"ab Hugh, Dafydd & Linaweaver, Brad - Doom 03 - Infernal Sky 1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (ab Hugh Dafydd)

information from the commanding officers at Pearl
Harbor before the Japanese attack in December of
1941. Well, we don't have to worry about that sort of
nonsense in this war."
I nodded, adding, "There's no Washington."
As we talked, I noticed that Arlene became more
relaxed. We discussed our military backgrounds in the
days before the monsters came. I was glad we had a
man in charge of the island who had been a division
officer on a battleship, and a captain seeing action in
the Gulf before that. He'd been doing a shore tour as a
commander when the world capsized.
"There's a pleasant sight," he said, pointing at the
sea. There was a cloud on the horizon. A small white
cloud.
He started to leave and then turned back, his face
suddenly as stern as a bust of Julius Caesar. His
mouth was his strongest feature as he said, "They
won't beat us. It's as if these islands have been given a
second chance. There will never be a surprise attack
here, not ever again. Let them come, in their thou-
sands or their millions. We're going to teach them that
we are worse monsters than they are. This is our
world, and we're not giving it up. And it won't stop
there. We'll take the battle to them, somewhere,
somehow. . . ."
He wanted to keep talking, but he'd run out of
words, so his mouth kept working in silence, like a
weapon being fired on an empty chamber after the
ammo is used up. We both felt the emotion from this
strong old man.
Arlene stood up and put her hand on his arm. She
helped him regain his composure. The gesture wasn't
regulation, but who cared?
For years I'd been asked why a rabid individualist
like me had chosen a military life. Some of the people
who asked that question understood that I wanted a
life with honor, especially after having lived with a
father who didn't have a clue. They could even
understand someone putting his life on the line for his
fellow man. It was individualism that confused them.
I became a marine because I believe in freedom: the
old American dream that had defied the nightmares
of so many other countries. Every Independence Day
I made a point of reading the Declaration of Indepen-
dence out loud.
I loved my country enough to fight for it. Now we
faced an enemy that threatened everything and every-
one on the planet. Any military system that had its
head stuck up its own bureaucratic ass was finished.