by Tom Kratman
"Huh? Oh sure, Juani," said Schmidt, pushing a button on a rather expensive air filter, turning on a window fan and opening another window a crack for good measure. "Happy now?"
"I'm a long way from happy . . . but it will do. Now what about Fort Hood?" asked the governor.
"I spoke to General Bennigsen, the Third Corps commander. He has heard the tapes of the conversation between Friedberg and the gunships. He's also seen what we pulled out of that storm cellar. He told me he would not obey any orders to use his corps as a police force. But, he also said, if we started shooting he wouldn't have any choice. He will defend his post, he says." Schmidt sounded as if he had a great deal of sympathy for Bennigsen, and the rather miserable set of choices he faced. More than sympathy, there was a tone of admiration and respect for the way he was making those choices.
"So, you are telling me that we don't have much of a military option but neither does Washington?"
"That's about it, Juani. For now. In six months? They could roll right over us. Maybe six weeks if they're willing to disengage from the rest of the world."
Juanita turned to her attorney general, raising one quizzical eyebrow.
The attorney general, David Rothman, was heavyset, dark complexioned, and nattily dressed; a Mormon convert from Judaism. Politically, he was considered to be just a few feet to the right of Attila the Hun, though this was a slight exaggeration. Indeed, his conversion to Mormonism had as much to do with rejection of liberalism as it did with acceptance of Christ.
"We've got two issues, Governor. One is the continuing imprisonment and future trial of Friedberg and her crew. That's the least pressing, though I am sure you can expect the White House to press. The other is . . . well, I think we need to inundate the federal courts with every kind of lawsuit we can imagine; criminal indictments, as well. We need to paralyze them legally, as best we can."
Schmidt snorted loudly; he had little use for lawsuits.
"Quiet, Jack," Juanita waved a hand. "Let him finish. What kind of lawsuits, Dave?"
"Governor, my staff has just begun studying that question. Some preliminary answers, though, include indictments against everyone in the White House, FBI, BATF, EPA and the Surgeon General's office who had anything in the slightest to do with what happened at your brother's mission. Hit them at the same time, personally, with wrongful death suits. Then there's the environmental damage done as a result of the smoke. That's another suit. Your brother's mission was an historic site, too; did you know that? There's another."
"And how many of those suits and indictments will survive the once-over-lightly at the Supreme Court."
"I can't answer that yet, Governor."
Juanita's lieutenant governor interjected a question, "Would it make any difference, really?"
"Would what?" asked Rothman.
"Even if we won all the suits in the world, what makes you think Rottemeyer will pay the slightest attention?"
Rothman didn't need to think about that for long. "Ultimately, she won't, not her. But . . . before she has actually lost them she'll fight them every step of the way. It's just in her nature, I think. She used to be a pretty fair lawyer herself once upon a time. Hated to lose anything, I've heard. And that distraction might help. Will probably help."
The lieutenant governor let his skepticism show plainly. White-haired and bent-shouldered, Dr. Ralph Minden held a Ph.D. in economics. He had been recruited for Juanita's gubernatorial ticket, despite being a Republican, precisely because he was an economist of national standing.
Minden announced, "Won't matter a hill of beans. She's going to cut off funding. She's going to keep taxing. Six months of that and she won't need to invade us, won't need to jail us. There are enough people here dependent on federal handouts that they'll lynch us in the streets long before it comes to that."
"Any way around that?" asked Schmidt. He had always respected the lieutenant governor's opinions.
"Maybe two. One is . . . well . . . why don't we make it illegal for federal income and social security taxes to be withheld in Texas? Won't stop companies whose checks are cut outside of Texas from withholding, mind you. But we are a net profit maker to the federal government in total. Losing revenues on payroll checks cut in Texas will hurt them . . . some anyway."
"What's the other way?" asked Schmidt.
"The Mint?"
"Huh?"
"There are two Federal Mints—divisions of the Bureau of Engraving. One's in DC. The other one? The Western Currency Facility. That's in Fort Worth, just up the road."
Schmidt cocked his head to one side and smiled. "Clever, Doc. You mean we take over the place. Then if they tax us, we just print the equivalent money to cover the tax."
"Yes, General. All of the tax. Plus we can manipulate the money supply if we need to; put a real crunch on the feds. The printing plant in DC just might be able to keep an adequate money supply circulating; half the reason they built a second one here was security and redundancy, after all, not capacity. But they couldn't stand it if we flooded the country with too much money. Holding the mint would send a message they couldn't ignore."
"Won't they just bomb the shit out of the Mint?" asked Schmidt.
Minden paused, then continued. "Right away, General? Right away and admit they have a revolution on their hands? Right away before they've even tried to take it back whole? Right away before we have a chance to disperse the printing capability? I think not."
Schmidt looked down, thinking hard. Slowly at first, then with growing insistence, a smile forced itself to his face. "You know, Doc. I don't think so either."
