Empire

by Brandt Legg

  At the same time, infrastructure, utilities—including the power grid, seaports, and airports, along with a host of other sites—required added attention. The media and universities needed to be controlled. The 3D facial recognition system tagged anyone suspicious, allowed for easier enforcement of curfews, and rounded up those on government watch lists. Tens of thousands were arrested. Prisons filled beyond capacity, led to the opening of detention camps. A network of facilities that had been established by the Federal Emergency Management Agency in the preceding decades for other uses had now been converted to hold large numbers of dissidents.

  In the ten days that followed the president’s decision, NorthBridge seemed to have vanished into the shadows as the State of Emergency took hold and the military grabbed authority in all facets of American life. The shocking reality to the average citizen of how unstable their country had become over-shadowed what some saw as the greater issue—which was just how incredibly fast the military had taken over.

  Vice President Brown stormed into the Oval Office while Hudson was meeting with his secretary and two legislative assistants.

  “You want to tell me how this is any different than martial law?” the vice president demanded.

  The president motioned to his secretary for the room to be cleared. “What are you even doing here?” he asked. “We’re not supposed to be in the same building at the same time,” he added firmly, “particularly in a crisis such as this.”

  “The line of succession is secure,” the vice president replied. “The Speaker of the House is currently in his home district. President pro tempore of the Senate is at the Capitol Building. The Secretary of State is returning from Canada. But what’s not safe is our country. I agree with you that martial law was too extreme, but you’ve done almost the same thing! A rose by any other name . . . ”

  “I’ve done what I’ve had to do,” the president said.

  “You may call this a state of emergency, but it might as well be martial law. You’re in danger of losing what control you have over the government. You’re ceding your power to the Pentagon.”

  “You saw those cities. I had to send the troops in.”

  “But you suspended the writ of habeas corpus without the consent of Congress. You’ve raised troops in every state. They’re arresting people without cause, searching without warrants. I understand that today the Army occupied and closed several courthouses in New York and California, and that the military has taken over more than thirty local police forces who failed to act on your state of emergency orders.”

  “You weren’t in the Sit Room,” the president said. “Whatever you’ve seen on television is nothing compared to what’s actually going on out there.”

  “How can I believe what I see on television when the military has taken over any stations and networks that were airing anything critical? It’s martial law. You created a police state. How are you going to get out of this?”

  “I. Don’t. Know.” The president stood up from the Resolute Desk and walked around the corner to stand right in front of the vice president. “The country was tearing itself apart. If I didn’t take this action, we’d be in a full scale civil war. I’ll figure out how to get out of it when I get there.”

  “But you cannot trust the military,” the vice president said.

  The president stared at her, surprised that she understood how precarious the relationship was with the Pentagon. “I know that,” he said quietly.

  “Then why are you letting them take control?”

  “Because I don’t have enough VS agents to keep order, and I can’t spare the Secret Service to even take back control of Wichita, let alone Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, Houston . . . What am I supposed to do? What would you do if I were dead and you were the president? How would you have solved this problem?”

  “We’re trying to break the REMies’ empire,” the vice president began, “yet you’re using the military, the very organization that’s paid for and controlled by the REMies to keep their empire in power.”

  “And your point?”

  “Maybe you should consider cutting a deal with Booker Lipton.”

  “He’s the one who’s caused all of this!”

  “Is he?”

  Chapter Sixty-Seven

  On the eighth day after the uprisings began, Melissa found Hudson in the Situation Room at three a.m. “You can’t keep doing this,” she said, stepping behind his chair and rubbing his shoulders.

  “Doing what?”

  “Working all night. You can’t survive on an hour nap here, two hours of sleep there.”

  “It’s the biggest crisis we’ve ever faced,” he said, stifling a yawn.

  “Imagine how much worse it would be if the president died during it.”

  “Maybe Celia could do a better job.”

  “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” she said. “Come to bed.”

  “Not yet.”

  “You’ve done all you could for today—or yesterday, since it’s already tomorrow.”

  “The generals—”

  “They’re behaving,” she said. “You’ve cut their authority every chance you got. There haven’t been more than forty-eight hours where you haven’t overridden them, reduced personnel, or had them pull out of a city. You’ve reinstated rights to nearly one-third of the cities and managed to close two FEMA camps already.”

  “It’s going well, but we’re not out of the woods. DIRT has been a huge help keeping the military in check. The biggest break may be the absence of any major NorthBridge attacks.” He stood, leaned against the table, and brought her close. “And all your contacts in the state governments. I’m not sure what we would have done without the national guards and the state police. Those people haven’t slept either.”

  “I’ve skipped a little sleep, too,” she admitted.

  “You’re amazing. You’ve been on the phone every single day, with every single governor,” he said. “I’m just trying to keep up with you.”

  “Then come to bed.”

  He didn’t quite get three hours of sleep before they woke him for a call from Dranick.

  “Secure line,” the DNI confirmed.

