by Tom Kratman
"Very good."
The party moved further upward, to one of the two large rectangular projections jutting up from the roof of the building.
"Can't take you onto the roof, ma'am. Nor even you, General Schmidt."
"Booby trapped, Top?"
"To a fine art, sir."
"What are you going to do once they clear the traps? The roof here doesn't look like you can hold it by fire from the inside."
Pendergast shook his head. "No, sir. Too thick. If they want to pay the price to clear a section of the roof we can't do much to stop 'em. We do have a few small holes cut that the guys can donate grenades through. But any kind of bunker we put up there would need a manhole and that would just be a way for the other fellows to break into our defenses. We've also cut some narrow half-moons in the roof to push through some claymores taped to poles." Pendergast gestured first at one such half-moon cut through the ceiling; then at a stack of poles—to which had been attached the claymores—standing in one corner.
"And then, once they do break in, we fight 'em for every inch; counterattack where we're able. We've been practicing for that every moment we weren't busy digging in. But the captain could tell you more about that than I could."
Pendergast led the way downward towards the command post for the defense. Reaching it at length he knocked and announced, "Governor Seguin and General Schmidt, sir."
Williams called, "Attention."
Schmidt let the men stand that way for only the barest fraction of a moment before commanding, "Captain Williams, gentlemen. Be at ease. The governor is an informal lady."
At Schmidt's order Williams, Davis, and James visibly relaxed. A stiff-backed Fontaine, detailed to bring up some snacks from the WCF cafeteria, however, didn't.
Juanita noticed. "You too, young man. I'm just the governor. You're a lot more important. You're a citizen."
Fontaine glanced a query at Pendergast who nodded, Yes, you too, dummy.
"You can leave, Fontaine," added Pendergast.
"First Sergeant . . . Mike . . . I wonder if you wouldn't mind having this young man wait, either here or outside. I've seen nothing but senior people. I'd like to talk to him."
"You heard the governor, Fontaine. Wait outside."
"Yes, Top."
"And now, ma'am," began Williams, "let me tell you how we're going to hold this place. . . ."
An hour and a half later Schmidt thought, and not for the first time in his life, Briefings suck. Then he heard the engineer captain, Davis, say something that caught his attention. "Aces and eights? Dead man's hand? What do you mean, Captain?"
"Eleven tons of ANFO, General, down below. If they take this place, they're going to take a bunch of dust."
"What's he mean, Jack?"
Schmidt sighed. Juani was not going to like this. "In poker, 'Aces and Eights' are known as the 'dead man's hand,' Governor. And ANFO is Ammonium Nitrate–Fuel Oil explosive. He means that, as a last resort, they'll blow the place sky high."
The governor was horrified. "But what about the wounded?"
Davis explained. "Ma'am . . . after what we are going to do to them before they get even halfway through clearing us out? There aren't going to be any wounded; not of ours anyway. They'll kill everything. Anyone would."
"I see . . . well, we can't let that happen." She turned to Schmidt. "Jack, is there any way we can get these boys out after they've bought a little time for us?"
Schmidt and Williams exchanged knowing glances. In your dreams, Governor, in your dreams.
"Governor . . . Juani . . . it's possible I could do an end run around Third Corps when it rolls in, fight my way to this facility and extract the same way. Possible, but not likely."
Juani was adamant. "Whatever it takes, Jack. I will not leave these boys . . . men, rather, without some hope of rescue."
"You're the boss, Governor. I'll start planning it. Go on, Captain," ordered Schmidt. "Let's finish this up."
"Yes, sir. Well, the last thing I had to cover was auxiliary power. Seemed likely they'd cut off the electricity once they were ready, so we've set up three generators to take up the slack. It isn't enough for environmental control or anything but it should keep enough of the lights and the intercom working. Oh, and the security cameras . . ."
* * *
"Can you hold this place for us, Private Fontaine?" queried Juanita as she and Jack waited for Williams and Pendergast—involved briefly in a discussion with the other leaders—to join them and escort them out.
"We can surely try, ma'am. And we sure intend to try. No matter what."
Juanita thought about that "no matter what"—thought about "aces and eights," too—and felt her eyes begin to mist again. She averted her face while blinking a few times to clear them.
"Is there anything I can do?" Juani asked the young soldier.
Fontaine thought briefly. "I kinda hate to ask, ma'am . . . but there's one thing. I wonder . . . well, I'd appreciate it if someone could look after my momma." Fontaine gave a smile somewhat rueful. "And, you know? Old Iron Mike? The first sergeant? He's harder than woodpecker lips, no mistake. But he's a mighty good first sergeant. I wonder if, maybe . . . someone could make him a sergeant major before it's . . . you know . . . too late. I think it would mean a lot to him."
Schmidt smiled and reached into his pocket, extracting two small cellophane wrapped packets. "Go get 'Major' Williams and 'Sergeant Major' Pendergast, would you, son."
