“Sir, I don’t speak any Kazak…”
“Of course not.” Bullard cracked his knuckles and laughed. “Who does, except for Kazaks? But you speak some Russian, don’t you? Isn’t your father a first-generation Russian?”
“I speak Russian okay. Good enough to get laid. And I traveled over there a few times—that’s where I met my second wife.”
“Your file says you’re divorced.”
“She flew home to Mother Russia when our economy tanked. But yeah, I speak Russian pretty good.”
“Well, that’s great, because the Kazaks speak Russian too, mostly. You’ll be okay. Most of their enlisted men can’t speak a word of English, but their officers speak it well enough. But not well enough to go blabbing to reporters, if you catch my drift.”
“I do, sir.”
“Not that there are any reporters down there, but you know what I mean. It’s good for operational security that the Kazaks can’t speak English. They can’t get close to the locals. Rural pacification is kind of a dark and foggy subject, and that’s not by accident. That’s why we’re using foreign troops in West Tennessee. Once it’s done, they’ll be shipped out or sent home. We’re not keeping written records. It’s an ugly chapter, one that won’t go in the history books.” Bullard leaned forward, elbows on desk, and stared hard at his new liaison. “Do you understand me, Agent Zuberovsky?”
“Perfectly.”
Bullard sized up the new man. The “CAGE,” the Chicago Anti-Gun Enforcement unit, was famous for its brutal efficiency at gun confiscation. This had been a perfect introduction to the ATF and then to the DHS for the agent. Like Bullard, Zuberovsky was divorced, with a messy trail of domestic violence complaints against him that had been papered over as he had shifted assignments, duty stations and agencies. The fact that Zuberovsky spoke Russian and could ride horses made him a perfect fit for the liaison assignment.
“The Kazaks have a new commanding officer,” stated Bullard. “We’ve discussed the plans for their battalion’s redeployment to the West; this is going to take place next summer. In the meantime, I want you to ride herd on them in West Tennessee. They think their job there is over, but we want Kentucky and Tennessee fully pacified before springtime. They need to clean out the dead-enders and the holdouts. The Kazaks know how to do it—they just tend to be lazy between ops. They need somebody to keep them on task until they’re redeployed out West. I’ll be sending you specific mission taskings; it’ll be your job to motivate the Kazaks to do them. Tell them about all the land out in Montana we’re going to give them. How it’s just like back home in Kazakhstan, only better. Promise them the moon, I don’t care. But let me be frank: you’re going to get your hands dirty, Agent Zuberovsky. Does that bother you?”
The agent didn’t hesitate or blink. “No sir, not at all. We can’t rehabilitate the fanatics. I saw the TV reports about what they did to the Memphis refugees after the earthquake. That was genocide, mass murder. In my book, those Tennessee rednecks aren’t even human. We don’t need their kind in the new America.”
“That’s good, Zuberovsky, very good. Keep that attitude and it’ll see you through. That, and the double differential pay you’ll be making in the RPP. Oh, and one more thing: we’ve got some new gear we want you to test out. It’s a microwave device for crowd control. You’ll be briefed on it, but it seems simple enough. I want a full report on how it works in the field, under real-world conditions.”
“No problem.”
****
December 24. Christmas Eve. Outside the tent, light rain was falling as twilight faded to black. The interior of the tent was barely lit by a single 15-watt bulb, hanging from the center pole. The electricity would be cut off promptly at 10:00 p.m. Every day and every night was the same, the only slight variation in the routine coming in the handcart that brought the meals. Tonight’s supper had been a bowl of sweet potatoes and corn. Carson wondered if the menu would improve on Christmas Day. Maybe there would be meat.
It was two weeks since he had been brought to the quarantine and vaccination section of Camp Shelton, a week since he’d last been visited by Doctor Foley. A vehicle pulled up close to the tent, and its engine shut off with a clatter. Bad fuel. The entrance flap to his tent was pushed aside, and a black enlisted man in his mid-twenties entered, carrying a large cardboard box. Carson recognized him from the day he had been detained at the Alabama-Mississippi border. He was one of the soldiers who had collected him in the orange pickup and brought him to the QV camp. He was the medic. Later he had brought Carson a used disposable razor and a sliver of bath soap for shaving. His nametape and three chevrons identified him as Sergeant Amory.
