G Hopf - The Long Road

What had happened to her two days before was new for her. She hadn’t blacked out in her last pregnancy, and she couldn’t recall ever having such severe abdominal pain.

A nurse entered the room wearing the camouflage uniform of an Air Force tech sergeant. She was young and round with her hair pulled back in a bun.

“Mrs. Conner, you’re awake?”

“Yes, I just woke. How long have I been here?”

“You were brought in almost two full days ago.. You fainted in the hallway. Dylan McLatchy found you,” the nurse said as she walked around the bed checking on the monitors and attending to her duties.

“I’ve never done that before. Is everything okay?”

“The doctor will be in shortly to go over everything with you,” the nurse said as she took her pulse.

The door opened and a middle-aged man wearing a white lab coat entered. He stepped over to Julia’s bedside.

“How are you doing, Mrs. Conner?”

“I’m fine. I was just telling the nurse.”

“Everything’s normal, Doctor,” the nurse said directly to the doctor.

“Great.” He smiled back.

After the nurse left the room, the doctor pulled over a chair and sat next to Julia.

“Mrs. Conner, I’m Captain Weatherby, one of the doctors here.”

“Can I sit up?” Julia asked, looking for the button to operate the bed.

“Sure, here,” Weatherby said, pressing the button that raised the head of the bed.

“Thanks. Now I can talk with you and not feel so awkward.”

“Mrs. Conner, you came in severely dehydrated. Also, your blood pressure was incredibly high. When we undressed you, there was vaginal blood, so we…”

“What do you mean vaginal blood? Is the baby alright?” Julia asked, concerned. She sat up straight and tense.

“Mrs. Conner, when there is vaginal bleeding, it is a sign that something might be wrong with the pregnancy. We examined you with an ultrasound, and unfortunately found that the pregnancy is ectopic.”

Julia’s eyes gave away the emotions she was feeling deep inside. Tears ran down her face and dripped onto the clean white sheets. She tried to speak, but the words would not come out. Losing even the strength to remain sitting up, she fell back into the pillows and gazed past the doctor. She wasn’t looking at anything specifically. Her thoughts went to the dreams she had of a new baby. Brad’s disappearance was helped by the fact that she had his baby. She consoled herself with the knowledge that even if he was confirmed dead, she would have someone. She would still have a part of him.

The doctor started to talk again, but it sounded like he was in the other room with the door closed. His voice just faded into the background and was unintelligible to her. All she could think of was losing this baby. Ever since she had found out about the pregnancy she had had visions of actually holding the baby and looking into its eyes. Her fantasies even extended to being there every day as it grew up, the first birthday, first steps, first time it said Mama or Dada, all of those precious moments that parents get to experience. Now, without notice, this new life was being taken away. These thoughts were suddenly stopped when Weatherby touched her arm.

“Mrs. Conner. We need to get you prepped for the procedure.”

“Get out,” she said in a low voice.

“Mrs. Conner, we need to get this done.”

“Get out, get out, get out!” she screamed.

Weatherby flinched, but he wasn’t shocked. He had been a doctor long enough to know that her response was not unusual. He pushed his chair back, stood up, and promptly left the room.

All Julia could see in her mind’s eye was the little baby. She wanted this baby, and for whatever reason, she felt that God was taking it away.

Unknown military installation

Gordon paced his cell hundreds of times. He didn’t have much to go on. He had to get out of there and find Hunter. The dreadful noises and screams that had echoed across the area last night foretold a fate he had no intention of experiencing. He couldn’t for the life of him understand how Rahab and his men had been able to take this base. All he could imagine was that Rahab had gathered together a large force who were just as crazy as he was. He knew Rahab was an extremist in the purest sense. He was driven by a deeply held belief that his cause was just and divine.

Gordon had run into these types in Iraq, and now they had taken root here. History had dozens and dozens of examples of these kinds of zealots. During catastrophic events, some look to a god to help explain why or to give them hope. Rahab’s flock had probably grown tremendously after the lights went out. It took Gordon only minutes to see the charisma and eloquence seeping out of the man. The sheer confidence was intoxicating. Rahab was a natural leader who was hell-bent on further destruction. The vacuum of authority and lawfulness along with Rahab’s obvious abilities would have made his climb to power quick. Gordon wasn’t scared easily, but Rahab scared him.

The sound of the door unlocking paused him midstride. He looked at the door in anticipation.

Same as the day before. The clang, bang, and creak as the door opened. The same two men approached him; each grabbed an arm and marched him out. This time they didn’t tape his mouth or cover his head. They rushed him out of the box and into the sunlight.

What Gordon saw now confused him. This wasn’t Fort Irwin. Ahead of him was a small bermed area that held a fuel truck. To his left he saw a paved runway with H emblazoned on some of the areas. He recognized them as helicopter pads. The tarmac stretched for hundreds of feet, two shorter runways running perpendicular to the main one. As he was being paraded through the small base, he saw dozens of people. Some carried guns; all the men had long hair. The women were covered in long robe-like garments. All of the structures he saw were temporary. Two large metal hangars stood at the ends of the shorter runways. He looked over his shoulder to where he had come from and saw another dozen Conex boxes. He thought, Is that where Hunter is?

He was attempting to commit the base’s layout to memory. He counted each person he saw, how many guns, positions, buildings, what the buildings might be used for, vehicles, and any other useful item that could help him put together a plan to escape. To the far side of the hangars were ten large white structures laid out in two rows with five buildings in each row. Gordon assumed those were barracks. Smaller shacks and random gear were everywhere.

Surrounding the entire base was a dirt berm; beyond it was flat, open desert that ran into towering mountains to the south and west. Everything he saw spoke to it being a military base, but this wasn’t Fort Irwin, this was a training area outside the base. Then Gordon’s memory from his Marine Corps days kicked in. Although he had never been to the base before, he had heard how large it was. It was similar to 29 Palms in size, mostly vast desert and training areas. He remembered someone telling him Fort Irwin’s National Training Center was almost the size of Rhode Island. Gordon didn’t recognize the mountains; he had no idea where they were or where Samantha and the group was.

Walking past the closest hangar, he peered inside. It looked like it was housing a classic car collection. A dozen or more vehicles, one being his truck, were parked in there with some more of Rahab’s people working on them. Gordon had counted more than fifty of Rahab’s followers. How could this be? he wondered. How could one man put together such a sizable force so quickly? Gordon’s thoughts soon went to his own escape. A feeling of dread came over him as he realized he didn’t know how he and Hunter would be able to get out of this place.