The North (#wattys2016)

Chapter 26

Journal Entry: 18 NOVEMBER 0639 HRS ZULU

 What should we do with Dawn-Marie? She’s only been with us for a couple of days. We’ll have to leave her back at the hide along with Jo and Kenny when we head out.

            I’m so freaking tired. I’ve debriefed Cruze and I’ve sworn Mel and Kenny to secrecy about what we found in the coulee until I’ve had a chance to fill in the entire team. The last thing we need is a lot of speculation about why Sunray had slapped together a makeshift death camp. Look at me, keeping secrets from Sid Toomey. Am I punishing him or have I lost faith in him? I’m going to need him on the patrol. He’s a one-man wrecking-crew, and our best machine gunner.

             What we’re about to do might spell the end of every last one of us. I have no idea what kind of fighters Sunray’s people are, but they’ve had more training than us and they’ve spent six months out there battling creeps instead of barricading themselves in like we’d done. But Sanctuary Base isn’t going to happen until we get past Sunray. I think everyone on the team kind of knows that by now, although we’re all afraid to say it. We could abandon the carriers and start gum sucking it cross country on  foot, but it will take us weeks and we honestly believed we’d have gotten much closer with our carriers by scrounging diesel and pushing on. I guess we didn’t realize the sheer totality of this messed-up new world it until we’d broken out of the city. We didn’t have a clue that we’d be going through occupied territory, or that we’d be fighting skirmishes against former soldiers – for crying out loud, we thought the enemy would be the creeps!

            I’m starting to understand why Mom took her own life. She couldn’t cope, and now I’m wondering how I’m going to cope enough to keep giving Jo a light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe she’s luckier than the rest of us - she’s just a kid, she only has a few years of the old world for a frame of reference. This terrifying world of creeps and sudden death is Jo’s new normal – maybe she’s better able to adapt to it because she doesn’t really remember much else.

            I’m going to crash for a few hours. If I don’t, I’ll probably lapse into a coma. Cruze and Doug and Sid can run the OP for now. This afternoon we’ll have a team meeting and hammer out our next move.

 

***

I awoke to someone nudging me in the ribs. “Get up – it’s near noon,” Sid grumbled.

I opened my eyes and looked around the tent. It was empty, and everyone’s kit had been cleared out.

“What’s the situation?” I said with a yawn.

“The team got up about forty minutes ago – Cruze had me pull the GPMG out of Ark One. Everyone is doing a count on our ammo and supplies. We’re going on a fighting patrol, aren’t we?”

I pulled myself out of my sleeping bag and slipped on my mukluks. “Yeah, Sid – just after last light.”

He handed me a cup of instant coffee. “There’s been a lot of movement over the past few hours. Another armored recce probe – we could hear their Cougar. Cruze and I checked it out.”

“What did you see?” I asked, not at all surprised. We had, after all, whacked their sniper crew, not to mention destroyed one of their light tanks.

“Just the one vehicle,” he answered. “They must have been looking for their people - you just know they spotted the burned-out hull of that Cougar and the bodies. They know we’re coming.”