Eric Walters - The Rule of Three

Everybody turned to me.

“An ultralight flown by a teenager is our advantage?” Howie asked. “No, offense, Adam.”

“No offense taken.” I understood completely.

“Having eyes in the sky provides strategic advantages,” Herb said.

“And you really believe we could win if we attack,” the judge said.

“No, it’s almost certain that we wouldn’t win.”

Again the room erupted, and again it was silenced by Brett.

“Look, I’ll go into any battle you want me to,” Brett said. “You know that. But you want us to attack when you think we’ll lose?”

“Not lose, just not win. What I’m suggesting is only the first battle. The war will come next. I have a plan, and I need everybody’s agreement and cooperation for that plan to succeed.”

“But you think we can succeed?” the judge asked.

There was a hushed silence as everybody seemed to stop breathing, waiting.

Herb answered with only one word.

“Yes.”

I brought my plane in for a landing and rolled along the street, finally coming to a stop right in front of our house. Herb was waiting, along with some of the committee members. I turned off the engine, and they surrounded me before I could unbuckle.

“The groups are in place,” I said.

My mother, Howie, and Brett were each leading a group of thirty people. They had spent the day in twos and threes and fours, moving into the positions where they were going to wait out the rest of the day and into the night.

For the week after the committee meeting, all we had done was plan for this moment. Rachel and Danny basically camped out at the Petersons’ place so that we could turn our house into a war headquarters.

The attack was scheduled for four the next morning.

“Is there any sign of any of the enemy out there?” Judge Roberts asked.

“I couldn’t see anything coming along any of the major roads.”

“Good… good.”

“They’re like a snake,” Herb said. “They fed on the other neighborhood and they’ve been lying low to digest what they gorged on.”

“I just wish we didn’t have to count on that,” the judge said. “We’re practically defenseless right now.”

“We have the wall, and there are still people on it. Nobody out there knows that there aren’t many weapons in their hands,” Herb said.

“We are too vulnerable.”

“There’s no choice. We need to send enough men into battle to sting them hard, to destroy as much of their men and equipment as we can.”

“So what now?” Councilwoman Stevens asked.

“Are the escape groups all ready?” Herb asked.

“As ready as they can be.”

As always Herb had a backup plan—a plan nobody hoped would ever have to happen. The community had been divided into thirty-two groups. Each had been given food, supplies, and equipment that they would take with them if the neighborhood had to be evacuated. Herb was with my family, Todd’s family, and the Petersons, along with Howie and his family and Brett. Our little group was the best armed and, along with a second group led by Sergeant Evans, was going to try to fall back to the Peterson farm, attempt to negotiate with the people who were there, or simply recapture it if negotiating failed.

If we did end up at the farm, we would be executing Herb’s original evacuation plan that I’d stood up against. I wondered if we should have just listened to him to begin with.

“How did the plane handle?” Mr. Nicholas asked.

“Sluggish, but okay. It’s more like driving a tank than flying an ultralight.” The cockpit, engine, and fuel tank had been covered in metal to offer more protection from bullets, and the whole thing had been painted a dull gray to blend into the sky.

“Slower but safer,” Herb said.

“Unless we run into another Cessna.”

“Have you seen one?” He sounded alarmed.

“Nothing. I own the sky.”

“How long will it take for us to get into position?” Herb asked.

“At least thirty minutes.”

“Then we’ll leave at three-fifteen in the morning to allow us a fifteen-minute margin for error.”

“I’ll be ready. Is everything else ready?”

“I’ll make sure it is,” Herb said. “It looks like you have somebody else who wants to talk to you.”

I turned around. Lori was standing off to the side, waiting, trying to look casual. She didn’t look casual. She looked beautiful.

“I’ll see you later.” Herb walked away, bringing the committee members along with him, and Lori came over.

“So how are—”

She kissed me. Suddenly, what I was going to say didn’t seem that important. Nothing seemed that important.

“I don’t want you to go,” she said.

“I have no choice.”

“I know.” She looked like she was going to cry. “I wish we could go up in your plane, you and me, and just fly away, go up and up, and when we came back down everything here would be the way it was before all of this happened.”

“I guess we all have things we wish for,” I said. “I already got one of the things I wished for, for the longest time.”

“What?”

“I think you know.”

She laughed. “I guess that it didn’t quite happen the way you had planned it.”

“Nobody could have planned this nightmare,” I said.

“People wake up from nightmares.”

“Let’s hope.” I sighed. “I’m sorry, but I have to prepare the plane. Can you hang around for a while?”

Now it was Lori’s turn to sigh. “I wish, but I have guard duty on the wall right now—with so many people gone, I volunteered. You have to promise me you’ll stay safe.”

“I can’t prom—”

“No, you have to promise me!”

“I promise, but if it doesn’t go the right way, then you have to promise me that Rachel and Danny are with you, that you and your family will take care of them.”

“They’ll be with us, I promise.”

“And then we’ll meet at the planned spot. Agreed?” I asked.

“Agreed.”

This time I kissed her.

I pulled the night-vision goggles down. Herb pulled his down at the same time. The world took on a soft green glow, and I could see the road ahead of me. I gunned the engine and we rolled down the darkened strip. Faster and faster, we were coming up to the two lights, guards holding flashlights to mark the end of the road. I wanted to be in the air well before I reached them. I gave it full gas and pulled back on the stick. We jumped off the strip and soared. I held the throttle fully open and kept pulling back.

The plane still felt sluggish. Between the protective plating that had been fitted on the plane, Herb, and the equipment and weapons we were carrying, it was well above the weight it normally would be.

I started a long, slow bank, trying to see through the darkness. If we could have waited an hour or so, there would have been a little light on the horizon instead of complete blackness. Below, looking ghostly, was my neighborhood. In the day, I could have seen the lush green plantings, the pools sparkling with water, the hundreds of secure houses, all contained within the high, strong walls that surrounded it. It was beautiful and precious and fragile and vulnerable. I couldn’t let anybody harm it or the people in there. They weren’t just my neighbors anymore—they were part of my tribe.

Herb was quiet beside me. In fact, over the past few days, he had been much quieter than usual. I knew he’d been busy supervising all parts of the whole plan, but still there seemed to be part of him that wasn’t there even when he was standing beside me. There were questions I’d wanted to ask him, but I didn’t want to trouble him when he had so much on his mind. Or maybe that was just my rationalization, because I was nervous about some of the answers I might get.