Free Flight by Bernard Wilkerson

training, timing each other field stripping,
reassembling, and loading weapons without being able to see. If
they ever had to use them in combat, they had been taught they
needed to be able to think about their tactical situation, not how
their weapons functioned.
    She wandered around a bit. The
canyon dead ended, the tower reaching high enough that the power
cables continued higher than the rim, off to wherever they went. A
small, metal box sat under the tower, protected by a chain link
cage with a locked gate. Probably more to keep critters out than
people.
    Their surroundings explored, Eva
sat in the front of the jeep with the MP23 next to her. It looked
bulky, almost awkward, with the grenade launcher attached. She’d
loaded that also.
    She leaned back in her seat and
looked up. Even on a ‘cloudy’ day in the desert, the night sky was
amazing. She remembered camping with her father and seeing a
million, billion stars. He told her stories from his grandfather,
who had been a carpenter in Ireland. Her great-grandfather had said
that God was a carpenter also, and what carpenter would build a
million homes and not populate them?
    She believed that as a child, but
when she went to school she learned that even if there were a
billion Earth-like planets in the galaxy, the odds of evolution
were so low that the likelihood of life evolving on even one of
those planets was non-existent. Earth was the anomaly.
    She believed that also, until the
aliens showed up, proving that Earth wasn’t the anomaly. Had her
great-grandfather been right the whole time? Had God really
populated the Universe with lots of people?
    She wished for the child-like
faith she once had but settled instead to stare up at a blank sky,
myriads of stars hidden by thick clouds.
    By early afternoon on their trip
south away from Utah, the dull gray clouds had covered the sky,
blocking the sun, and now those same clouds blocked the stars and
the moon. Eva was glad she had gotten sun earlier in the day, when
she could.
    If what Mark had heard was right,
and the clouds were caused by dust from meteor strikes, the
equivalent of a nuclear winter could set in. Temperatures would
cool and food growth would be impacted. They wouldn’t see the
sun.
    Eva mourned the sun, if that were
the case. She liked sun. Even her hair liked sun. It had recently
started turning dark when she didn’t get enough sun, and she liked
her hair blonde. If a nuclear winter did set in, her hair would get
too dark, and she’d have to bleach it.
     
    She wanted to check the time and
immediately reached for her pocket. But her phone wasn’t there.
They had no signal and she’d left it in her backpack in the cargo
area of the jeep. It was almost worthless now. If the entire cell
network were down nation-wide, it would be completely worthless.
She looked around the jeep for the keys so she could look at the
clock, but instead found an old style watch Mark had left in the
cupholder. She checked it. She’d only been on watch an
hour.
    When the time finally came to wake
Mark up, she was exhausted. She’d solved all of the world’s
problems and won the interstellar war against the Hrwang while she
sat in the front seat of the jeep.
    She and her partner traded places
and Eva didn’t even remember falling asleep. Before she was aware,
a dim sunrise reflecting on the walls of the box canyon woke her
up. Mark was asleep in the front seat. She smacked him on the back
of the head.
    “What? I’m awake. I was just
resting my eyes.” He looked embarrassed.
    “Daylight enough for you?” she
asked.
    He nodded.
    They took turns hiking away from
the jeep to take care of business, then ate protein bars and drank
water for breakfast. They double checked all of their weapons,
making sure everything was loaded and spare magazines were ready.
Eva filled her camo pants pockets with them.
    They topped off the fuel tank with
gasoline from the jerry cans.
    With the Glock at her side and the
MP23 carbine in