* * *
"Send the car away, Jack. We'll go back by helicopter."
"Are you sure, Juani?"
"I'm sure. If those men in there can do what they seem determined to do then I'll be damned if those people in Washington are going to frighten me out of the air. We'll take the helicopter."
"That's my girl, Juani. . . ."
* * *
Governor's Mansion, Austin, Texas
Elpidia had thought she was alone in the house. Normally—every day, of late—the governor had gone to her office, the father of the family to his, and even the youngest boy, Mario, to school long before Elpi even awakened.
The girl was surprised, therefore, to hear the sounds of sobbing, quiet but distinct, coming from the governor's home office.
Also quietly, Elpi walked to the door. Shyly she knocked.
"Who is it?" asked the governor in a quavering voice.
"Solo yo, Gubanadora . . . just me, Governor, Elpi. I heard crying. Are you okay?"
Juani hastily dried her eyes on her sleeve and answered, "I'm fine Elpi," in a voice that gave the lie to the claim.
Elpi walked in, invited or not. "What's wrong?" she asked.
At the query Juani burst into fresh tears. She half bent and wrapped her arms around herself to try to control the trembling. Rocking back and forth she moaned over and over, "They're all going to die . . . they're all going to die . . ."
Elpi was literate in English, but freshly and barely so. She could make out the headlines from the newspaper laying on Juani's desk. "The Eyes of Texas are Upon You." She read a few lines, painfully slowly. It seemed to her that the state's free press was being a little irresponsible in putting any blame on the governor for the state of affairs. She came to the line, " . . . and the men who are about to die in Fort Worth . . ."
"Who is going to die?" the young girl asked.
It came out almost as a shriek, "All those men in the currency facility are going to die and who knows how many others? And it's all my fault . . . mine, mine, MINE! Oh why, oh why couldn't I just leave it alone? Why did I have to start this whole thing?"
Elpi walked over to Juanita and put a warm hand to her quaking back. When this did no good the girl bent her head down, resting a cheek upon the quivering shoulder of the Governor of Texas and whispered, "You didn't start anything. Neither did your brother. This was started by the people who throw riot police at people who protest killing little babies. It was started by people who attack churches and burn children alive."
"You didn't st
art it Governor . . . but you have to end it. You have to see us through this."
Twisting around, Juanita pulled the girl into her shoulder and sobbed, "I know."
* * *
State Legislature, Austin, Texas
Behind Juani, standing at the podium, a map of Texas and its surrounding states shone against a screen. News cameras panned across her, the screen, and on to the raptly listening legislators. This broadcast was going out live to Texans, and via continuous streaming on the Internet to the rest of the United States. A Chinese company had rented Texas the use of a satellite to bring the word to the rest of the world.
"This is what we know," began Juanita. Instantly, at Schmidt's direction, several dozen symbols appeared on the map behind her.
"To our west, just across the border with New Mexico, the bulk of the 1st Marine Division and the Army's 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment stand poised to invade. To our north, in southern Oklahoma, is the Army's Third Corps. This force has in it the 1st Cavalry Division, the 1st Infantry Division, 4th Infantry Division, and about two thirds of the 101st Airborne Division, a helicopter heavy formation."
"East, in Oklahoma, is the 18th Airborne Corps. This group has been reinforced by, again, about two thirds of the Second Marine Division. The rest consists of two brigades each from the 3rd Infantry Division, the 82nd Airborne Division, and the 10th Mountain Division.
"Southwards, the Navy and a brigade of Marines are blocking our coast and poised to descend upon it. We have reports—reliable reports—that a portion of the 1st Marine Division has boarded ship to pass through the Panama Canal to join the fleet assembling in the Gulf."
At this last bit of unpleasant news the legislators, those at least siding with Juanita, gave an audible groan.
Not everyone was on her side of course. Some were ambivalent, others hostile. Many were simply frightened and this news—though not unexpected in broad terms—made them more so.
Juani looked out, smiling, at a known opponent, Imogene Cochran, seated about center in the room. Imogene—pinch faced and severe—was of the rather rare far left variety of Texas Democrat. She returned Juani's smile with a sneer.
"We are prepared to fight them," Juanita announced baldly, voice ringing loud and clear through the hall. "On the Gulf Coast beaches, in the cities, in the towns, in the field . . . we are prepared to . . . but surely we do not want to," this last was spoken in a stage whisper.
"We will hold off from fighting until the very last extremity.
"Something else we know: officials named by the White House have been integrated into the regular armed forces down to battalion level. These men . . . and a few women . . . are backed by federal police forces and appear to have the duty of insuring that the orders of the White House are enforced."
Juani gave a smile that was perhaps slightly out of place. "It seems that Washington does not trust its own army. Kind of makes you wonder whether, if Washington doesn't trust the armed forces, perhaps—just maybe—we can."
Most of the legislators joined Juani's smile at the jest. Imogene merely looked furious.
