The Lost Country, Episode Two

Chapter 4

I’D BE LYING IF I SAID I hadn’t already felt uneasy—even before we rounded the bend and saw the big pickups. Deronda Drive was that kind of road: the kind that started normally but then began to twist and turn, and to narrow, climbing all the while, so that the houses on both sides (some nearly palatial while others seemed little more than glorified hippie shacks) closed in all around us. Add to that the fact that we’d run out of places to turn back, and you can imagine how on edge we (already) were when we saw the crashed gate and the occupied vehicles beyond it.

Nor had those occupants taken long to train weapons on us—about 4 seconds, by my count—snapping them out through side windows and an open door even as the men in the payloads (one of which was equipped with a large-caliber machine gun and the other some type of rocket launcher) did the same.

And then there we were, faced off like the Hatfields and the McCoys—only we weren’t ready—there beneath the sun in the Hollywoodland hills with the Santa Ana wind blowing and Gargantua idling and their blue and white Tucker flags fluttering, proclaiming “Keep America Great” and “No More Bullshit.” As though there was still somehow a recognizable government—a recognizable enemy; something they could project all their fear and loathing and frustration onto, just as before. As though nothing had changed since the Flashback at all.

I reached up for the targeting goggles slowly, knowing the new windows were tinted but not wanting to take any chances, but didn’t put them on. “Nobody get excited,” I said. “It’s just ... it’s just a precaution.”

“Oh, Jesus,” whispered Sam.

“No, he’s right,” said Mr. Fantastic. “Because—see that rocket launcher?” He pointed at the truck furthest back—a black Dodge Ram with pig ear exhaust stacks and a custom lift. “That, my friends, is what you call bad news. Now, I don’t pretend to know what that is, exactly, but what it reminds me of is the French MILAN ...” He got out of his seat and crouched in front of the windshield. “Okay. Yuh. See that dome just inside the barrel? That’s the warhead. Big, right? Nasty, right? That’s because it’s an anti-tank weapon.” He looked at Sam suddenly—to make his point, I guess. “It kills tanks, see. Stops them dead in their tracks. They’ve even been confirmed to have taken out a U.S.-supplied Abrams—that’s the main battle tank of the U.S. Army—in Iraq, in 2017, during their conflict with the Kurds.”

He turned to me before making eye contact with each and every one of us. “And you better believe it when I say, people, that that thing will cut through this hull like it’s tinfoil. So Jamie’s doing the right thing; providing he keeps his focus on that missile launcher. The question is, do we shoot first and eliminate the threat preemptively—by taking out the operator and anyone else who dares to go near it—or do we try to talk to them? Reason with them? Convince them we’re not a threat?”

“But we are a threat,” said Sam—softly, gravely. “We’re here for the bunker. And so are they, obviously. Or they’ve seized it already. I mean, look at what we’re driving. There’s a machine gun on the roof, for—”

“I say we shoot first,” interjected Nigel—after which he seemed shocked that he’d actually said it. “She’s right, I mean—S-sandahl. Sam. We are a threat; and there’s no point in trying to deny it. So are they. I mean, come on. You saw the banner. If that’s not a territorial claim, I don’t know what is. And they’re w*********h, anyway, mon. Stupid and dangerous on—”

“Yo, pound sand!” snapped Lazaro. “I voted for Tucker, too, you know, and I’m not some crazed redneck you can just ...” He trailed off suddenly and looked around—as if for approval—but nobody said a word.

“—on the face of it,” finished Nigel, succinctly. He looked at Mr. Fantastic and then at me. “And you know it as well as I do.”

I looked out through the long, narrow windshield: at the armed, thickset men—most of them were at last partially overweight—and their dirty, dark-colored trucks; at the poised rifles and trained, glinting machine gun, the rocket launcher with its big, tank-killing warhead.

Mr. Fantastic, meanwhile, had gotten back into his seat. “What’s it going to be, Jamie?”

I unbuckled my harness and leaned forward, elbows on my knees—began rubbing my temples.

At last I said, “And this is the only way in? The only road that can be used?”

Paper rattled as Nigel shifted. “Mount Lee Drive, that’s right. Winds all the way up to the City of Los Angeles Communications Facility, which is right above the Hollywood sign.”

“And beneath it? The sign, I mean? That’s our bunker?”

“About 50 yards down from it, that’s right. Only accessible by air or on foot from there, since the private road from below was removed.”

I peered out at the trucks, which shimmered in the heat. “How in the hell did they find out? That’s what I want to know.”

“Does it matter?” asked Mr. Fantastic. “Besides; we don’t actually know that they have—we don’t know anything, really. Not why or how long they’ve been here, nor how many of them there are, we don’t even know if—"

“That’s bullshit, mon. We know it’s a train because that’s how they roll; and we know there’s more of them—probably up there rooting around because they’ve never actually been here and don’t know what they’re looking for. No, scratch that—they’re probably on their way here, because these assholes have already radioed them while we sit here and have a goddamn debate about—”

“Nigel.”

“About—”

“Nigel. Shut the f**k up.”

“But ...”

“Here.” I handed the targeting goggles back to him. “Put them on. Shut the f**k up. And put them on.”

“Wait, what?” Lazaro just glared at me; it was almost as though I’d stabbed his mother. “Is this a joke?”

“I know, you’re checked out on the internal gun control. But let’s be honest, Dwayne. You don’t want to hurt these people. Hell, they’re like family, right?” I clapped him on the shoulder briskly. “Just one, big, happy Tucker Train. One big tent from Cabela’s. Isn’t that right?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Sam, get the ramp,” I instructed, and watched as she flipped the toggle—reluctantly.

“Because we’re going to go meet your friends with our hands up,” I said. “And you, sir, are going to do all the talking.”

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