Ok here we go once again, I do not own the world of the terminator no money is being made and its just for fun, at least I'm having fun and I hope all those people out there who are reading this are having fun as well, be sure to let me know if you do! Enjoy Chapter 6 (and best wishes for 2008); Romantic interlude?
When they at last reached their destination after several more days the winter was definitely on in the highlands. On the last day in the high pass, rain had turned to sleet and, fortunately, sleet had quickly turned into snow. Even as they where now descending from the mountain passes the weather was colder than it should be this time of year. Jacob was starting to wonder if they would be welcome. Ray had been a good friend, but they hadn't spoken to each other for over a year. But still they weren't coming in empty handed. Even if he didn't take them in for friends' sake he could be persuaded that they had skills and equipment which would aid in long term survival. As they drove up to the lane that lead to Ray's farm they noticed a sign had been nailed up next to the road stating that trespassers would be shot on sight. They decided that they would approach carefully honking the horn every now and again to draw attention. As they slowly drove forwards they came to a barrier across the road. Stopping the car Jacob got out. He stepped up to the barrier and stood in the road way with his arms slightly stretched out from his body showing he wasn't armed. They continued honking the horn and after what seemed like an eternity a voice called out. "You taking an awful big risk there didn't you read the sign? Yeah!" Jacob replied. "But I reckon my friend Ray wouldn't really shoot someone on sight if he wasn't acting aggressive. You know Ray?" The voice called out. "Went to college with him and to law school, he only passed the bar 'cause he could copy my answers." Sniggering the voice replied "That sounds like him all right. Ok you can come up to the house the others stay here. John you stay here and keep an eye on those folk."
Slowly Jacob climbed the barrier and a man walked up to him. "You have to be blindfolded, we don't want nobody seeing our defences," the man said. Jacob shrugged his ascent and let himself be blindfolded. They walked in silence up to the compound. His guide gently guiding him without a stumble. As they got to the building the man called out to Ray. " Hey Ray we've got a guy here who says he knows you; you want to take a look?" Jacob heard a door opening after a moment the Ray called out "Jacob! Man is that you? You look like shit, take of his blindfold, Jacobs ok!" Ray called out to the man guiding him. As his blindfold came of Ray took him in a bear hug, "Man Armani suits don't hold up to this kind of shit" He grinned at Jacobs suit which was torn in places and generally covered in mud. Jacob smiled "Yeah well you try crossing the mountains in this shit the main road is blocked in places and soon the passes wont be passable at all. I was lucky to be able to hook up with some people with a Landrover. What kind of people?" Asked Ray. "Just some folk I met on the road; One of them is a first class mechanic and the other is a computer whiz who owns the Landrover and his woman." Ray looked a bit doubtful; "I don't know Jacob, we can't have wasters here everybody got to pull his or her fair share of the work. You, I know can handle everything and the mechanic is good to have around. But a nerd and his hanger on?" Ray replied. "Oh, well you won't be wanting the gun making equipment they brought?" Jacob replied slyly. "Gun making equipment? Tell me more." Ray asked animated. Jacob was taken aback by this enthusiasm but hid it. Ray seemed more than a little interested in that, more than he had anticipated.
They walked up to the main building. It had changed since Jacob had been here last. A new and even larger barn had been erected next to the old one. Everywhere Jacob looked he could see people busy either working construction or moving supplies. Jacob could see several people coming in and out of the old barn, it was obviously being emptied out. Some people where busy working on a new ditch which had some structures adjacent to it. Apparently they where supposed to be very sound as they where pouring concrete into what looked to Jacob like deep pits. A little further back some other men where busy hooking up a generator to a windmill obviously to provide extra power. He also saw a group of men unloading some materials from old army trucks probably from a dump store.
All the while Jacob continued to tell just what kind of equipment they had Ray led him into the house. When they sat down Ray had some food and drink brought up. After Jacob had finished Ray looked thoughtful for a while. Then he spoke up; "Well that gun making equipment is a heaven sent that's for sure, so you're all welcome. I'll have somebody guide them in. They'll have to earn their keep of course. The people here are actually mostly my neighbours and the towns folk we decided to stick together for mutual defence and support, there's some fifty of us in all. Since my place is the best suited because of it's seize and because I stocked up for just this occasion we decided to gather here. We've pooled all our resources and we reckon we've got enough supplies to last us for at least a year maybe two without having to organize a expedition to the nearest town. We've stripped the nearest gas station bare and we want to send another team to another one we think is in easy range. Your Landrover will come in handy there as well an extra hauler is always useful."
