Burning Nation

by Trent Reedy

Cal was already in the office, opening up with his rifle through the front window.

  Then the whole world exploded. Machine guns lit us up. Fist-sized holes burst open in the front bay doors. I dropped to the floor. Bagley screamed as a round took a bite out of his head. He was hit three more times before his body fell to the floor. The tool bench was shredded and sparks flew as rounds ate up the back wall. Herbokowitz’s hip exploded and his leg flew off. I thought Sparrow’d been hit, but she started crawling back toward the dungeon hatch, covered in Herbokowitz.

  “Cal!” I screamed. “Cal, get the hell out of there!” Most of the office was a giant window. He had to be dead. And we would be. There was no way out of this. I’m sorry, JoBell, I thought. I tried. I love you so much.

  Sweeney wrapped his arms under mine and pulled me back toward the dungeon. “Move your ass, Wright!”

  I came back to my senses and looked around. Everyone else had made it back downstairs. Sweeney would be there by now if he hadn’t stopped for me. The Fed had Schmidty, had probably killed him, but there were people still alive to fight for. I’d never let them down again. All of these thoughts rushed through my brain in the time it took to crawl a single foot. Finally, I slid my way through puddles of blood and bits to plunge down the stairs into the dungeon headfirst.

  “Danny!” Becca threw her arms around me.

  I pulled away from her and nodded. “Get the guns! Luchen, grab the fifty-cal. Sparrow, you take his SAW. We’ll go out the tunnel and flank them. Kill any soldier you see.”

  I wasn’t the ranking soldier, but nobody wasted time with that shit. We moved fast, quick-crawling through the tunnel and flying out of the escape hole behind the slag heap next door like a swarm of pissed-off hornets. We could see the Fed from our new position at the side of the shop, but they hadn’t noticed us yet.

  “Spread out,” Kemp said. “Don’t give them a single area to target.”

  Luchen set up his .50-cal rifle behind a square piece of concrete sidewalk. Sparrow took cover behind a rock, getting the SAW ready. Kemp loaded a forty-millimeter grenade into his M320 on the bottom of his M4. Sweeney, Becca, and me readied our rifles.

  “Danny?” Becca’s whisper was shaky.

  “You can do this,” I said. “We gotta do this.”

  Becca nodded, and her face took on the same look of determination she wore when she and Lightning barrel-raced at the rodeo. She brought her rifle up and aimed at her target. I turned away, not wanting to watch that sweet, kind, beautiful girl I had known since we were both babies preparing to do something as terrible as kill.

  Meanwhile, two Fed gun Hummers with big American flags flying from the radio antennas on the back opened up on the shop. Their guns fired an endless series of eight-round bursts, sending a shower of bullets ripping through the business that Schmidty and my father had built, destroying my dream.

  I got ready to shoot. “Aim for the heavy gunners first! Let’s waste the mother—”

  I was cut off by the roar of our own gunfire as Luchen started shooting. One of their .50-cal gunners lost his head. The other jerked around in the turret as he was peppered by 5.56 from Sparrow’s SAW. Six other soldiers were shredded before they even had time to shift fire on us or scramble for cover. Then our rounds were sparking off one of the armored Humvees as it started backing up.

  “Don’t let them go!” With the turret gunner dead, the Feds were all trapped in that armored truck with no way of taking a shot at me. I rolled over the top of the slag pile and high-stepped through the snow to the Fed vehicle. I dove up onto its hood, grabbing the big metal lift shackle ring and pulling myself face-to-face with Major Alsovar through the thick windshield glass.

  I moved up to the roof, going for the gun turret to get inside the vehicle. The Humvee was on the street now, rolling away toward Main Street and the Feds’ HQ. Alsovar picked up speed and then hit the brakes, probably trying to dump me onto the pavement. But I was ready, with a solid grip on the lip of the turret. I’d ditched my M4 along the way, but my .45 would be better in close quarters anyway.

  I dropped headfirst — gun first— into the turret, firing rounds at the driver’s seat. Alsovar was gone! Out the door. Schmidty coughed in the backseat. “Hold on,” I said.

  I pulled myself back up on top of the Humvee and swung my weapon around, aiming for the major. He ran for it, sprinting toward the steel cylinder grain bins of the Freedom Lake grain co-op.