* * *
Washington, DC
"So what if we don't cut communications with Texas," asked Rottemeyer.
"Can't stop the propaganda coming out of there," announced Carroll, simply.
"But," he added, "maybe we shouldn't worry so much over that. After all, there's propaganda and then there's propaganda."
"Hmm?" queried Rottemeyer.
"Oh, when this all kicked off I contacted a hack writer I know, called National Endowment for the Arts and got him a grant. He's a hack, but he's a good one. Father of Pain: The True Story of the Deadly Fanatic Catholic Fundamentalist Cult of Texas will be hitting the book stands day after tomorrow. We'll pin everything from child abuse to drug use to running a prostitution ring on that priest. And we'll get the first dig in. They won't recover so easily from that."
"Where did your hack get the information?" asked McCreavy.
Carroll fixed her with a pitying stare.
* * *
Cemetery, Dei Gloria Mission, Waco, Texas
Ranks and files of caskets, twenty-six of them undersized, stretched across an open area that was part of the Mission's old Spanish cemetery. Among hundreds of witnesses and participants to the funeral, only a few were related in any way to the victims. Elpidia, seated in a wheelchair—and with her arm and shoulder still plastered—was one of these.
Juanita, her husband, and Schmidt were there, too, of course. In fact, all of Juanita's family that could make it had shown up to bid farewell to their Uncle Jorge. The four boys, Carlos, who worked on Wall Street, Thomas and Roderigo, both still in college, and Mario the youngest and still in high school, stood flanking their mother and father, like an honor guard.
It was her youngest son, Mario—a fine strapping, handsome boy, not too different from his late uncle—who had taken upon himself the duty of pushing Elpidia's wheelchair around . . . that, and offering what comfort he could.
Comforted by Mario or not, Elpidia still wept continuously. All assumed it was for her baby. They were only half right, however. Elpi also wept for her priest and for fallen Miguel, the only men in her miserable life to date who had ever treated her decently for any length of time.
The priest presiding had finished with his portion. The time had come for Juanita to have her say. Tired, and with the fatigue and stress showing on her face from a night spent preparing to speak, she stood. Patting Elpi'
s good shoulder, Juanita turned then and walked steadily to a podium, her progress followed by the cameras that fed directly to Stone's Internet node and from there to the rest of the world.
Juanita began calmly, "The people who did this, who committed this horrible crime, believe that they have accounted for everything; that they have foreseen everything. They think that with their guns they have frightened half of us into submission . . . and with their taxes bribed the rest of us into acquiescence.
"They think that they can get away with anything—murder, mayhem, massacre—by just showing some teeth on a television, promising to steal some more money only so they can give it back . . . after it takes that expensive night on the town in Washington, to be sure . . . and telling us how they feel our pain."
Juani's face grew bitter. " 'Feel our pain' . . . so they claim. Do they? Did they feel it when they roasted twenty-six of our children alive in a storm shelter? Did they feel it when they blasted a priest of God to bits with their gunships' rockets and machine guns? 'Feel our pain'? They can no more do that than they can feel our rage."
Among the crowd, many began softly to weep, joining their cries to Elpidia's. Schmidt—himself—found the need to wipe his eyes.
"But why not?" Juanita continued. "What have they to fear from us, after all? Haven't they frightened—the half—and bribed the other half?"
Bitterness fell away before rage. "Oh the fools, the fools, the stupid . . . Stupid . . . STUPID and utterly contemptible fools." Juani stopped for breath before continuing. She stepped away to put her hand on her brother's casket. "They have left us our sacred Texan dead. And while Texas, under their yoke, holds these dead, Texas will never be at peace.
"For I have had a vision. And with this vision I speak to those who think themselves my people's masters, and I speak to them in my people's name. Beware, you tyrants in Washington. Beware of the day that is coming. Beware, you sanctimonious hypocrites. Beware of the risen people. Do you think, you tyrants, that law is stronger than life? Do you think, you hypocrites, that your fascist propaganda can outweigh mankind's desire to be free?"
Looking directly into the camera now, face grown red even through her olive complexion, Juanita pronounced the future. "We will try it out with you. We will take back what you have stolen. We will be free."
Chapter Eight
From the transcript at trial: Commonwealth of
Virginia v. Alvin Scheer
DIRECT EXAMINATION, CONTINUED
BY MR. STENNINGS:
Q. And what do you think it was that made your wife ill . . .
MS. CAPUTO: Objection, Your Honor.
This question calls for expert testimony—
MR. STENNINGS: Horse pucky, Your Honor. The Defendant only needs to address what he thought it was at the time and no one is a more credible witness on that than he is.
THE COURT: Overruled. But I caution you, Mr. Stennings, that your client will only be allowed to testify as to his own impressions without the Court taking any note of them as proof, one way or the other.
MR. STENNINGS: Thank you, Judge. Go on, Alvin.
