Defeat Read Online Free PDF Page B

to do.”
    The others accepted that and
started to head back down the trail they had come up. Leah and
Wolfgang followed, but stopped when the American called out, “Hey,
wait up!”
    The four waited for him, and when
he caught up, he showed them his phone. Wolfgang didn’t recognize
the app displayed on it, but he understood the no signal
icon.
    “ Look, this is
classified,” the Captain explained, “but a nuke just got dropped by
someone, and I’m gonna tell you about this, classified or not.” He
paused for a second, looking at each of the other hikers, then
continued. “My phone has a link to a top secret network of
satellites. Anywhere I got a blue sky, I’ve got a signal. And now I
have nothing.”
    Wolfgang shrugged, not entirely
following what the man was saying.
    “ What does that
mean?” Leah asked guardedly.
    “ It means the
satellites are dead.”
    Wolfgang shrugged, still not
completely understanding what the man was explaining. But it didn’t
matter. He had a responsibility to get the others back safely, and
then he needed to go home. An image of his wife and daughter came
to mind, and he wondered if he would ever see them
again.
    “ I’m going back,”
he announced simply and started running down the
mountain.

 
     
    3
     
     
     
     
     
    Jayla wanted to run after her
stupid sister, but couldn’t tear herself away from the monitor at
the same time. It led to a schizophrenic running back and forth
between the deck, yelling for her sister and returning to the den
of the cabin and trying to catch up on what was
happening.
    Satellite communications were
being disrupted somehow, but the news agencies were doing all they
could to gather and communicate what was happening. No one knew
what was wrong with the satellites, but they had learned from land
lines about one of the most horrific acts of violence man could
perpetrate against man.
    Details were nonexistent. They
didn’t know how many, or who had done it, but everyone knew from
the telltale mushroom clouds that nuclear weapons had been dropped.
Two were confirmed; one in Southern Germany and one in Eastern
England.
    The aliens were blamed. The Soviet
Republic was blamed. Jihadists or terrorists were blamed. Even the
United States was blamed by some of the overseas agencies. But no
one knew. No one knew who had launched the nukes, no one knew why,
and no one from any government was answering any questions about
what would happen next.
    No one knew how the alien shuttle
had disappeared from in front of the United Nations. More
importantly, no one knew why the aliens had left. Had they learned
of the impending nuclear war and left town? Had they started it? If
so, why?
    When the questions grew too many,
Jayla broke away from the monitor and ran outside and screamed for
her sister for a while.
    When she finally took a break from
the chaos in her mind and thought clearly, she decided her sister
must have hiked down to the lake. Daddy often took them there. The
trail was well marked, the lake only about four miles away, and
Jada could have easily gone down there on her own. Jayla could
scream all she wanted and it would do no good. Jada would be
completely out of earshot.
    She hoped her sister would be
smart enough to return before it got dark. She ran back inside to
her monitor.
     
    The nuclear bunkers at Vandenberg
Air Force Base were well camouflaged, converted missile silos. The
only way to them was across a field, through a circular hatch, and
down a long ladder.
    Christina came out of the
evacuation tunnel into a grassy field, sounds of the Pacific Ocean
in the distance.
    She loved being stationed at this
base, right on the coast and just a short trip south along the PCH
to Santa Barbara. It was a beautiful weekend drive. Other trips,
she and her husband would head north, driving to Pismo Beach or
even up to Morro Bay. It was a perfect posting.
    Now, under the threat of nuclear
war, the waves and the surf she could hear seemed strangely