  “Alsovar!” I shot at him just as he ducked between the bins. “You hunting for me!? You better bring a whole hell of a lot more guys! This thing’s just starting! I’m coming for you! I will give you a war!”

  Two farmers slowly came out from around the side of a different bin with their hands up. One was holding an older comm, maybe shooting footage of me standing on the Humvee. I holstered my gun and whipped out my pocketknife, jumping onto the roof of the vehicle and bending its tall radio antenna down in front of me. Alsovar didn’t like how the rebels were getting fired up about me? I’d make sure to give them a real show.

  “Danny Wright? I can’t believe you’re alive,” said the farmer without the comm. “The Fed’s been saying you were killed in the border battle.”

  “The Fed lies.” I cut the American flag on the Hummer’s antenna loose in three hard slashes and dropped it to the ground. A few months ago, disrespecting that flag would have made me sick, but that was before America had betrayed me and my home. I held my aching left fist angled above my head the way I had the day the Fed killed my mom. This was the image that people were putting on posters and T-shirts, the one Alsovar was complaining about. I shouted my message loud and clear, right at the farmer’s comm. “It’s time to fight back. Rise up, Idaho!”

  —• is why I wrote Lincoln the Dictator. The man is revered for saving our democracy and freeing the slaves, and he did those great things, but history overlooks the fact that he ignored key freedoms essential to that democracy in order to do it. First, with no authorization from Congress, he ordered the blockade of the southern states. Then he single-handedly suspended the right of habeas corpus, which is the right of a prisoner to be brought before a judge —”

  “Dr. Lavinson, I’m sorry. I’m going to have to interrupt you there. NBC News has just received this video from an anonymous source who claims to have smuggled the footage out of Freedom Lake, Idaho. We’re going to cut to that right now. Do we have … Is the video ready? Ladies and gentlemen, this is an NBC breaking news exclusive, and there it is. If you compare the photograph in the bottom right corner of your screen to the person firing from the roof of the Humvee, it’s pretty clear. That’s Daniel Wright, the teenage subject of so much controversy early in the Idaho Crisis. Wright was reported dead shortly after the beginning of the reconstruction of northern Idaho, but … And it’s tough to make out the audio on this clip, but we believe he is taunting Major Federico Alsovar, commander of the FIRA in Wright’s hometown of Freedom Lake…. There — we believe he just said, ‘I will give you a war,’ a sort of catchphrase, if you will, that Wright first used after his mother was killed by federal forces when he attempted to run the federal blockade. There you see Wright cutting down the American flag. Clearly, he is absolutely in league with the insurgency now. We’re told this video was shot a matter of hours ago, recorded on an older digital video camera, and then smuggled into Washington where it could be sent to us via the Internet. Thus at this time, it appears Daniel Wright is still alive.

  “So far, the White House has refused to comment on this development, but this would seem to prove that President Griffith’s declaration of Wright’s death was either in error or another ‘tactical deception.’ We’re going to replay that video for you now, and we’ll be joined by Idaho Crisis experts from the •—

  —• Even if it turns out that the video is authentic and current and that it does show Daniel Wright, I really don’t think it matters. Laura Griffith continues to call this the Idaho Crisis, but over five hundred American soldiers have been killed
. The number of insurgents killed is unknown, but almost certainly higher. We need to face the fact that unless we act now, we will find ourselves in the middle of a full-blown second civil war. It’s easy for the senators and representatives from the Southern Coalition for Unity to demand an escalation in the fighting, because the states they represent are far from Idaho, but many in California, Oregon, and Washington are worried about what will happen to our homes, to the sociopolitical and natural environments of the Pacific Northwest and the West Coast. We applaud President Griffith’s efforts toward peace, and we hope James Montaine and the leadership of Idaho will take the steps necessary to end this conflict. •—

  —• FriendStar and Shout Out are already buzzing with some important celebrity opinions on the newly released video that apparently shows Daniel Wright still alive and very much working with the insurgents. Chicago Bulls star point guard Ripley JeDaris shouts,

  Kat Simpson, star of the teen vampire blockbuster Nightfall shouts,

  Moving words from some top celebrities. Maybe their example will inspire peace. •—

  I drove Alsovar’s ruined Humvee back to the shop.