Indicating a big man whose bare arms where full of tattoos, he said "Waldo there is another heaven sent, he owned a small army surplus store where a lot of people used to pick up gear for camping trips. Thanks to him we've got three old army trucks and a lot of weapons. They're old, mostly M16's and some .50 machineguns but still better than hunting rifles. Best of all where the Meals Ready to Eat, and other foodstuff he had. That stuff will keep for ages, together with my supplies that will be good for later on when the perishables have gone."
Jacob got curious; what's so useful about the gun making equipment, I thought you had some yourself, and why do you need all that firepower? Yeah well, there has been some very worrying news that makes me itching for more firepower. I'll tell you all when your friends are here so I don't have to repeat myself. But it looks bad Jacob. Bad man." Ray looked down and didn't look up for some time. At the sound of a car approaching he got up and said; "come your friends are coming. Tonight at dinner I'll explain what is going on. We've got plenty of weapons but few means to really maintain them so I need to check just what kind of stuff you brought and have it placed in the workshop. I'll get Zach to assign you and your friends bunks and to work parties."
That after noon Jacob and his party spent their time settling in. Alex and Charlie where placed on the technical team and spent their afternoon setting up the equipment they brought from Bobs home in the cellar of the main house. Together with the equipment Ray had and some of the stuff that came from Waldo's yard Charlie thought they could not only maintain the weapon supply they had but also manufacture simple new weapons, similar to the RPG's used by guerrilla groups around the world. Charlie reckoned that if they could get some other tools they might be able to produce some really efficient weapons. But they would need more extensive tool making equipment for that. Jacob was assigned as a driver one of the scavenging teams and was busy preparing for the trip to the other petrol station. He soon proofed his worth in pointing out that if they where going to strip the place they didn't really need to bring cooling bags and stuff. He figured that if the fridge was even still running it would be the easiest to simply take it along. That make good sense in any case cause they could always use the extra cooling capacity. The leader of the expedition made a note to return to the other gas station and any other places where they had left the fridges. Jacob thought it might be worth their while to scavenge the equipment to see if the technicians could rig a cool storage room.
Honey proofed difficult to place until she made a passing remark about the people at the compound not being environmentally friendly and not recycling enough. It turned out that before she met Alex she had been very deep into the environmental life style due to her then boyfriend. Her afternoon after that was spent planning a recycling regime for the compound. They weren't the only new additions to the compound. Their had been some people at the gas station who had all been allowed to come. It turned out that the compound was less stand offish than the sign at the entrance led them to believe. Anybody who was willing to pull their fair share of the work and accept Ray's leadership was welcomed. The other newcomers where just as curious as to why the compound was being turned into a fortress as Jacobs group. What Jacob had thought was a ditch was a trench, the constructions build next to them where casemates and gun emplacements. Together with odd remarks made by the people who had been at the compound longer made them all very curious.
After the evening meal the newcomers where gathered into a small room. Ray and two others from the original group where there as well. "Ladies and gentlemen" Ray started. "I do apologize for the mystery surrounding all the preparations you've seen. As you can guess we're expecting trouble, big trouble in fact. I've asked Sheriff John and Dr Paul here to verify what I'll tell you, they have heard the same thing as I did and are members of our executive council" There where nods all around the room and people acknowledge the two who where flanking Ray. "I think that all of you remember where you where when the bombs starting falling. I was in the back mending a fence when a saw the first flashes in the direction of Nevada. Marie and I grabbed the kids and rushed to our shelter. I turned on the Radio to see if I could get anything most was static, so I tuned into some military channels." He paused and took a deep breath. " I tell you those folk where as dumbfounded as the rest of us. The sense I got listening to those folks that they had been hit completely by surprise. One even stated that the firing of their own missiles was so sudden that they had started firing even though there where maintenance workers still in the silo's. Half that base had been destroyed by the firing of the missiles." Again Ray paused assessing the faces of his audience. Most where aghast, Honey had turned several shades paler. Nobody had thought that there own government could be so callous as to even allow that possibility.
