Read Tomorrow 7 - The Other Side Of Dawn for Free Online Page A

phase of the war. This is it. What happens in the next few weeks will decide the future history of this country. And ours. And theirs too for that matter. That’s why you’re being called into action. That’s why we’re using every resource we’ve got. That’s why I’m here.’
    Ryan lit another cigarette. It was his third already since we’d stopped our mad rush away from Tailor’s Stitch.
    ‘And it’s where you come in. Have you heard of D-Day, from the Second World War?’
    We’d all heard of it but no-one knew quite what it meant.
    ‘It’s when you launch a big attack, isn’t it?’ Kevin asked. ‘I saw that movie.’
    ‘Yes, exactly. Come to think of it, I don’t know why they call it D-Day. Why not A or B or Z? Anyway, our D-Day has arrived. Every soldier we can call on, every weapon we have, will be thrown into this. It’s the counterattack that we’ve been working on for nearly six months.’
    ‘Do you mean we’re going for broke?’ Kevin asked. ‘All or nothing?’
    ‘Well, I wouldn’t quite put it that way. But the consequences of our being defeated would be ...’
    Ryan searched for a word, but when I heard the one he chose, I wished he hadn’t bothered.
    ‘... it would be catastrophic.’
    He stubbed his cigarette out on a rock and looked at us, waiting to see our reaction. I think he was disappointed. None of us said anything, none of us showed anything.
    Eventually Homer broke the silence. ‘So we’re one of the resources, huh?’
    ‘Essentially, yes. Sounds a bit cold-blooded, doesn’t it?’
    He lit another cigarette. Fi wrinkled her nose and moved away, so she was upwind of him. ‘Sorry,’ he said to her. ‘I’m giving up after the war.’
    He continued. ‘The stuff we stored on that island is basically to let you live off the land for a few weeks, and inflict a lot of damage while you’re doing it.’
    ‘Damage what exactly?’ Lee asked.
    For the first time Ryan looked a bit excited. He got a light in his eyes. I wondered if he really was a bit of a goer after all. It was hard to work out, after what had happened that morning. Did he really want to get involved, but was holding back because of orders, because his skills were too valuable to be risked? Or was he a wimp who used orders as an excuse to stay out of danger? I started to think it was probably the first, and the way he’d slammed his fist into the tree, up on Tailor’s Stitch, was pretty fair dinkum.
    Maybe now we were being asked to do the job he would have liked for himself .
    ‘That’s just it,’ he said. ‘You’ve got a record, and I don’t know everything you’ve done, only what I’ve read in the papers basically, but Mother of God you’ve got a record and that’s why Colonel Finley sent me. And after what you’ve told me about how you ambushed that patrol this morning, I’m getting an idea why.
    ‘What he wants you guys to do now is go totally mobile. Guerillas on the run. Bombs to go. You travel light, you pick your own targets, you hit and disappear.’
    ‘But that’s not going to make a difference,’ Fi said. ‘Not a major difference, not the kind of difference you’re talking about. The five of us aren’t going to win back a state or two in a couple of weeks.’
    Ryan waved that away with his cigarette.
    ‘Of course, of course,’ he said. ‘But for want of a nail a war was lost.’
    I don’t think any of us had a clue what he meant.
    He waved his cigarette again and said: ‘We’ll be coming by land and sea and air. Like I said, we’ve led them to believe that we’re too low on troops and equipment to do any more than hold our line. We’re gambling that they’ve swallowed the disinformation. The truth is that we’ve been saving a lot of stuff for just this eventuality. I can’t say any more about that.
    ‘But your mission, should you choose to accept it ...’
    Lee laughed at that, and Ryan grinned at him, so I knew it was a line from a movie somewhere.
    ‘Your