Seeds of the Bitter Harvest. John Sheppard

a great deal of effort to his full height. Slowly, he looked around, afraid he would see them. When they didn’t appear to be in sight, he got his bearings and stumbled his way back to the apartment.

      As Andy headed home, he caught sight of himself in a storefront window. No wonder the few people who are out are stepping aside as I pass, he thought. His hair was disheveled, one eye was nearly swollen shut, and a thin stream of blood flowed from his puffy lower lip and his nose. Wow, my parents should see me now!

      CHAPTER 6

      Strong winds from the west were sending biting salt water spray in Jeremy’s face, stinging his skin and burning his eyes. He had some training in America with the US Navy Seals. They had pressed his limits of endurance and pain, but he survived. Nonetheless, he wasn’t a big fan of water. His preference was good old terra firma. The last couple of days on a rusting, smelly, freighter rocking several miles of the coast had not been his idea of adventure.

      While the Seals had taught him to grin and bear it through almost anything, there was nothing in the rule book that said he had to like this. The winds were cold coming from the mountains. His homeland was normally rather temperate, but when the cold blew in from the west during the winter, temperatures could plummet and the weather could be rough.

      The winds had caused swells large enough that they were nearly swamping the FC 470, known as a Zodiac in military circles, and a rubber dinghy to civilians. The little dinghy bobbed like a cork, so their forward progress was extremely slow. Jeremy’s muscles burned from the rigors of pulling his oar through these large swells, and strong winds. Still, he barked encouragement to the rest of his four man team. He could see the shoreline, silhouetted against the starry night sky.

      Their goal was to reach a small abandoned fishing village, just some five miles down the coastline from their landing point. They had been ordered to land here instead of the village, just in case an Enemy patrol decided to check out the village. Once they had landed, they would hug the tree-line, and meet up with their contact.

      Finally, the exhausted team made it to shore. There was no time to relax. The rough seas had put them considerably behind schedule. Major Trent could tell from the position of the stars, that the first glimmer of daylight could not be more than an hour or two away. The men made quick work hiding the Zodiac, and changing from their wetsuits, back into civilian clothes.

      He and his men had been wearing ‘civvies’ for more than a week now, with the exception of their brief time in the wetsuits. They had been stripped of their military ID, checked, and double checked for anything pointing to their service. Jeremy knew that if they were found in Enemy territory, in uniform, they would be tortured and killed on sight.

      The day of their departure from the base, an old pick-up truck had appeared at the rear entrance to the Ammo dump. They hopped on board, and they were driven to the docks, to mingle with the dockhands, before boarding the freighter. The freighter captain and his First Mate kept them in quarters away from the crew, and arranged for them to slip overboard under the cover of darkness. No official ship’s log would contain a record of the team having ever been aboard.

      Jeremy did take time to ensure he and his men hydrated and ate an energy bar. His mind drifted to the conversation he had with his wife the night before. When he called her, he had not been able to tell Sandy that he was preparing for a mission. She asked little about him and her voice sounded hollow, distant. It wasn’t like she didn’t say the right things; just that her conversation seemed mechanical, void of life.

      Trent had insisted that his family leave the country as the Enemy continued to advance. They had left in April with Sandy’s parents and were safely in Europe. There had been a trickle of citizens leaving the country since the start of the war; the Enemy’s progress at the beginning of the year turned the trickle into a torrent. A majority of the wealthy and middleclass had left by the time the airport was seized leaving only the poor who didn’t have the money to escape, dedicated civil servants, the military, and those of different social classes who refused to believe that defeat was possible.

      His children, Anna and Kurt, had added to Jeremy’s sense of foreboding when he talked to them last night. Unlike Sandy, they were exuberant to talk to their daddy. It had been months since Jeremy had been able to get a call out; and it was obvious that they missed him so.

      When Jeremy had asked how they were doing, Kurt mentioned “Uncle Frank”. There was no Uncle Frank on Sandy’s side of the family. When Jeremy pressed a little more, the kids said he was with them a lot, and took them somewhere almost every weekend.

      Before he could find out more, Sandy was on the phone. Her voice was tense, she explained that Frank was an expat too, and was just helping out. She ended the phone call abruptly saying she wasn’t feeling well. Jeremy had this pit in his stomach since the call, and it wasn’t going away.

      “Major”, one of the men called him back to the here-and-now; “Orders, Sir?”Jeremy had his men slip on their night vision goggles; he didn’t want them walking into an enemy patrol in the dark. Besides, the improved vision allowed them to make up some time they had lost at sea. He also knew he couldn’t afford any more lapses in concentration. They were now in Enemy territory, a slip-up could not only cost the mission, but each of the team members their lives.

      They would ditch the goggles, like their wetsuits, once they rendezvoused with the underground. It would be hard to explain the goggles, if they encountered an enemy patrol later on.

      Their movement down the coast had gone smoothly when they reached a clearing about one hundred yards from the village. Trent motioned to his men to halt. They stopped in unison, and quietly hit the ground. He stared into the darkness, waiting for the signal that it was safe to travel the distance between the woods, and the village.

      There it was. Three quick flashes, a pause, then, three more flashes coming from the window of the first house, on the outskirts of the village. Jeremy returned the signal. It was followed by two long flashes. All was clear. With a quick hand motion from him, the team sprinted across the clearing.

      The side door of the house opened, when they were a few feet from the door. They had entered directly into the kitchen. It was a larger country style kitchen, with a good size oval wooden table and six chairs around it. Maps were strewn around the table. The windows were covered with wooden planks, and cardboard, to prevent light from the oil lamps from shining through during the darkness of night.

      Four men, Jeremy assumed to be members of the resistance, stood around the room, weapons at their sides. These were not the typical freedom fighters of the cinema - lean, rugged, young men, with a couple of days of unshaven stubble adding to the manliness. These guys did need a shave, but they were unkempt, middle aged, balding, who could stand to lose a little weight.

      One of the men stepped forward, and extended his hand. He was the shortest of the group, maybe 5’ 5’’, tanned, with a rim of white hair. Round, wire-rimmed glasses rested on a thick nose, attached to a round full face.”Welcome, I’m Owl”.

      Jeremy wanted to laugh out loud. The man looked like an owl, maybe he had been a professor before the occupation. Really, we’re supposed to trust our lives to these guys? They don’t look like they could protect us from an invasion of fire ants, and ‘owl’ come on, it sounds like the name from a ‘B’ movie.

      Maybe it was Jeremy’s facial expression, or raised eyebrows that gave him away; but the man gave him a bone-breaking hand shake and said:

      “Yes, Owl; its best you don’t know our real names. If you’re captured and tortured, you can’t lead the Enemy back to us, or our families.”

      Now, Jeremy felt a bit sheepish. These guys weren’t a part of some weekend adventure. It was real. They were fighting for the future of their country. They were taking every risk he was, and maybe more. He at least, could return to the relative safety of his base, they lived with this every day.

      Owl introduced the rest of his team. There was ‘Raven’, a dark skinned man, with a large protruding nose, and dark, beady eyes, a smile seemed to be permanently attached to his face; indeed like a bird with his prey in sight.