A. Yes, sir. At least, I thought it was the pictures of them kids that set my wife to throwing up. Turns out, it was more than that.
Seems the doctor got it wrong. She had . . . well . . . I can't pronounce it. Wouldn't even try. But however you pronounce it, she had it and it was killing her.
No, no, I never blamed the doc. I mean, you should have seen him there, wall to wall screaming kids and none of their parents trying to control 'em. Hell, half of 'em were there with nothing more than runny noses but under the new system the doc had to see them, too. All of 'em, or risk losing his license, his job, maybe even going to jail. I heard a rumor once that the government, the feds I mean, was deliberately sending doctors to jail so that they could be put to treating the prisoners. A cost-saving measure, I heard it was. Might have even been true, I don't rightly know.
The wife, she went downhill fast, too. Wasn't but maybe two weeks before she was in the hospital, full time, and . . . well, it was awful to see, her just wasting away right in front of me. She held my hand pretty near constantly towards the end, though she never cried. . . . Well, I mean sometimes she did cry. But it was for her babies who was going to be left alone in the world.
That wasn't a problem, as it turned out. My folks took the kids in and told me not to worry about 'em.
I was right glad about that, glad and grateful. 'Cause, you see, the very afternoon of my wife's funeral I set me to thinking about what it was that killed my wife. Once I figured it out . . . well, naturally, I went and dug me up that old rifle I'd buried . . . .
MR. STENNINGS: Stop right there, Alvin.
A. No, sir. I don't care who knows. Weren't no one going to kill my woman and get away with it. . . .
* * *
Greenville, Texas
"Put your goddamned backs into it, boys. Dig and fill. Dig and fill. The general and the governor are coming and I want you all to make me proud."
The speaker, First Sergeant Michael S. ("Iron Mike") Pendergast, of Company A, 144th Infantry, Texas National Guard, smiled blithely to see his men redouble their efforts. Satisfied with that, Pendergast bent again over his own shovel, digging, lifting and sifting sand into bags taken from flood emergency stocks. An irregular stream of dump trucks had been delivering sand to the armory all morning. An even less steady stream had come to disgorge sandbags in their thousands. As piles of filled bags grew, more trucks—these ones army-issue five-tons—were filled to overflowing by other work parties. The men of Company A were moving small mountains of sand.
"Wish to hell we could have some civilians to help us, Top," said one of the men as sand silted around his hands and into the sandbag he held open for the First Sergeant.
The first sergeant glared. "The general said 'no,' Fontaine. So we dig alone. Leastwise, we do until the engineers get here."
"Didn't say we could do anything about it, Top. Just wishin' out loud."
"Just hold the sandbag, Fontaine."
"Yes, first sergeant," agreed Fontaine meekly as he stretched the mouth of the sandbag in his hand to a fillable size.
From off in the distance, Pendergast heard again the rumble of heavy trucks, heavily laden. "That's my cue," he announced, sticking the shovel blade down into the sand pile. "Take a break, Fontaine."
"Yes, Top."
Buckling on his equipment, Pendergast tucked his helmet under his left arm, sauntered over toward the approaching line of engineer vehicles and waited.
He didn't have long to wait. As the first truck slowed to a halt, a rather splendid looking captain of engineers emerged.
"First Sergeant Pendergast, sir. A Company, 144th Infantry."
The engineer returned Pendergast's salute, answering, "Captain Davis, 176th Engineers. Where can I find your CO, Top?"
"Captain James is in his CP with our battalion S-3, sir. The S-3 is Captain Williams."
"Thanks, Top. My first shirt should be here in a minute or two. You can show him where and how we can help you best."
* * *
Washington, DC
Although not ostensibly designed to look down upon the United States, a spy satellite, given the right orbit, was as useful for that in the United States as for anywhere else. Or as useless, some would say. Thus, the head of the National Security Agency could pass on to the Director of Homeland Security satellite photographs and the analyses that accompanied them. Thus could the DHS bring the same to the President.
"There's no doubt, Madam President. None at all. Texas is mobilizing her own military forces. Even expanding them, it seems."
Rottemeyer looked toward McCreavy. "What does that mean to us, Caroline?"
McCreavy consulted her notes before replying. "They have one more or less old-fashioned armored division. Five tank battalions. Four infantry. Four artillery. Three Engineer. The usual support."
Rottemeyer caught on the phrase, "Old-fashioned? That's g
ood for us isn't it?"
Shaking her head ruefully, McCreavy answered, "In this case, no, Willi, it isn't."
"I do not understand."
McCreavy sighed, then went on. "Well . . . let me put it this way. In our entire regular force here in the States, excluding the Marines, we have not a single tank. Nor do we have a single vehicle capable of taking on a tank in a heads-up fight. Not one. Those five tank battalions have more combat power than any one of our divisions. And they could chew even the Marines, who do have tanks, if not that many of them, to bits."