  “How bad?” the president asked impatiently, knowing Colonel Dranick wasn’t calling with good news.

  “Remember the couple?” Dranick asked.

  “Of course,” the president replied. They’d been following every moment of the lives of a man who worked for Coyne and his lover, a woman employed by Bastendorff. As best they’d been able to ascertain, neither REMie knew that the two underlings were involved in a secret romance. The rivals, each vying for the CapStone, would have forbidden any such contact. That is unless, as the Wizard had theorized, it was some kind of set-up. In the REMie world of MADE events, it could have been a trap for the couple, or a “dangle,” what the CIA would call an agent sent to provide a stream of disinformation to the president.

  “It looks like it wasn’t NorthBridge,” Dranick said.

  “I’m exhausted Enapay, please just tell me.”

  “We’ve picked up from their conversations last night that this is all part of the CapWar. Coyne and Bastendorff are going at each other, and they’re using the United States as their battlefield.”

  “They started this?”

  “Yes, sir. They both want you out. They expected this to immediately bring you down. Apparently, they didn’t count on the Pentagon to support you.”

  “You’ve clearly been helping with that.”

  There was a brief silence before Dranick responded. “I’m doing everything I can to help you get through this.”

  “Call the Director,” Hudson said. “Get her to find a DIRT team that isn’t vital to putting down the uprising. We need arrest warrants for Bastendorff and Coyne.”

  “Mr. President, excuse me,” Dranick said, as if confused. “We don’t need arrest warrants, we need a Dark Ops unit. It’s time to take these two evil REMie bastards out.”

  Chapter Sixt
y-Eight

  Bastendorff cleared a table consisting of six elaborate Lego Star Wars sets, including a four-thousand-piece Death Star. As the multi-colored plastic bricks and assorted other pieces crashed onto the floor and ricocheted in hundreds of directions, the fat man bellowed as if he’d been knifed. “Why is Hudson Pound still alive!?”

  An assistant, used to the billionaire’s verbal abuse, reluctantly continued the briefing. He informed his boss of the progress being made by the administration against the riots and uprisings. Bastendorff interrupted the man continuously, interjecting profanity laced commentary on the reports. As the assistant proceeded, the outbursts worsened.

  “Just three days ago Times Square was locked down!” Bastendorff barked. “The Pentagon had turned hotels in at least nine cities into temporary prisons, and now that’s over?”

  “Yes, sir. The president has apparently kept the generals on a tight leash. He’s been undoing their measures swiftly. The public’s view of the president is becoming more favorable as the crisis continues. The media and internet are still extremely limited. However, we’ve been able to gauge the population’s sentiments through the normal government channels—”

  “They’re using Three-D and AI to assess and predict human behavior . . . ”

  “Yes, large scale Artificial Intelligence programs are interpreting the Three-D data with dramatic accuracy.”

  “And the data shows the president is winning?”

  “Yes, the people are increasingly concerned and fearful about the Pentagon’s power and the prospect of long-term military authority and occupation of their cities, towns, and even homes.”

  “Fear? I’ll give them fear!” Bastendorff raged, clearing another table filled with Lego Ninjago temples and attack vehicles. “So they see Pound as a kind of hero?”

  “That’s what the data’s showing, quite clearly. The public believes he’s working to keep the Pentagon in check, that the system which ensures a civilian government in control of the military is more fragile and at risk than ever before in America.”

  “You know what happens to heroes? They have a fancy funeral, and then songs are written about them. Let the fools sing!”

  The assistant nodded as if agreeing with his boss’s statement, even though he always thought the big man was letting emotion warp his perspective. “They see Pound as fighting to preserve it while balancing the need for utilizing the armed forces during the crisis.”

  “The crisis? This is my crisis. I created it!” Bastendorff yelled. “And it should have grown from crisis to civil war by now. What the hell is going on over there? I’ve sunk billions into this war!”

  His rage dissolved into another stream of expletives before he began calling in more of his lieutenants. After a group of fifteen of his top people had assembled, he gave new orders and revamped his strategy to destroy the president and create more trouble in America.

  “I want him dead and the country left in shambles. Any and all means necessary are authorized. Ten million dollars to the one who gets it done!”

  A more subdued Titus Coyne spoke with several elite financial leaders and four other REMies who were allied with his efforts.

  “This is only round one,” Coyne began. “While Pound has surprised us with his ability to handle the turmoil, this actually plays into our hands. Bastendorff may have chosen the complete destruction of the United States as his path to the CapStone, but I’m not interested in cleaning up that big of a mess. The president has done us a favor. Let him do the heavy lifting, I prefer not to get my hands dirty.”

  “But his popularity is increasing,” a Federal Reserve Governor said.

  “I assure you that he will not be the president for much longer.”

  “How long?” another REMie asked.

  “Long enough to finish stabilizing things, he’s good at that,” Coyne said.

  “Are we talking weeks or months?”