“Tonight’s the big night, Mr. Amnesia. I’m going to be your driver. There’s a uniform for you in here, everything you need. I hope I guessed right on the boots.”
“You’re coming?” Carson was momentarily flustered.
“I’m driving you to Vicksburg and over the river. That’s the plan, right?”
Carson didn’t let on that he had not known the details until this moment. “What about Doctor—I mean Lieutenant Colonel Foley?”
“He’s coming too. He’s outside in the truck. Hurry up and get dressed. We’re getting out of here just as soon as you’re ready.”
Carson wasted no time changing. The box contained a pressed Army Camouflage Uniform, including a black beret, a patrol cap, and a wide-brimmed boonie hat. The boots fit well enough, about one size larger than his feet. He used his own brown leather belt. A thick field jacket in matching camouflage went over his uniform blouse. The boonie hat was rolled up and stuck into the left cargo pocket of his pants. The beret went on his head, flooding him with memories at its touch. The patrol cap was too small, and he left it in the box. The cloth nametape over his right pocket read BRICE; over the left was U.S. ARMY. The black eagle on his rank device and on his beret made him out to be a full colonel. The rank insignias were attached to both the blouse and field jacket with Velcro, and Carson smiled to think how simple this made it to impersonate an officer. His short-cropped gray hair matched the assumed rank, and as instructed, he had kept himself clean-shaven.
When he had dressed, he picked up his pack, which he had kept loaded in readiness for this moment. With his back turned to Sergeant Amory, he slipped his diminutive Kel-Tec .380 caliber pistol into the right front pocket of his camouflage pants. Since he had been brought to the quarantine camp, none of the guards or medical personnel had shown any interest in him, much less searched him or his few belongings. In the uniform of a colonel, he would be even less subject to search. The Kel-Tec was thinner than the width of a finger and invisible in a pocket.
Carson briefly flipped through a bundle of cards and folded papers in the box, after removing the rubber band from around them. There was a laminated Army ID, a folded yellow cardboard vaccination record, several black-and-white plastic ID badges with metallic shirt clips, and a few other cards. He slipped on his reading glasses and gave them a cursory examination. He was now Colonel Jonathan T. Brice. He put these ID cards into his angled left shirt pocket, along with his reading glasses. “Okay, Sergeant, let’s go.” He deliberately referred to the medic by his rank, in order to establish their officer-enlisted relationship. To noncoms, colonels were close to God. Even a fake colonel might give pause to a man used to saluting officers.
Outside the tent was a green crew-cab military pickup truck. A heavy black tarpaulin was stretched taut across the bed. Amory slid behind the wheel. Doctor Foley sat in the front passenger seat. Carson got into the back behind the driver and set his pack on the seat beside him. The interior light came on briefly when the doors were opened. Doctor Foley turned and glanced at Carson.
Carson spoke first. “Sergeant Amory said we’re crossing the river at Vicksburg. How far is Vicksburg from here?”
“About a hundred fifty miles, the way we’re going,” replied Foley.
“What’s in the back? Everything I asked for?”
“Ev
erything on your list. Right, Amory?”
“Yes sir,” answered the medic. “Everything.”
“I’ll have enough gas to make it all the way to Dallas?”
The doctor hesitated for a beat. “There are six jerry cans. Thirty gallons. It’s plenty.”
“I’d like to check it.”
“There’s no time for that—it’s all there. Go ahead, Amory, let’s get out of here.”