  “Wright, you okay!?” Sweeney yelled at me when I stepped out.

  “Schmidty’s in back,” I said. “Cal?”

  Sweeney shook his head. “Haven’t had the chance to —”

  “I’m fine!” Cal said, stepping over the bottom frame of the window. “Ears are ringing, and a couple pieces of glass cut the hell out of me, but I’m fine.”

  I laughed, offering a high five. Cal only held up his bleeding hand.

  “Damn it, Wright. Every time you leave the dungeon, all hell breaks loose,” Sparrow said. “If you’d just stay in hiding, we —”

  “It’s not my fault!” I said.

  Crocker ran up to the Humvee with a huge box of food. “We should get out of here. The Fed could bring an air strike anytime.”

  “Where were you during the fight?” Sweeney asked.

  Crocker had already stowed his box in the Humvee and was running back toward the shop. “Someone had to pack up the C4, the radios, and some food and blankets and stuff. Or do you want to rush out of here with nothing to live on?”

  Sweeney followed him. “Maybe with another guy out here, we wouldn’t have almost got —”

  “Danny,” Becca said quietly from over by the Humvee. “Hey, Danny, I think you need to come here.”

  “Hang on a second,” I said. “We have to figure out—”

  “Danny, never mind that shit.” Schmidty’s normal cracked voice sounded softer and more broken up than usual.

  Becca held the back passenger Humvee door open. There were tears on her face.

  Schmidty sat sideways with his legs hanging out of the vehicle. Blood ran down from a wound in his gut. Sparrow rushed up with a bandage, but he pushed her away. “No! Save that for someone who needs it.”

  “You need it,” said Sparrow. “You’ve been shot.”

  “I know that, damn it! Now leave me alone!”

  “I got this,” I said to Sparrow and Becca, taking the bandage. “Help Crocker. We gotta move out.”

  “Yes, Private,” said Sparrow, reminding me that she outranked me.

  I ignored her. “Come on, Schmidty.” I held the bandage up in front of him. “Let us take care of that for you.”

  “Alsovar already took care of me. Shot me right before you started to come down through the turret. You just …” He gritted his teeth against the pain. “Get me to my chair … in the shop, would ya?”

  I wiped my eyes and nodded.

  “Don’t be a pussy,” Schmidty growled. “We’re trying to win a war here.”

  “Cal, help me,” I said.

  Cal and me groaned as we lifted the fat old man out of the Humvee. Sweeney joined us. With the bay doors shot up and useless, we walked Schmidty around to the front office window, crunching over the broken glass. It looked like a giant cheese grater had been taken to every surface. Junk, scraps, and blood littered the floor around the remains of Bagley, First Sergeant Herbokowitz, and the three Feds.

  Schmidty grunted as we put him in his chair. Blood had soaked his belly and the crotch of his jeans, running down his thighs. “Cigarette.” He coughed. My hands shook as I held out his pack of smokes. He took one and frowned at me. “Lighter, dumbass!” Cal put the lighter in his hand, and Schmidty lit up. He closed his eyes as he took a deep drag. Then he coughed again and wiped blood from his lips. “They said … smoking would kill me.” He smiled. Cal and Sweeney and me tried to laugh.

  Becca stepped up beside me and put her arm around my back. She was trying to look tough and avoid crying, but she wasn’t very good at it. Neither was I.

  “Come on, man,” I said. “Let us help you. We’ll get you to a doctor.”

  Schmidty shook his head. “Fed’ll be waiting there to bring you in. You need to get your shit and find a new … place to hide.”

  “Guys,” I said to Cal and Sweeney. “Get our stuff loaded in the Humvees.”

  “Right. Um … Goodbye, Schmidty,” Sweeney said.

  “Hey, moneybags,” the old man said to him. “Basement at my house. Hidden real good. Bunch of cartons of smokes. Worth big in trade.”

  “Right,” Sweeney said.

  “But don’t go there right away!” A fit of coughing shook him. “Damned Fed will be all over the place.”

  “Thanks.” Sweeney nodded.

  Schmidty waved my three friends away, and they went to help load the Humvees. “This ain’t your fault, Danny. Don’t blame —”

  “I blame Alsovar,” I said. “I blame the Fed.”