Juani took a deep breath, steeling herself. The next part was going to be difficult. She pushed a button on the podium. The symboled map disappeared leaving a blank screen in its wake.
"Did you ever notice how, when Somali kids are starving, the papers and television screens are full of pitiful pictures? Did you ever notice how, when Kurdish kids are driven from their homes you can hardly pick up a magazine without being bombarded with big, innocent eyes? A California girl gets kidnapped and murdered and the media pastes her picture across the nation.
"Why do you suppose we've never seen a single picture of any of the kids burned alive in Waco?" She tapped the button on the podium once again and the screen behind her lit with a portrait of a smiling little Mexican girl.
"That's Josefina Sanchez." Juani tapped the button again and the screen split. On the right side appeared the obscenely charred corpse of a very small person, curled into a fetal position and holding a smaller bit of once-human charcoal between arms and chest. The legislators groaned.
"That is also Josefina Sanchez. In her arms is a little baby . . . what is left of one . . . named Pedro."
A tap of the button and the picture zoomed in to focus on the little shriveled bundle that had been found wrapped in Josefina's arms. Another tap and it focused further onto Pedro's face, little carbonized teeth faintly visible inside a burned and distorted mouth, empty eye sockets staring from blackened face.
Again she tapped the button and a full color picture of Pedro at his first birthday party appeared on the right side of the screen. Thank God I didn't let Elpi come to this and told Mario not to let her near a television or computer, thought Juani, fighting down her own gorge.
Juani continued to tap, interspersing normal pictures with pictures of the recovered, charred bodies. At each she announced a name, "Maria Ramirez, aged nine . . . Pablo Trujillo, aged eleven . . . Peter Smith, aged eleven . . . Colleen Drysdale, aged ten . . . Katherine Collins, aged eleven . . . David Robles . . ." About halfway through there was the sound of someone wretching.
"You have no right," shouted Imogene. "You have no right to show us these things. It isn't decent."
Juanita scowled. "No right, Imogene? No one had a right to do to these kids what was done to them. And you don't have a right to bury your head in the sand and ignore what was done to them. Admit it, that's the real crime in your mind. Not the killings, but upsetting you." Bitch.
"Enough, anyway," Juani continued. "The rest of the pictures wouldn't show you all anything you don't know now.
"But you all needed to see why I decided to resist. It wasn't my brother and it wasn't even that . . . that . . . that bastard of a 'United States Commissioner for the State of Texas,' Forsythe, that Washington stuck me with. It wasn't the taxes and it wasn't the jobs and it wasn't even over the control they were taking in the schools.
"I just don't want to live, don't want any of our people to have to live, under a government that will do this; murder a bunch of kids then wrap itself in a shroud of sanctimonious hypocrisy and pretend nothing ever happened.
"One last thing before I go: we are about to be invaded. Washington will no doubt decide to call it something else . . . but an invasion is what it is. I am not going to ask every Texan to fight the invasion. In fact, except for those many thousands who have joined our National Guard and State Defense Force, I am going to ask the rest of the state not to fight.
"But I am going to ask, in fact I am going to beg of the people—here in Texas and elsewhere in the United States—do not fight . . . but do not cooperate. Block roads, interfere with supply columns, stop trains, swarm over airfields. In short, make this invasion impossible to supply and federal control impossible to maintain.
"If you will do this, I think we can win."
* * *
Matamoros, Mexico
Hanstadt never did quite buy in to the whole nonviolent civil disobedience idea. It just wasn't in his nature. He measured things materially; so many guns, so many tons of rations, so many artillery shells . . . so much X . . . so many Y. That was what made him a prize as Schmidt's G-4 and something of a cipher for the governor's other plans.
"How many shells did you say came with those things?" he asked, pointing a finger at a passing CONEX on its way to Camp Bullis. He had to shout to be heard over the roar of massed diesels.
"Carl" answered, "Seven hundred fifty rounds, mixed high explosive, illumination and smoke, with each 85mm gun. two-fifty to three-fifty with the others. Plus you're getting a fair number of pure ammunition loads."
"And you say these things are self-propelled?"
"The SD-44s, the 85mm jobs, are auxiliary-propelled. That is, they have an engine, a steering wheel, a driver's seat and a small gas tank. For the 122s and 152 you're going to have to rig up something on your own and use civilian trucks."
"And the manuals are inside?"
"Every CONEX comes
with a manual and firing table printed in Spanish. I figure you have enough Spanish speakers in Texas. Though, I've got to tell you, those manuals were translated from Chinese by people maybe none too good. You'll have some problems."
Hanstadt normally wouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth, but these guns were no gift. Texas had paid for them with the ships about to be seized while going through the Panama Canal. They had also forked over no small amount of cash for all the stock to Materiales de Seguridad, SA, the Mexican-incorporated, Panamanian-run arms company that had held these particular weapons.