The medic started the engine and pulled ahead. The pickup’s headlights illuminated the rain. The dashboard lights barely revealed the doctor’s face. Carson could only faintly see the skin of Amory’s neck and his black beret. They stopped when they neared the fence surrounding the quarantine camp. A soldier wearing rain gear stepped out from a sheet metal guard shack and swung open the gate. They drove across the base by a route Carson didn’t recognize from his way in, but that had been two weeks ago, in the daytime, and he had only been able to see out the sides and back of his cage on that trip. Now he was completely lost, depending on these two practically unknown soldiers to get him off the base, across the state, and over the Mississippi River.
He asked, “Why Christmas Eve?” He thought he knew the answer, but he wanted to hear the doctor speak—primarily to gauge his sincerity.
“It’s after curfew,” answered the doctor. “Only military and police are allowed on the roads, so we won’t be stopped. On Christmas Eve everybody will be a little slack at the checkpoints, maybe even sneaking a few nips of liquor. For that matter, the checkpoints will be undermanned, or even just left open for the night. I have papers showing that we’re carrying critical vaccines in coolers. Nobody will hassle us, nobody ever checks vaccines. It’s perfect. It’s even raining. Nobody will be out.”
“But Texas isn’t part of the emergency zone, is it?”
“No, but it’s not hostile to us either. We have decent relations. Texas won’t be a problem, not with your IDs. You have everything you’ll need to be a colonel returning home to Texas on Christmas leave. It’s completely normal.”
Carson was suspicious. “So how are you getting back, if I’m driving all the way to Dallas in this truck?”
“No, we’re coming back in the truck. You’re going the rest of the way in a civilian car, once we’re over the river. That’s where we’re going now, to pick up the other car. Sergeant Amory will drive you to Louisiana in this truck, and I’ll follow in the car. Once we’re over the river we’ll switch vehicles, and you’ll go the rest of the way on your own.”
“What about the curfew, won’t that be risky with a civilian car?”
Doctor Foley answered after a hesitation. “Don’t worry. In Mississippi it’ll be okay, since we’re all in uniform and I’ll be following right behind this military truck. Amory knows what to say at the checkpoints, and he has the right papers. Once you’re in Louisiana, just wait until daylight when curfew’s lifted before you take off in the car. Louisiana is much more relaxed than Mississippi. Then it’s a straight shot across I-20. It won’t be a problem.”
“What about crossing into Texas? I didn’t see a driver’s license in the ID cards Sergeant Amory gave me.”
“You won’t need a civilian driver’s license: your military ID is all you’ll need. You’re an Army colonel traveling on official leave orders. You won’t get any trouble from police. One of the fringe benefits of martial law. Rank hath its privileges, Colonel Brice—especially when you are in uniform.”
Carson wondered about this, but he changed the subject and asked the doctor, “What’s your family think about this, your going out all night on Christmas Eve?”
“What family?”
They drove in silence after that, through pitch darkness, passing no other vehicles, finally leaving Camp Shelton and heading along a small state road under a canopy of rain-soaked forest.
“Where is the other car?” asked Carson, his hand resting on the pistol in his pocket.
“Just a little further up,” replied the doctor.
The truck stopped at an unlit, unmarked intersection, turned right, continued for another minute at slow speed, and then turned left down a muddy dirt track. Branches brushed both sides of the truck until they entered a clearing. A long mobile home stood on the opposite side of the small open space between the dripping pines. Carson slipped the tiny Kel-Tec pistol from his pocket and placed it on the seat alongside his right thigh. He could conceal it entirely beneath the palm of his hand. Their headlights shone across the boxy white trailer and a dark compact car parked in front.
Doctor Foley said, “Pull behind the Toyota and stop.” Amory did as he was told, driving slowly through high, unmowed grass. When the front of the truck was a few yards behind the car, he parked and turned off the headlights. The pickup was even with the small stoop and side door of the mobile home. A dim porch light illuminated the trailer and the vehicles.
“This is where I’m getting out,” said Doctor Foley. “I’ll follow right behind you in the car. Sergeant Amory knows the way to Vicksburg.” He opened his door, turning on the overhead interior light, and stepped out into the drizzle—then unexpectedly jerked open the back passenger door of the truck. “You’re getting out too, John Doe.” The doctor held a full-sized pistol, a military-issue Beretta M-9.