  He gave me a thumbs-up, the cigarette dangling from his mouth. “… never had any kids of my own …” His breath was getting shallow now. He pointed his cigarette around the building. “Sorry. I think the shop’s a loss.”

  I looked back at the old man, my father’s friend, my business partner. He deserved better than this. My eyes blurred, and I wiped my tears away.

  “You gotta win this, Danny. Promise me.”

  “I promise.” I squeezed the pistol grip of my .45. “And I’ll get Alsovar too.”

  “Wright,” Kemp called from outside. “Humvees are loaded. We can’t stay here.”

  Schmidty brought his bloodstained cigarette to his lips with a shaky hand and took a long drag. “I got a buddy. He got a cabin, old converted barn … up on Silver Mountain. Shady Glen Road. Go there.” He pointed at one of the dead officers on the floor. “Give me that bastard’s nine mil. I’ll stay here. Feds come back … I’ll give ’em hell.”

  “Schmidty …” I couldn’t help it. The sobs escaped me now. “I never thanked you. Never told you how much —”

  “Would you get the hell out of here already!?”

  “Yeah.” I managed to smile. “You stay your regular old pissed-off self. Goodbye, Schmidty.”

  I left him there, bleeding out in his dusty old chair, watching over our ruined shop, ready to fight the Fed when they came. He would die as he lived, as a fighter.

  “Schmidty?” Becca asked me when I took my place in the front passenger seat of one of the Humvees. Cal was ready to drive, and I didn’t argue.

  “On his own terms,” I said. “Let’s go.” Becca turned away and looked out the window. I grabbed the radio handset, making up our call signs on the spot. “Rebel two, this is rebel one, over?”

  “Um, rebel one,” said Kemp over the radio from the other Humvee. “This is rebel two, go ahead, over.”

  “Two, this is one. Follow us. I got a plan, over.”

  “One, two. That’s a good copy.”

  “Cal,” I said, “take us up to Sweeney’s storage shed.”

  “The snowmobiles?” Sweeney asked.

  “You got it.” The Sweeney family had a whole extra building to house Sweeney’s dad’s ’vette, their four-wheeler, two Jet Skis, and four snowmobiles.

  The radio squawked. “Rebels on this frequency, be advised we are monitoring this channel a
nd tracking the location of your vehicles. We are authorized to use deadly force to stop you. Surrender now if you want to live.”

  “Why would they bother warning us?” Sweeney asked. “Why not just sneak up and kill us?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe they want prisoners for interrogation, or they’d prefer to take us without a fight. Either way, they ain’t getting what they want.”

  “Just ignore them, dude,” said Cal.

  I held the handset to my head and keyed the transmit button. “Attention Fed assholes! You tracking us!? Fine! Come get us. I swear, I will kill every single one of you! You make sure you bring Major Alsovar along, because I got a special bullet just waiting for him. How copy that, shithead!? Rebel one, out.”

  I crawled back between the front seats, over the blood of the dead Fed gunner we’d tossed out before we left, and pulled myself up through the turret behind the .50-cal. If we were attacked, I’d at least be able to give them a fight. “Cal, speed up!”

  “Fast as I can, man,” Cal said.

  Down the street, a man came out the front door of his house. I tensed up on the machine gun, ready to return fire if I needed to. “Yeah, Wright! Woo!” He waved the dark blue Idaho flag above his head. “Give ’em hell, Wright!”

  In the past, I’d hated this kind of attention. All I’d ever wanted was to live my normal life. My truck, the shop, football, some country music with a little rodeo, my friends, Mom, and my JoBell were all I needed. Now the Fed had taken away almost all of that. There was only one thing left to do.

  I held up my left fist to the man as we passed. “Fight back! The war is on!”

  * * *

  Sweeney was out of the Humvee almost before Cal brought us to a stop. I cleared the machine gun, pulled the two pins that held it on its mount, and put the gun and an ammo can on the edge of the roof so I could grab them from the ground.

  “There’s still some gas left in here!” Sweeney yelled from inside the shed. He filled up one snowmobile and then handed the can to Cal, who set about gassing up the other three. Sweeney hitched a sled behind his favorite snowmobile, a 1,000-cc Ski-Doo Grand Touring he liked to call the Silver Bullet.