Chapter 95 - The Ghost Fortress
The ancient Bell UH-1 Huey rattled violently as we crossed the Blue Ridge mountains.
Unlike modern fly-by-wire aircraft, the old Vietnam-era bird had no computerized flight computers for Tartarus to hijack. It flew purely on hydraulics, cables, and jet fuel. Vance sat in the co-pilot’s seat, manually adjusting the fuel mixture while Jake huddled in the passenger bay, clutching a captured enemy combat rifle.
Below us, the dense forests of the Shenandoah Valley stretched out like a dark sea under the pale moonlight.
"There it is," I said, pointing through the cracked windshield toward a sprawling stone manor perched on the crest of a ridge, surrounded by three concentric rings of razor-wire fencing and automated searchlight towers.
"The old Carter estate," Jake breathed. "We spent every summer there until I was twelve. Dad used to take us fishing in the creek."
"Look closer, Jake," I said bitterly.
Beneath the facade of the antebellum mansion, massive blast doors had been excavated into the mountain face. Heavy power generators hummed with enough current to shake the canopy of pine trees, and on the manicured southern lawn—where our grandfather used to sit in a rocking chair sipping bourbon—a three-meter satellite uplink dish pointed directly into the heavens.
"Tartarus primary uplink," Vance said, checking his scanner. "It's transmitting target telemetry. He's arming the secondary orbital strikes. ETA to launch: twelve minutes."
"Put this bird down on the front lawn," I ordered Vance.
"Elena, the perimeter is bristling with anti-air quad-cannons!" Vance shouted.
"They're tuned for high-speed radar signatures!" I yelled back. "We come in below tree-top level, flare out hard, and crash the skids straight through his greenhouse! He won't expect us to attack the front door!"
"Hang on!" Vance yelled, yanking the cyclic stick back.
The Huey roared like a wounded beast, dropping out of the sky like a stone. Pine branches whipped against the cabin glass with deafening cracks. The ground rushed up to meet us—the familiar green lawn of my childhood, now turned into an armed fortress of the apocalypse.
*TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!*
Automated guns opened up from the guard towers, tearing holes through the helicopter's floorboards.
"Flare! Flare!" I screamed.
Vance pulled the collective with all his strength. The Huey leveled out five feet off the turf, its rotor blades obliterating the glass structure of the Victorian greenhouse in an explosion of white shards and flying timber. The aircraft slammed into the brick terrace, sliding forty yards on its belly before coming to a violent halt against the front pillars of the grand estate.
Silence descended, broken only by the hiss of leaking hydraulic fluid and the ticking of the dying turbine.
I kicked open the buckled side door, tumbling out onto the shattered bricks with my carbine ready.
"Jake! Vance! Move!"
Vance rolled out, carrying the terminal. Jake tumbled after him, his rifle held tight against his chest.
The massive oak double doors of the manor swung slowly open.
There were no guards waiting. No barricade of mercenaries.
Only a single, frail old man sitting in a leather wingback chair at the end of the grand entrance hall, illuminated by the flickering light of a massive stone fireplace.
He wore an impeccably pressed four-star general’s uniform, devoid of dust, untouched by war. Beside his chair stood a walking cane topped with a silver eagle, and on the antique side table rested a small, gold-plated remote control with a pulsing crimson toggle.
General Arthur Carter looked up, his pale, piercing blue eyes locking onto mine with the warmth of an open grave.
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"You're late, Elena," my grandfather said softly.
***
