On the third day I sat in the cafeteria with Eunice and forced myself to eat the watery instant mashed potatoes on my tray. I wasn’t particularly hungry but didn’t want Eunice to nag me or to feel wasteful. The odor of unwashed bodies and subpar food intermingled with my misery over Callie and my own self-pity and physical discomfort to create a level of nausea I’d never experienced before.
I turned my attention to others in the cafeteria too small for everyone to eat at the same time. We ate in shifts and we showered in shifts. Everything was scheduled and regulated like a well-oiled machine. I was a cog in a mechanism with no objective other than to tread water and it was a struggle to do that. And I couldn’t help but look at the other women and think, What the fuck are we going to do?
Every face in the room was different but all held the terror of our situation and the things we’d experienced. All of us were from very different walks of life. Some of us lost our partners during this ordeal and others lost their children. And I was sure there were a few lonely souls grieving for themselves because they didn’t have anyone. But I couldn’t help but see the one similarity uniting us. We were women. We all came into this life with a mark against us no matter how advanced our society claimed to be. We’d been abused, turned away from knowledge, rejected from equality, had our intellect dismissed, our judgment questioned, thought of as weak or fragile, told by society we’d never be good enough or smart enough, and our values as human beings were boiled down to our outward appearances and what we could offer the world sexually. The world had never seen us as human. Only as objects and something pretty to look at and fuck. And it infuriated me. Callie died for this. All because she was born with a vagina.
Just then I spotted Megan walking through the cafeteria with a couple of officers and a young woman with bright orange hair in civilian clothing. I sprang to my feet and went to her without thinking. Eunice called after me but I ignored her. Megan looked surprised when I caught up to her.
Ignoring her companions I said, “I want to help.”
Megan said, “The kitchen is always—”
I waved my hand dismissively to cut her off. “Not like that. I want to help you guys. I want to be a part of whatever stops this.”
Megan frowned and crossed her arms. The orange-haired girl appeared surprised and confused by my sudden intrusion.
One of the other female officers with a severe expression and tight blond bun told Megan, “We can always use more troops.”
Megan responded to the woman but directed her gaze at me. “I don’t think using untrained civilians as troops is in the best interest of the United States government.”
“Don’t!” I barked. I noticed a few women seated at tables near us take interest in my outburst. I lowered my voice. “Don’t give me that shit. We all know you’ll need all the help you can get. And I’m willing to do anything so Callie…” My voice broke and I swallowed to staunch the tears welling up. “Anything so Callie’s death wasn’t in vain.”
Megan mulled over my offer.
“Please,” I added.
I hadn’t noticed Eunice behind me until Megan redirected her gaze and said, “You too?”
I turned to look at the stern expression on Eunice’s face.
Eunice said, “Yes. I want to take out the son of bitch who cost me my religion.”
“Okay,” Megan said. She took my upper arm and turned me away from the tables and the eavesdropping women eating their dinner. She whispered in my ear, “Go to building B at nineteen hundred hours. We’re having a briefing about our deployment in two days. Our mission is to take out the message at its source. We can’t guarantee success or your life.”
A thrill ran down my spine as I realized what their plan was.
“Got it?” Megan added.
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Just you and Eunice. Not a word to anyone else. We only have so many pilots and aircraft available and I’m certain every woman in this room wants to be on those planes.”
“Yes.”
She let go of my arm abruptly and headed toward the kitchen. The other three followed her.
Eunice sidled up next to me and whispered, “What did she say?”
I whispered, “We’re going to storm the White House.”
A sinister grin spread across Eunice’s face and I was sure my own expression mirrored hers.
Chapter 15
The noise inside the helicopter became maddening after the second hour in flight and made any conversation nearly impossible. I wasn’t sure I wanted to talk anyway. I found myself looking around at the other eleven women and studying their expressions as they readied themselves for what we were going to do and what could possibly happen to us if this didn’t go as planned. I thought I could tell the difference between the regular civilians and the actual military personnel but none of that mattered anymore. We were all dressed in military garb—including helmets—and fitted with random objects to use as weapons, mostly sporting goods items. I’d chosen a cricket bat. Others had baseball bats and hockey sticks.
Eunice sat beside me and I knew the woman on my other side was a civilian and she might be the most important person on the helicopter aside from the pilots. She was the orange-haired girl who’d been with Megan when I’d volunteered. And she was always up front and easily spotted during our few meetings leading up to this point, due to her beautiful hair. She was Melissa Hayward. She was the brains behind the invisible force field around the base and the person who’d been able to disable the broadcasting setup, if it was even at our destination. That was the one uncertainty sitting heavily on everyone’s mind. This could be all for nothing. What good would it do to kill the President if we found him and the signal was still broadcasting? And what would happen even if we could dismantle it? Were the men completely gone? Would the interruption reset them? The force field repelled the offenders but it didn’t stop them once they were dragged within its boundaries. We didn’t know but each one of us was willing to die trying. Because what were we left with if we didn’t?
My adrenaline surged and abated on takeoff only to surge again when Megan opened the back of the aircraft to refuel mid-flight. I was overcome with the fear I would be sucked out the door. I gripped Eunice’s arm and leaned into Melissa to steady myself. I thought I was going to have a heart attack from fright when Megan stood feet from the edge and unfurled a hose with a funnel attached to the end. She stood uneasily as a second helicopter approached with a penial attachment and inserted it into a funnel as we continued to our destination. The terror and sexual imagery of watching the plane being refueled set me off into a round of hysterical laughter. A few of the women on board gave me worried glances and I was sure they thought I’d finally snapped. Eunice and Melissa found my laughter contagious and nervously laughed with me.
Things died down after refueling and the ebb and flow of fear made me tired. I was hoping for one more adrenaline surge when we arrived. There was a bit of commotion at the front of the copter after a while and Megan left her seat.
She shouted over the noise of the aircraft to be heard. “We’re approaching our destination! Prepare yourselves! The place is swarming!”
We all stood to look out the small porthole shaped windows. The streets appeared to be alive and were filled with people. I could make out the shape of the Washington Monument in the distance and my heart began to hammer in my chest. Eunice was looking out the same window as me and said something I couldn’t make out over the craft’s dissonance.