Chapter
1
January 2, 2131 Two years after the Flare
“Is it true Adam?” Amy demanded of her twin brother as soon
as he walked in the front door, having just returned from a trip to town in a
search for information. He said nothing but silently held the morning newspaper
out for her to read, squeezing her shoulder as he slipped by. She didn’t
question where he was going or try to make him stay though she desperately
wanted to; the others had to be informed. She took but a moment to scan the
headlines to see the truth spelled out in the black ink taking up the page.
Senate Declares War on
Christians
She took a moment to pray and then quickly followed her
brother, The Council would be meeting and they would have to decide what was to
be done. One thing she knew, no longer were any of them safe, America had
turned against them.
As she walked towards the living room she could hear the
loud voices through the door as everyone tried to talk at once. She slipped in
to sit next to her mother near the back. Her brother was at the front after
having given his report, he sat beside her father and the other the men on The
Council.
“What are we going to do?” Sarah, a young girl of fifteen,
asked her voice shaking as she voiced the question on everyone’s mind.
Immediately the room silenced as all eyes turned to The Council. The five
elected leaders exchanged glances and Bill Lincoln, stood to address the crowd
gathered.
“It doesn’t appear we have much choice, as most of you know
we came up with a plan for just such an event months ago. It’ll be just a
matter of time before they come looking for us. We’ve never made a secret of
our faith and although we don’t know if they’ve tracked us to this house or
not, we have to assume we’ve been compromised. Get together only what you can
carry we’ll have to retreat to the camp as soon as we can get out of here.
We’ll leave as soon as it’s dark, which gives you about eight hours. Get
yourselves ready, and make sure you leave no trace of where we’re going. This
is war, and we won’t be able to help anyone if we’re dead.” He said a quick prayer
before letting them go; Amy hung behind waiting for the room to clear before
approaching.
“Amy?” her father asked, as she walked farther into the
room, the other men turned and Bill motioned for her to speak.
“Send me ahead to set up the camp.”
“Why should we send you?” Mark Drake asked quietly, she took
no offense at the question, knowing that it was standard to ask similar
questions before they could decide whether or not to send her. The safety of
too many people was dependent on making sure the camp was set up securely and
they couldn’t afford any mistakes.
“If you’re sending Adam you should send me too, we work well
together and we know how to look out for each other. History has proven that
people tend not to notice a girl and guy traveling together but they will
notice two men, I’m a logical choice.”
For a moment Amy thought they were going to just ignore her
request, but then Steve Williams spoke up.
“We’re sending Adam and Kyle, why don’t we ask them what
they think.” Amy didn’t reply she wasn’t surprised to learn that Kyle would be
going with Adam; Kyle Marks was a good fighter with an uncanny ability to get
around undetected and shadows in his eyes that suggested he had untold secrets
from his time before joining their little community. She had worked with him in
the past and they’d always gotten along, but whether or not he thought she’d be
an asset for this mission remained to be seen. Mark went to get the two who
were preparing some food for the journey. When they came into the room Adam
caught sight of his sister and smiled, not surprised she had volunteered. “Kyle,
Adam, Amy’s volunteered to go with you to set up the camp, any comments?” Bill
wasted no time in asking after telling Amy to wait outside.
“No objections here, I’ve worked with her before, she’s good
and most people won’t think twice if they see two guys and a girl together,
just the two of us may raise suspicion.” Kyle replied easily,” Amy is level
headed and can talk herself out of just about any situation.”
“Same here, it’s always nice to know she’s got my back,”
Adam threw in, not looking at his father. Bill nodded before dismissing them so
The Council could confer. The two young men went outside to wait with Amy. She
looked up as they walked out into the hallway, glancing up to meet her
brother’s gaze.
“I was wondering how long it would take you to volunteer for
this trip,” Adam remarked leaning against the wall next to her.
“Couldn’t let you two go out and have all the fun without
me, now could I?” Amy responded, leaning on the wall opposite them, Kyle
laughed. Since he didn’t have siblings, it always fascinated him to watch the
Collins twins interact. They were always teasing each other and playing pranks,
but in a fight you’d think they could read each other’s mind with how well they
anticipated the other’s minds. After having lost both his parents in a raid
last year, he had been told of the group of Christians in Eastern Washington
who were rumored to take in orphans. These people had become the closest thing
he had left to family. As he watched them go back and forth he shook his head,
with them around life was never boring. He was just about to say so, when Mark
Drake stuck his head out the door.
“We’re ready for you.”
The young people immediately ceased their banter as they
entered the room to hear The Council’s decision.
“Amy,” Bill started as soon as they came in and shut the
door. “You will go with Kyle and Adam to set up the camp. On the way you’ll
need to make sure that the road is clear, we can’t let these people walk into a
trap. If you encounter a problem, you three will choose one of you to come back
and tell us, if you can’t get away try to leave some signal not to come.