He continued after the shocked gaspes and protests had silenced. "Some where asking who was in charge, then all of a sudden a clear voice said. I am. That person said his name was John Connor, he gave no rank but he told in brief what had happened. A small but world wide terrorist group had seized control of the worlds nuclear arsenals and launched an all out nuclear assault on the whole of world in an effort to eradicate humanity. Their ultimate goal to create a new race of Ubermenschen and rid the world of the Untermenschen. As their group was only limited in number they had also seized control of an advanced US program for research into the building of autonomous fighting equipment and would use the products from that program to terminate the last pockets of human survivors. John Connor stated he was the last member of a combined effort from several secret services who had tried but failed to foil this plot.
Connor also told how he had been at the research base where those machines where being developed when the terrorists had seized control of the equipment and how the base personnel had been wiped out by their own devices. Connor and a civilian, the daughter of the base commander Katharine Brewster, being the only survivors to escape the assault by fleeing whilst being chased by, what Connor called, terminators. Eventually reaching a hardened shelter they had destroyed their pursuers but had been trapped at the base by the machines before they could act to stop the nuclear assault. Now they where hoping to be able to organize the survivors from there. He warned everybody that soon there would be machines out there hunting and killing people, he also gave these machines their name, Hunter Killers HK for short. In general according to Connor the machines would take on three forms, tracked vehicles armed with dual Gatling guns, aerial robots armed with heat seeking missiles and metallic humanoid machines which could use any weapon that humans could operate. Of these the last where obvious the most dangerous, fortunately Connor stated there weren't too many of those operational.
What Ray and the others hadn't been told by Connor was that there was no terrorist group, it was a program called SkyNet that had become self aware and had decided to eliminate the whole of the human race that was behind the plot. Not wanting to be made into a lunatic he had concocted the story he had told everybody so as to be able to take control of the resistance and not discredit himself up front. He hoped that in time he could build on a small inner circle and explain the truth to them. From that group out he could then slowly percolate the truth to the human survivors. What was worrying to Connor had been the virus assault and what the T800 had told them. That the virus had been part of SkyNets plan to seize control of the military installations and other assets. Obvious it had been preparing for this for some time. Initially SkyNet had acted in the instance of becoming self aware according to what his mother had been told by Kyle Reese. This time it had prepared itself, who knew what preparations it had made and if the Terminatrix had contacted it, what it had been told by the Terminatrix. For now within the military the presence of and corroboration of the story by General Brewsters daughter, Katharine led to reluctant acceptance of his story.
It had been difficult communicating with survivors as atmospheric disturbances caused by the assault made any communication spotty at best. And at first Ray and the others who had picked up the military radio chatter had discredited the story as contact was lost. However after a few days Paul had by chance picked up a panicked report by someone calling for help. The voice had been begging for help, machines where killing people in their homes by blocking their escape and setting fire to the buildings. The voice had stopped with the ominous announcement that the machines had shot down the door of his apartment building and where now setting fire to the building. Paul had lost all contact with the man after that.
And that had led to Ray, Paul and John contacting the other people in the area. At a meeting they had organized they had explained what they had heard and plans had been made not only to try and survive this as a community but to fortify Rays place and prepare for war. They had been unable to contact any military remnants or John Connor. It seemed they had taken to switching channels in a random fashion which the civilians couldn't get onto with their equipment. Alex said he might be able to help there. He thought he might be able to help there as the switching of channels couldn't be completely random. If he could catch enough of the chatter he might be able to track the sequence of frequency change.
Apart from Alex the group of newcomers was stunned into silence. Jacob looked at Ray and new that whatever the truth was for now Ray believed it and thought it was best to be prepared for the worst. One of the men who had come from the gas station exploded; "You think we're gonna believe that! It's a load of crap! Machines out to kill people, terrorist bent on killing the human race, it's ludicrous! It sounds like a bad James Bond plot." It was Jacob who responded; "Do you have any idea why or who started this crap? I don't. For the moment as farfetched as it sounds it just might be true. And if it is true, we'd better be prepared. And if it isn't it still is a good idea to get together and build defences. Who knows what's going to happen. There are going to be a lot of desperate people out there, looking for food and anything that will help for survival. If we stick together we stand a better chance of survival anyway. Now we can send out groups to gather supplies and not just the stuff that's immediately needed but also tools and other hardware and also raw materials, basically anything we can get our hands on."
