Chapter 2


It seemed as if this driveway never dried out. Jake had been getting out on it and running every morning and, while the softness of the ground did help keep his knee and leg from throbbing, it also made the little pathway something of an obstacle course. That was true even when you did not factor in the hundred and one pot holes that covered the mile and a half long stretch from station to hard top. Jake was not kidding about those water filled traps either. There really were one hundred and one exactly. He had counted them six times, now, while out on his runs.

This morning, Jake found that he did not need such boring and mundane distractions. Since he started his daily routine his hope had been that others would eventually volunteer to come along with him. He tried to goad them by challenges along the lines of how an old man could run circles around them. So far, it had little effect on anyone and none whatsoever on Norm who had made it perfectly clear that he thought Jake looked like an idiot out there on the driveway.

Jake had managed one tag along and that was Rusty. Unfortunately Rusty was also Shannon’s dog and he seemed to be the only one around the station who actually didn’t need to be running. The dog had little trouble with keeping up with Jake and was constantly trying to trip him into one of the many water filled holes. He actually succeeded, twice.

Finally, Jake got some two legged company. It had started out as Shannon, who was only trying to follow along with her dog. She had dropped out somewhere back around the quarter mile mark. When the late comer passed the teenager, Shannon was in the bushes wrenching her guts out. Then the newcomer finally caught up with the new guy. 

Danni Nguyen slowed down to match Jake’s pace. She then laughed, “I kind of figured some green beret guy, like you, would have already made it at least half way by now.”

Jake snorted. It was about the only laugh he could manage while running, “I was taking it easy for the kid, so she could catch back up.”

Danniealla apparently had no problem laughing while breathing heavy, “sorry Jake. I saw her back there and I don’t think she’s headed for any place but the bathroom after that.”

That made Jake think of all kinds of “young versus old” comments but, instead, he opted for another observation, “what are you doing out here? Isn’t this a little early for you to be pushing your lungs?”

“I’ve been on my ass for a month now,” Danni replied back and, despite having a bullet hole through her lung, seemed to have little problem keeping up with Jake. Danni just told him, “I have to get back in shape.”

At the pace they were setting, Jake had to wonder if ‘getting back’ was really the right word. Was this girl even breaking a sweat? She had to be hurting, right? Jake had only broken a leg and done a little damage to his knee yet, even after three years he could still feel it. Danni looked or, at least acted like, she was ready to go out and run a marathon.

The pace had certainly not slowed down the girls reflexes. She reacted to the on coming vehicle, one of the stations official four wheel drives, with much more speed and agility than did Jake. That was probably why, after it sped right past them, that Danni was still dry. Jake was not so lucky. He got off the road and avoided the vehicle’s bumper but, wheels skipped right through a pot hole and left him soaked in muddy water.

Danni laughed and then took off running again as she yelled back, “come on! The sweat will take it off you!”

The dog stood there and looked at Jake in a way that made it almost seem as if he too was laughing. Jake slung some mud in the animal’s direction and then ran off too follow Danni. He soon caught up with her but, when he did, he made a suggestion as they reached the only fork in the driveway. He stopped her and then pointed in the direction that did not lead to the main road, “the hanger is up that way, right?”

Danni was still bouncing around as if she were still running, “yep, that’s where it goes.”

Jake told himself that they needed to stop running for now. This girl had just gotten over being shot twice. She needed to take it easy, of course. He began walking in the direction of the hangar, “you know I have been up there twice and I have yet to find this Chuck guy.”

Finally, Danni stopped bouncing around. She just shrugged and then motioned for Rusty to follow her. 

