia’s dog, Daisy, barked at the intruders from an upper room.
Pop! Pop! Pop!
The barking stopped.
“Daisy!” Julia screamed. She ran to the stairs.
Medhavin grabbed her arm and urged in a hushed tone, “No. They’ll kill us all.”
Julia broke his grip and sprinted up the stairs. “Daisy! Mommy’s coming!”
A black-clad agent tackled her as soon as she topped the stairs. The basement door slammed shut.
There was a scream, then more struggling.
The door opened. Julia sat on her knees in the entryway. Her nose was bleeding. A man in a ski mask stood over her, his rifle to her head.
“I know you’re down there, Martha,” called the unseen agent-in-charge. “You have three seconds….One!”
Martha started to step toward the steps.
“No!” Julia yelled.
“Two!”
Martha paused.
“Kill her,” said the agent-in-charge.
“STOP! STOP IT!” Martha yelled as she ran up the stairs to the main floor. “I’m right here!”
“Hold your fire,” the lead agent ordered.
Black-clad agents seized Martha and shoved her face-down to the floor. One pinned her face to the floor with a knee across her neck while another secured her hands behind her back.
“Get her up,” ordered the agent in charge.
Martha looked upon her captor. The nametape across his right breast read, “Piven.”
Piven smiled. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Congresswoman. You’re under arrest.”
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