He looked around at the group sensing that he had all their attention; "Everything we take for granted right now is going to become very, very scarce, and a small group doesn't have the right cross section of skills to be adaptable enough to cope with the demands that our new life will put on us. We've got skilled technicians but do the now how to melt metal and forge that into the implements we need? Sure we've got farmers here, but they are livestock farmers do they know enough about crop growing to ensure a steady supply of staple foods? And you can bet we are going to need things we have yet to even begin wondering about. So I myself am planning on staying and doing my part cause, wether or no these machines appear a community has more chance of surviving than anybody alone or a small group." He once again looked around even the doubter looked convinced. Jacob looked at Ray who once again started talking;
"OK people here's the deal. Like Jacob said whether or not Connor's telling the truth it still makes good sense to stick together. That's what we decided as a group. If you want to stay you're welcome in exchange for your full cooperation. John, Paul, Jennifer and me have been elected as the executive council and our word goes. If you want to leave that's your choice. You can take what you brought in with you, all though we'd might want to barter with you for some of your goods. We'll even give you a week supply of food and drink and all we ask of you in return is that you do spread the word even though you don't believe it. And if you think people are interested send them over but be careful, we don't want layabouts and as Jacob pointed out not everybody will be trustworthy."
The doubter raised his hand; "Jacob here has actually convinced me to stay, but my wife and children are still out there. Am I allowed to go and fetch them?" Ray looked at the man and then asked; "What's your name again? Tony." Replied the man. "Well where did you live Tony, you do realize that most cities have been destroyed? We live in a suburb of Grenville." He replied. Ray looked thoughtful and then replied "I think the executive committee has to discuss this, but I think we can kill to birds with one stone here." Looking at Paul he said; "Paul can you go find Jenny? I think she and Mary where looking at Honey's recycling plan." Then he turned back to the group; "I think everybody has enough to think about for right now. You don't have to decide right now but we would like a definitive answer in two days time from each and every one of you. Once you've decided we right your names up whether you choose to stay or not. We think that in time a record of who has been here will be handy if people come looking for relatives that's why we take everybody's name down."
As everybody started leaving the room, quietly discussing the news amongst themselves Ray motioned to Jacob and Tony; "Could you two hang on for a sec? I've got an idea about Tony's request and Jacob might be handy there as well." Just then Paul returned with Jenny. "So Ray what's so important, Honey's plan is really good and we should discuss it in detail and start implementing it." Jenny said. Ray smiled at the brusque speech of Jenny, she had been the local teacher at the preliminary school of the community and had ruled her tiny class with an iron hand. Which was exactly why he had wanted her on the council. She was well liked by all but firm enough to make any hard decisions needed.
"Ok, ok, Jenny, no need to bite my head off, and I agree with you we should implement some sort of recycling plan we'll look at the plan after this. But we have something else to discuss which I think is a bit more urgent. Tony here wants liberty to look for his family. I think we have two things to discuss: One; will we allow everybody to go and bring their family; Two; if we allow Tony to leave shouldn't we use it as a scrounging slash recon mission as well?" John turned out to be the sole opponent of allowing people to leave to fetch their family. So they decided to allow this. John did insist that they should only allow it after they had been talked to about the unlikelihood of family members surviving and the possibility of even finding them. As for Tony they decided that he would be allowed to go. They did explain the difficulties and the possibilities of finding his family. It was then that Ray spoke up; "I think we should send someone along and indeed turn this into a recon mission." Jenny asked; "Why should we do that?" Ray answered; "Because Grenville is the most likely place that that man was calling from who said that robots where killing people. If we want to verify their existence we have to look there. And if it isn't true Tony has a chance of finding his folk because the city hasn't been destroyed in the assault. We might also want to get in touch with the city's authorities and set up some sort of trade. We've got a lot of prime cattle we can trade for goods and supplies. So it's an all around win, win situation."
