Eric Walters - The Rule of Three

“But it could take hours for him to get there and back and—”

“What if I flew there to see?”

“You’re not equipped for night flight, are you?” Herb asked.

I shook my head. “I could do it… but not really.”

“Then let’s just get ready for action, but not take any right now,” Herb said. “Agreed?”

My mother hesitated. “Agreed. It’s hard to just sit back and wait, but I know you’re right. Let’s get ready,” my mother said.

The explosions had stopped long before there was enough light to fly. Waiting, we’d made some preparations, getting ready to go. I took off, with Herb beside me. I’d sat in my plane waiting until the first thin ray of light had allowed me to fly. The whole neighborhood had been awoken either by the explosions or by other people who had heard them. It was eerie being out on the street, silently surrounded by others, everyone listening, waiting, wondering, and thinking the worst. It had been a relief finally to be allowed to get the ultralight in the air. The sun was just up above the horizon as I started to circle Olde Burnham. With each circle I got tighter and tighter. The air was still, and smoldering fires were sending smoke straight up into the sky, rising and fading until it dissipated and disappeared. Herb, beside me, studied the ground with binoculars. I needed to stay focused on flying.

Herb continually told me what he saw. The neighborhood was deserted. He saw bodies, but he hadn’t seen any signs of life. Over three hundred people had been living there. I could always make out movement before when I passed over at this height. Now there was nothing moving except for the rising smoke. I couldn’t even conceive that they’d all been killed. Some must have run away, and others might still be hiding in the houses where we couldn’t see them.

With each pass we could see more of what was on the ground. It was so obvious that I didn’t need binoculars. Large sections of the perimeter wall had been broken down. The gate blocking the street entrance was completely smashed. Houses scattered throughout the subdivision had been burned down or had gigantic holes in them or were missing an entire side. Vehicles were burned and the roadway was covered with debris—smashed brick from the collapsed houses, and bodies, lots and lots of bodies. I couldn’t see those, but Herb was narrating what he was seeing for me.

“Okay, I want one more pass,” Herb said. “I want it low and slow.”

“How low and how slow?”

“Make it just above the roof level and just above your stall speed.”

“Do you see something?” I asked hesitantly.

“If I did we wouldn’t be flying so low. Just one more pass to be sure. If there’s a problem we can certainly have some help pretty quickly.”

The away team, along with two dozen other armed guards, was divided into two groups, one just west and one just south of the community. They were waiting to hear from us if it was safe for them to proceed. Brett was leading one group and my mother the other, behind the wheel of my car. She had insisted on going out this time. I would have been happier to have her back at the neighborhood. It was bad enough to risk one of us.

Our neighborhood was on full alert, and the guards on our walls had been doubled. Everybody knew something had happened, but they had no idea yet that our friends had been wiped out. Wiped out . That echoed in my head.

I made the final turn and aimed straight across the subdivision. I eased off the accelerator. I wanted us to be slow but still well above stall speed. Stalling out from that low an altitude would leave no room for error, no time to restart the engine, and no time to find a safe place to let down.

As it was I didn’t know where we were going to put down. The streets inside the subdivision were filled with debris, and I didn’t want to put down on any of the streets surrounding it. Funny how in the last couple of weeks I’d felt safe when I was down there inside their walls. Now the walls were ruptured and breached, and my sense of safety had just as many holes in it.

We came in so low that I could see which houses needed their roofs patched. Others just didn’t have a roof anymore. There were multiple homes that had been gutted by fire and some where I could clearly see the blast marks from explosives. It looked like there wasn’t one car remaining that hadn’t been set on fire. I knew they had had a lot more vehicles. Those must have been used for escape or taken by the attackers.

What hadn’t been taken were the bodies that littered the streets. Now, at this height and speed, I could see them for myself. There were dozens and dozens. Some were by themselves, away from other bodies, alone in death, but there was also a mass of bodies all clustered together, fallen into one heap at the end of a street. They must have stood and fought there and been cut down by a barrage of fire. We passed beyond the back fence, or what remained of it.

“I didn’t see anything,” Herb said. “No movement. Pull it up and I’ll radio down.”

Simultaneously I gave the plane more gas, pulled back on the stick, gave it left rudder, and banked to the left.

“You can proceed,” Herb said into the radio. “Be cautious. We’ll reconnoiter and then land. Can you clear a space for us to land inside the area, please?”

“Will do.” It was my mother. “Keep safe.”

I straightened out so that we were parallel to Burnham. “How far do you want me to go?”

“Go five minutes. Far enough to make sure nothing is coming, but well away from the city, from their base of operations.”

“Are you sure it was them?” I asked.

“I think what I saw down below fits with what I saw when we flew over their compound. They have the men, machinery, and weaponry to do that sort of damage. I’ll keep an eye on the ground, and you keep an eye on the sky. I don’t want any surprises from above.”

I’d been so focused on the ground that I’d momentarily forgotten about the sky. That’s where the real danger for us would come from. We could outrun or hide from anything on the ground. A shot or two at most and we’d be past, hidden or out of range. A Cessna could go farther, faster, and higher. I wouldn’t be able to outrun or outdistance it. With renewed anxiety I scanned the horizon and above, looking for anything else sharing the sky with us. All I could see were a few birds. No danger there.

“The road is definitely clear,” I said. “There’s nothing and nobody; but you could hide dozens of people along here and I’d never see them from this height. Do you want me to drop down or double back?”

“No, keep going.”

As we traveled I started to catch glimpses of movement on the ground. There were people moving along Burnham. On both sides, on the little streets there were more people, going about their business. I wondered how much they knew about what had happened just a few miles away. Life went on. What was more important was what we didn’t see. There were no convoys of trucks, no masses of armed men, coming along Burnham toward our away team. Of course I hadn’t really expected to see anything approaching us, but I thought we might catch a glimpse of them moving away.

“Do you want me to go farther?” I asked Herb.

“This is far enough. You can go back and put down.”

“Shouldn’t I stay in the air to keep watch?”

“I need to be down there. Besides, I think it’s better that you’re on the ground. Maybe you can see more from up here, but you have to remember, the more you can see, the more you can be seen.”

That sounded ominous, maybe because it was so right. There was no way of telling who on the ground was watching us.