  “Days,” Coyne said, which created a murmur around the room. “Hudson Pound’s time as president will be over in a matter of days.”

  The president had told Dranick he wanted assets seized and due process carried out. “Those REMies will be arrested.”

  “As if our justice system isn’t part of their empire?” Dranick had questioned.

  But the president already had a team of nearly two hundred lawyers working to restructure the entire system. The Gypsy program had identified a long list of judges and prosecutors who had “REMie tendencies,” which meant they were knowingly or unknowingly working for the elites. “We won’t sink to their level,” the president had told his old army buddy. “They’ll be put on trial. The world needs to see the full breadth of their conspiracy.”

  However, the appearance of justice and transparency for the REMies’ great crimes wasn’t his only motivation. REMies were not a unified force running the world, such as conspiracy theorists imagined the Illuminati were. Yet the REMies maintained power by abiding by a few rules, and the “RAT clause,” as Hudson called it, was their most important, and the president’s main concern. The REMie Asset Transfer, or “RAT” clause, stated that in the event of a REMie death, his wealth must pass to a family member or other REMie. This was one reason Vonner had researched his ancestry so thoroughly. REMies always knew to whom they were related. It was the RAT clause that had allowed them to keep and consolidate their wealth in the hands of so few families. New REMies, such as some of the tech billionaires of the past few decades, could trace their bloodlines to other REMies.

  Hudson explained the decision to Melissa as they were grabbing a quick breakfast in the president’s study.

  “I understand the RAT clause is why you want to seize assets,” the first lady said, “to keep them from passing their wealth. But won’t all the possible heirs be indicted as co-conspirators?”

  “No. These are going to be difficult cases. Even if we can get Fair and Free in place and level the playing field so we can be guaranteed honest judges, we’ll be lucky to get all the REMies themselves in prison. Going beyond that to immediate family, let alone distant family members, will be impossible.”

  “I get it,” she said. “But isn’t the RAT clause what got Schueller his inheritance? What happens to his billions?”

  “Schueller isn’t a REMie. He won’t be prosecuted.”

  “Vonner was.”

  “You can’t prosecute a dead man.”

  The president took a call from Rex. “Thought you’d want to know,” Vonner’s old fixer began. “In the final wave of violence that hit Vegas, it seems a building belonging to a distant relative of yours got hit.”

  “Really?” the president asked. “Was anyone hurt?”

  “Fortunately, most everyone was evacuated. However, there were numerous injuries. Most were nothing too serious.” Rex rolled a handful of black dice onto a glass table. The rattle was loud enough that the president could hear them. “But the reason I’m calling,” Rex continued, “is that there was one fatality.”

  “Sorry to hear that.”

  “Yeah, I knew you would be,” Rex said. “It was your relative.”

  “Oh, no . . . are you sure?”

  “Yeah. Tarka just confirmed it. Lester Devonshire is dead.”

  Chapter Sixty-Nine

  It took the most powerful military on the face of the earth just twelve days to completely put down the uprisings and restore order. Still, it had been an epic disaster—six thousand two hundred ninety-one dead, twice that many injuries, and property damage in the hundreds of billions. The cost to the economy was going to be in excess of a trillion dollars, maybe twice that depending on which economists were doing the figuring. The Federal Reserve had stepped in and was doing what some critics called “smoke and mirrors” to keep the economy afloat. However, as always after a war, the rebuilding would be a boon.

  But the country was scarred. It would be a long time before anyone could know how deeply.

  Hudson gave the speech of his life, declaring victory and thanking th
e brave men and women of the military and law enforcement, as well as the countless ordinary citizens who had acted with bravery and honor when called upon. To the portion of the general population who had not panicked and added to the mayhem, he offered deep gratitude and promised that this would not be allowed to happen again.

  While the media was blaming NorthBridge, the president promised that a full investigation was underway, and he believed it would show that another group had created the catastrophe. “Outside forces are manipulating events and distracting everyone,” he said in a thinly-veiled reference to MADE events, which he would soon be revealing as part of Cherry Tree. “They will not be allowed to win.”

  Privately, though, the president knew he and the country were in a weaker position than ever before. NorthBridge had mostly sat out the uprisings, perhaps knowing the REMies had been hoping to bring them into the mix. If they had, it would have led to the end of America.

  But NorthBridge could strike at any moment. Fonda had made it clear that something was underway. The REMies had hardly dipped into their resources and still managed almost to ignite a civil war in the country the rest of the world viewed as the most stable, a safe haven for a century. No more.

  If not for Dranick providing constant access to the full network of spy satellites, Hudson might have made a mistake, might have missed a trouble spot, might have messed up. Instead, by torturing his body with endless green tea and dangerously little sleep (and even a few of Fitz’s Cokes) he was able to hold the Union together and prevent either rebels or the military from gaining too much power. General Imperia had led the operation, proving to be a brilliant tactician and demonstrating an uncanny ability at controlling civilian populations.