Jenny Spoke up again; "but won't we be bringing undue attention to ourselves? I mean right now, if these machines do exist they don't know about us. If we send someone to check them out won't they catch onto us? And what's to stop a big city from simply taking what they need from us? We can't possibly hope to stop a group as large as a city from taking what's ours by force." It was Tony who replied to that. "Well Jenny, if the machines even pause to check us out after they've killed us they probably won't be able to connect us to a specific place. But you can bet that if that threat is real sooner or later they are going to be looking for groups of survivors like us. So if we can get intel up front that would be beneficial to us. I mean we would know definitely if they exist and we might get a handle on what kind of force we have to deal with. On the other hand if its just dealing with the city we have to make it clear that a long term trading relation will be far more beneficial than a once of theft of our goods." Ray then said; "and that's exactly why I would like Jacob to go along. Jacob's an extremely good lawyer. He can sweet talk the candy from a hungry baby with a smile from the baby's granny to boot. I now he can handle himself as well and I trust him to pull this off in either case."
They all smiled at this colourful explanation of Jacobs power of persuasion. Jenny nodded thoughtful at this explanation. She realized that Tony was trying to sway her vote to a go but she also realized he was right in any case and it wouldn't do to start making decisions based on internal politics. Rays antics lightened the mood and after Jenny had agreed as well they settled on a three man expedition. The third man going with Tony and Jacob was one of Johns deputies named Jim. He knew all the routes between the compound and Grenville and was an excellent tracker. They also decided that they would check if anybody else had any relatives they wanted picked up from the city. As it was they found that two other members of their group had relatives there. The mother of one of the farmers lived there and the sister of one of the towns folk also lived there. They took down their addresses and marked directions on a map. Both also gave them letters to convince them to come with them. It was decided they would leave the day after tomorrow as tomorrow they would be busy preparing themselves.
It was decided they would take the Landrover Jacobs group had arrived with instead of the deputies Jeep as that could be traced to the compound. Apart from a two weeks supply of food and water they each took some weapons. The deputy took a carbine and his service revolver. Jacob brought the elephant gun and Charley gave him his Webley for close in. Tony settled on a M16 after receiving some instructions from Waldo on the use he felt comfortable enough with it. Apart from those weapons they all carried a few sticks of dynamite. They decided to take a small trailer with them to carry any salvage they found. They would be looking for any items on the priority list to salvage with medicines being on the top of that list, on the insistence of Alex they would also be looking for computer and electronics equipment as what was at the compound wasn't up to date according to Alex.
The day after the meeting they loaded up the Landrover and Tony was made familiar with his M16 by Waldo and Jim. They forced him to strip and reassemble the weapon and had him do some target practice as there was no telling when he would need to service the weapon in a pinch. Jim also taught Jacob and Tony some police hand signals for silent communication. They discussed their route to the city and each member of the team made themselves familiar with the route and the layout of the town. During the day the expedition to the nearby gas station got under way. Al three trucks went as well as an old Jeep. With the salvage team gone and several of the ranchers out herding their cattle to new grazing grounds. The compound was eerily silent even though there was still a lot of activity going on.
With Charley and Alex gone on the salvage trip and Ray busy discussing the recycling policy with Honey and the council members Jacob found him self on ends in the afternoon. They had finished loading up and had discussed their plans at length. Tony and Jim where doing some additional target practice and the occasional shot sounded out in the silent afternoon, so now he wandered around the compound alone. As he walked about in the late afternoon he came on a group of women who where busy working on the trench. Some where digging the trench and filling buckets with dirt while others filled sandbags from the buckets for use at the buildings or scattering the dirt away from the trench, trying to make the trench part of the landscape.
As he looked on one of the women working in the trench stood up and straightened her back. She looked at the others of the working party and said "take five ladies, I think we've earned something to drink now don't you all?" After that the ladies climbed out the trench via a ladder. The woman who had spoken tried to climb the trench directly but it was to steep and she slid back down. Wiping the sweat from her brow she looked up at Jacob. She had a petite figure and a pretty face with freckles now streaked with dust and grime from the work on the trench. Her red hair was tied up in a bun though a few errant streaks of red streamed across her face. Jacob stood still and looked at her and wondered how she had gotten here and if she had lost any family or friends in the past days. Apparently he was staring as the girl suddenly spoke up; "So are you just going to stand there staring or are you going to give me a hand up?" She said in a sarcastic tone though her tone was light and the smile on her tired face also reached her voice. Shocked out of his reverie, he smiled and extended his hand to her. "Hi there;" he said. "I'm not usually so dumb but all this has finally gotten to me. Looking at you ladies at work it really struck me that the world as we know it has come to an end."
