Free Reckoning ~ Indian Hill 2 ~ A Michael Talbot Adventure by Mark Tufo Page A

tonight.”
    “Don’t worry, with all the noise we have going on up here, you’ll be lucky to make it past nine.”
    “Great,” I muttered sarcastically. “Just try to keep me as far away from the firing range as possible.”
    “Will do,” Paul smiled. “Bud, I can’t tell you how much good seeing you has done for me.”
    “Yeah, it feels pretty good for me too, my friend.” I headed out the door to check out my new digs. My new quarters were nothing if not sparse; and it appeared to me that it had been vacated only moments before by some now greatly disgruntled lieutenants. An Army standard issue cot dominated the room. I almost laughed when Major Salazar asked if these quarters would be sufficient. I wanted to tell him that my alien abductors had put me up in what was equivalent to the Ritz, at least, comparatively speaking. But I refrained. It was going to be hard enough getting along around here, especially when the henchmen from out of town returned to tell their tale. Well, at least the cot was off the cold, ice-packed ground. That gave me a little comfort but right now, I was pretty sure that I would have been able to sleep on that too.
    I awoke possibly a few hours later to the rumblings of a low flying jet. The thing flew so low it nearly uprooted my tent in the after wake. The jet passing by was closely followed by the shouts and curses of all the people it had disturbed. I walked out of my tent and tried to stretch my way to wakefulness. I asked the first passer by what the hell was going on.
    “They like to let us know occasionally that they are still watching,” the private said as he shuffled on by, bearing his load of what appeared to be munitions. I strolled on up to the command tent, where Paul and the major and a few of his other staff officers were discussing tactics. All conversation ceased as the other officers noticed the Marine insignia on my uniform.
    “It’s alright, gentlemen; we can talk in front of him,” Paul said to cut through the silence.
    “But sir,” one of the captains spoke out, he’s regular military. He’s exactly what we’re trying to keep our secrets from.”
    Paul looked squarely at me. “Captain, are your orders to report directly to me?”
    “No, Colonel, they are not,” I answered much to the amazement of Paul’s staff. I continued. “My orders are to report directly to General Burkhalter.” A couple of the junior officers looked like they were getting ready to throw me out of the command tent.
    “Relax,” Paul said as he commanded everyone to sit back down. “If you gentlemen had been scrutinizing his uniform more closely, and looking past his Marine emblems, you may have noticed his name tag.” The officers turned in unison. Recognition dawned on most of their faces. A few, however, were not able to piece the puzzle together quite so quickly. I remembered who those men were; they might just be a little too dim to be leading men into battle.
    “Captain Talbot, what an honor to meet you” said one of the first officers who had risen to throw me on my keester. I shook his hand; it felt like granite. This man had spent more than one summer out in the sun splitting logs, or rocks more likely. “Captain Dusty Davidson, at your service.”
    “Pleasure’s all mine, Captain.”
    “Why was that recon plane flying so low?” I asked no one in particular.
    Captain Davidson spoke up. “Ever since we hid everything under our camo netting, they’ve been flying lower and lower to try to get some good pictures of our encampment, but what they don’t know…” The captain turned to Paul to make sure that it was alright to release this information. Paul nodded his consent. “Well, what they don’t know is that we’re tapped into their radar systems down in Colorado Springs. We know the second their planes leave the runway.”
    “What about the satellites?”
    “Well, this special camo netting completely throws those cameras off. It’s infrared and radar