Remember to leave markers at the checkpoints. Do you understand?” When all
three said they did he nodded, “All right then, we’ll leave you to get ready,
you’ll need to leave within the hour.” As The Council members and Kyle filed
out Dave Collins, the twins’ dad, hung back.
“Amy, why don’t you go let your mother know the change of
plans,” he requested. Realizing that he wanted to speak to her brother alone,
the young woman nodded and slipped out.
“Dad, I didn’t ask her to come,” Adam started as soon as his
sister had left.
“You didn’t discourage her either,” Dave responded, trying
not to let his warring emotions show on his face. It was bad enough having his
son volunteer for these missions, but having his daughter out there too… It was
just too much.
“You heard Kyle both of us would rather have her watching
our backs than anyone else.” Adam argued, knowing where the conversation was
going. “I know you don’t want her to be in danger, but we’ll all be looking out
for each other and you know as well as I do, that if you had said no, she
would’ve come up with a mission just as dangerous, if not more so. At least
this way Amy has us to watch out for her.” His father turned back to face him
an incredulous expression on his face.
“Do you think my only concern is for your sister?” He went
on without waiting for an answer. “Don’t you realize that it’s hard enough to
send you on these missions, without having to watch both of my children go into
danger?” David crossed the room to grasp his son by the shoulders and stared
hard into his face. “Adam, I never wanted this life for us. I never dreamed
that this would happen, but now…” he stopped as his voice broke. Adam blinked
at the sheen in his father’s eyes.
“I know Dad, but we’re here now and the Lord has given these
skills to Amy, Kyle, and I for a reason. We fight well together; you have to
let us do our job.” For a moment David said nothing, his son sounded much more
mature then his nineteen years, he studied him for a moment, the dark blue eyes
and curly black hair kept short so as not to get in his way in a fight.
Everything they did, down to the clothes they chose and the way they kept their
hair, was done deliberately so as to help them blend in and not interfere with
their fighting. He was trained well, they all were and now the time had come
for war, he couldn’t protect his children any longer. He gave a curt nod and
then pulled him against him for a brief, hard hug.
“Go then, get ready, and the Lord be with you.” Adam looked
into the eyes of the familiar face and offered a smile, there would be no
good-bye or tears. They had to believe they would be reunited, if not at the
camp, then one day in eternity. Otherwise they were fighting for nothing.
*
The small band of three took off within the hour as planned
and started along the back roads to where the camp was set. They knew that the
hardest part of their journey would be getting there. Once they had arrived, they would be greeted
by the small group of friends who had been left to guard the camp. The group of
men, women and their families who already resided at the camp, nicknamed Paradise, were those who had lost their
jobs and had false charges brought up against them. They had fled from the
false accusations and with the help of The Council, Paradise had been
established.
The three young people traveled swiftly, not daring to slow
down, but keeping their senses on high alert so as not to miss anything. So far
the agents and officers the government had sent out had stuck mostly to town,
but now, with war officially declared, no one knew if they had spread out to
search the forest or not. One thing was for certain, the further they got from
town the safer they were sure to be.
*
Amy didn’t know how long they’d been walking when Kyle
suggested they rest for a minute; she agreed, sitting down and watching as her
brother grabbed his compass.
“The second check point is just over there,” he told them
after a minute of consulting the instrument. Because of the solar flare that
had hit the earth two years earlier, the electronic devices they used to take
for granted, were now obsolete, making the once simple task of keeping people
appraised of their progress now much more difficult. Since an alternate plan
was needed, they’d set up check points. They varied depending on the location,
this one was a tree. Amy took from her backpack a small green rock and took it
over to the tree, while the boys scouted the area she dug in the dirt a bit
until she found what she was looking for. A little notch on the underside of an
exposed root flipped opened a trap door. The area inside was only about an inch
square and the whole process of creating it would seem quite pointless if you
didn’t know why it was there. She placed the rock inside the hole and closed it
back up, making sure to conceal the root and erase her footsteps. When the rest
of their company came later that night, they would send scouts ahead. The
scouts would go to each check point, if they found a green rock, they would
know that the team had made it this far and it was safe to continue, but if
they found a white rock it would mean danger and that something had gone wrong.
At that point they would keep going, but the group would split up and take
different routes, and if they found no rock then they would immediately assume
that the team had been captured. They would go to a different location until
more information could be obtained; the alternate camp was so secret that only
The Council and its occupants knew its location. In the event of capture, no
one on the team would be able to tell them where their people were headed.
The plan was not perfect, Amy mused, as they quietly picked
up their packs and started the journey again, but it was the best they had.
I can't wait to see where this story will go. Great job!
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