"Yes, I suppose the changes are apparent in the little things like women who normally would never do such a thing digging trenches and preparing for war;" she said. Jacob had to agree. Not wanting to interrupt the conversation he asked her; "And what did you do before you started a career as a trench digger?" She laughed and looked at him seizing he up. "I was a housewife," she said holding her hand to her breast in a pose which stated that manual work had been far beneath her. "My husband was an up and coming executive in a big firm down south. We had bought a house here to be able get away from it all. He was at our place in the city at work when all this started. There was a big mushroom cloud over down that way so I reckon there is no way he got away." Jacob looked at her, she looked sad. "I'm sorry;" he said. "I shouldn't have asked. Oh don't be silly," she replied. There was no way you could have known, besides the magic was going from that. I do miss him though, I wonder what he would have thought about all this and what he would say if he saw me scraping up dirt and filling sandbags."
She had sat down on a fallen log which was behind the trench. The slapped her hand beside her in an invitation gesture. "Come sit down," she said. "You're to tall to talk up to," she said when he hesitated. "So what's your name tall and handsome, you came with that Landrover party yesterday right?" She said in a whimsical tone. "Jacob, at your service ma'am," he replied in an equally whimsically tone. "And might I enquire as to your name?" He asked keeping the conversation light. She laughed; "Sarah," she said. "Well Jacob now we are properly introduced can I ask about your significant other?" He grinned; "Apart from my ex I don't have a significant other, and she was in LA. So little chance of her showing up as well. Yes I came with Charley, Alex and Honey across the mountains."
She was silent for a moment; "what's it like out there? I mean we haven't seen to much of it all everything was far away. We saw some flashes and clouds in the distance but apart from that it's been quiet." Jacob stared in the distance for a while and thought about what had happened and what he had seen. Slowly he started telling her about the destruction of his office and the destruction he had seen on the way here as he talked she took his hand and squeezed it. When the other women returned they where still deep in conversation, thinking it best to leave the two talking there they decided to work on a different part of the trench and leave those two to talk.
Jacob and Sarah sat there talking on the tree trunk until the bell sounded summoning everyone for dinner when they headed to the hall together.
After dinner Jacob, Jim and Tony reviewed their plans and had planned to make an early night of it. But afterwards Jacob looked for Sarah he found her talking with some other women. She was so deep in conversation that she didn't notice him. Just as he was about to walk away she saw him and came to him. "So Jacob, all set for tomorrow?" She asked. "Yes." He said. "But I enjoyed our conversation earlier and wanted to talk some more. It's been refreshing after the past days to talk to someone else. What do you want to talk about?" She asked. "Oh everything," he said. "The meaning of life, the universe, fish how many stars there are in the evening sky and if they have planets and if every single one has life on it." She laughed; "Why the answer to that is 42 of course." He laughed even louder, and so deep in conversation they wandered of into the starlit night, the first in a long-time.
In the pre-dawn hours Tony found the couple sitting on the tree trunk where they had spent the afternoon. Smiling Tony shook Jacob awake; Startled the couple looked sheepishly around. "It's time to go Jacob," Tony said. "We've got your gear ready so if you just take your leave from your lady friend," he smirked and then continued, "we can leave." Jacob turned to Tony and asked; "Can you just give us a second or two Tony?" Tony smiled; "I'll do better than that, since we packed an early lunch you still got a minute or two, maybe even three." Jacob turned to Sarah after Tony had walked of chuckling to himself. "I'm not to good at goodbyes, I enjoyed talking to you last night it gave me a sense of normality and I would like to continue this when I return." Sarah smiled; "So would I Jacob, so you just be sure and return, don't take any chances and stay safe." She then stood on her toes a gave him a quick kiss on his cheek. He hugged her fiercely and then gently let her go. "I shall return;" he said. "Go get 'm general" she replied and then they took their leave.
Jacob quickly walked to where the Landrover was parked as he climbed in Tony and Jim chuckled softly. "Finally, the lover boy decides to join us." Jim remarked. Raising his eyes to the sky Jacob just shrugged. "Ok, we're going to use the highway right up until the junction which branches of to Oaksfield in the south. We'll follow the road to Oaksfield for about 30 miles. There's a branch off to another road which leads to Grenville. That road is little known and ends as a back road into the suburb where your wife should be. We'll stop a few miles before we reach the suburb and hide the car and Tony and I go in on foot. If we don't return within a day you have to assume we're either dead or captured. Return to the compound in that case.