“Oh, you…bastard,” Carson swore. He turned sideways facing Foley, his left hand on the back of the front seat, his right hand over his own pistol. “We shook on it. I would have kept my end of the deal.”
The doctor shrugged. “Well, Mr. Doe, I was willing to go with the plan, but I was outranked at the last minute. That’s how it goes.” The door of the trailer opened, and two other men walked down the steps and stood on either side of Doctor Foley. The mist-shrouded porch light above the trailer’s door backlit the three. The men wore camouflage military rain parkas, with their hoods pulled up over their heads, hiding their faces. “Get out, asshole,” barked the taller of the two, standing on the left. He held a pistol leveled by his side. “If you really do have coffee and solar panels hidden somewhere, we’re going to find out tonight. Right here, right now. And if you don’t,” he snickered, “well, then you won’t have to worry about what Santa Claus is bringing you.”
Carson could think of nothing to say. He had been double-crossed. Whether he talked or not, he’d be done for once he was put under interrogation. If he revealed the location of his hidden catamaran, they’d execute him, probably after forcing him to lead them to the boat. If he didn’t talk, they’d wind up torturing him to death. Either way, it was game over if he complied with their demands.
“Come on, get out,” said the doctor, waving the pistol. Carson put his right hand on the seat beside him, as if to help push himself toward the open passenger-side door. The three men stood shoulder to shoulder just outside the cab, the doctor in the middle, his Beretta’s muzzle only a yard from Carson’s chest.
“Okay guys, you win—no need to get rough.” He began to slide over, then swung his left arm across to deflect the doctor’s barrel while at the same time pulling up his little .380. He extended the gun like a striking snake and put one shot into Doctor Foley’s forehead almost at contact distance. He moved the pistol’s aim a foot to the right and fired again, into the center of a shadowy hooded face. He brought the pistol back to the left and fired just as the taller man dropped beneath his line of vision.
Frozen in the front seat with his hands still clutching the steering wheel, Sergeant Amory yelled out, “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!”
Carson grabbed the handle of the door behind him and pushed it open while covering the open passenger-side door with his pocket pistol. He slid out and fell back onto the wet grass just as the third man reappeared across from him. The man’s Army Beretta exploded with a booming flash that flared across the interior of the pickup. The shot passed through both open doors as Carson hit the ground and rolled onto his side. The big military pickup had high ground clearance, and Carson could make out a pair of legs on the other side, backlit by the glow o
f the trailer’s porch lamp. More bullets impacted the inside of the partially open door just above him.
Lying on his side, Carson took a two-handed grip, the gun horizontal. He aimed as well as he could by feel and instinct, his little pistol’s sights invisible. He fired twice at the nearest shin, and heard the tall man cry in pain. The man dropped to the ground clutching his leg, and Carson fired two more times at what he could see of his enemy’s torso, and on his next trigger pull he heard only a click. The little Kel-Tec was finished, empty. Without pausing, he bounded up, threw himself into the backseat of the truck, and grabbed the doctor’s Beretta from the floor, where it had fallen. He aimed it toward the back of Amory’s head and began to squeeze the trigger. Fear and excitement flowed like lightning through his veins—he was running on killer instinct, going for a clean sweep, eliminating every threat one after the other.
“I didn’t know sir! I swear I didn’t know!” The medic’s hands were now straight up, palms pressed against the roof of the cab. Slight movement in Carson’s peripheral vision alerted him, and he whipped the Beretta back to the right. The tall man, the one he’d shot beneath the truck, groaned and pulled himself up to a sitting position. His rain parka’s hood was pushed back, revealing a bald head glistening wet with rain. He looked inside the cab at Carson, and with an unsteady arm, he lifted his pistol above the seat. Carson was faster. He rapid-fired the Beretta, hitting the wounded man two times in the middle of his face. The bald man fell backward against the wooden steps of the trailer and didn’t move again.
Foreign Enemies and Traitors Page 12