When they reached the hangar it still appeared as if nobody was around. Of course Jake was not so sure he would actually grace this place with the title of hangar. It was actually more of a rounded roof that looked kind of like a quanza-hut that they had run out of material to finish. Somebody had piled up sand bags around the sides and dug out underneath the shelter but, even that much did not make it look any more sturdy. Jake was sure a good wind would blow the entire thing away. It was probably a good thing that it was set back just behind a set of dunes because that was the only protection it was getting.
There was also only room for one of their two choppers to sit under the cover of sheet metal. The other was parked right out in the open with no more prep than having it’s rotors tied down to the broken concrete pad that also happened to be half covered in sand. Jake could not bring himself to call this place a heliport. The word he did think to describe it was, “disgrace.”

“What was that?” Danni asked when she heard Jake mumble something.

Jake ignored the question as he watched the dog. Rusty was sniffing and on the trail of something. Jake smiled and wondered why he had not thought of this before. He followed the animal right to a patch of sand. It was when Rusty was trying to nudge his nose into the dirt that Jake finally got it. He reached down and lifted up the tarp, that the sand was piled over.
At that time, Jake thought about giving some command like, “sick balls,” but the yelling from under the tarp was enough to make that seem moot. It was coming through loud and clear, along with being quite profane. It ended with, “what the hell Rusty? Get out of here you damn mutt!”

Jake called down in the hole, “not sure Barbara would like to hear that someone called her kid’s dog a mutt.”

A head popped out from under the tarp and it was not exactly what Jake had expected. When the guy crawled all the way out of his hole he only became more surprised. Jake had pictured this Chuck as being the quintessential mechanic, some grease covered, pot bellied, crusty acting, old fart, with a gravely voice, and a bad attitude. Chuck was nothing of the sort. For one thing he was just a kid. For another, his clothes were not of the grease covered variety. The guy barely wore any at all! He had on some shorts and that was about it. Past that, all he wore were his abs, his pec’s, and all of the other bulging parts of his anatomy.

As the guy smiled and grabbed Danni for a long hug, Jake looked around and noticed all the weights and benches over by the hangar. Jake clicked his teeth and figured that they really did get used.

“When did you get back,” Chuck asked her.

“Yesterday,” Danni replied with glee. She also did not seem to be in any hurry to let go of the mechanic.

Jake’s face wrinkled in stark contrast to the smiles, “and I been here for a month. How come it is that I haven’t met you before?”

“Oh,” Chuck only shrugged, “sorry dude. You’re like that new boss guy from Earth, right? I just kind of figured I’d wait and see if you’re going to stick around before I bothered. You know that last guy..”

“Blew his brains out,” Jake replied, cutting the boy off.

“Na,” Chuck waived that off, “that was the guy before him. The last guy was here for like, three days? Then he ran off with some chick from Valley.”

Danni became confused, “I heard he vanished one night downtown.”

Jake had heard enough. He nodded back towards the drive, “I think I’m going back to running.” As an after thought Jake did point to Chuck. Jake found it somewhat disturbing that the guy in best shape around here, with the possible exceptions of the girl with the bullet hole in her chest (not counting the dog) was the mechanic. Jake asked the guy, “do you run?”

“Oh, no way dude,” Chuck actually went to the trouble of flexing, “I hurl and curl man.”

On the way out Jake had to ask, “where the hell does this guy live? I didn’t see any residence back there.”

“Oh,” Danni was once again matching Jake’s pace, “there’s this old bunker, from the first rebellion I think, that’s back over behind the dunes.”

Jake got that funny look on his face again, “the guy lives in a century old bomb shelter?”

“Not all the time,” Danni replied in an upbeat tone, “in the dry season he usually puts up his tipi over the by the hangar.” Jake was not so sure what disturbed him the most about that. Was it the fact that the guy actually lived that way or, was it that Danni acted as if it were perfectly normal.

Jake just grunted and said, “how the hell did that guy ever wind up in an organization like this?”

Danni gave Jake a very serious look. It spelled out the question that she failed to ask like, “nobody told you?” Jake just shrugged and his face spelled out, “well?” Danni picked up her pace to see if she really could leave this Special Forces guy in the dirt.