PROJECT BlueBolt - BOOK II - THE GULAG JOURNAL: BOOK II - The Gulag Journal

by Marshall Huffman

  Tim was a smart guy with a good head on his shoulders and I could sense that he would do well in life. He had what many people lack, common sense.

  ***

  Day 88 Journal Entry

  The platform is almost done and we have all the lines and electrical hooked up for the mud pump. I helped Tim with the other wiring for the drill. He would show me how to make the connections and then let me do them. He came back and checked everything to make sure I had done it right. I only made one slight mistake so he was feeling pretty trusting by the end of the day.

  About the only thing missing in my conversations with him was his lack of information about what was going on in the lower 48 states. He wasn’t concerned about current events. He lived in his own world and just ignored the rest of it. For a guy so smart it seemed like an unusual anomaly in his character.

  By the end of the shift, we were ready to start erecting the derrick. Tim said we would be running lines and making connections on the rig itself. I just hope the wind isn’t blowing at 30 miles per hour while we are up there.

  ***

  Day 89 Journal Entry

  Well, this was an unusual day. Someone, possibly the owner of the NorthStar Drilling Company, came to the site today. He gathered all the company workers and had them meet in the mess hall.

  We were told to stay in our barracks until the meeting was over. They were in there for over two hours before he finally came out, climbed into his truck, and took off. The Company guys stayed in the mess hall for another forty-five minutes. Whatever it was about, they seemed pretty animated and upset.

  Obviously we were all speculating on what had transpired. One guy said they had all been fired. Another said the company probably went bankrupt. The theories flew in every direction with no one really knowing a darn thing.

  Finally, we were told to get back to the job of erecting the derrick. So much for them being fired or the company going under, I thought. I was anxious to talk to Tim but one of the other foremen grabbed me to start unloading pipe for drilling. It wasn’t until lunch time that I had a chance to finally corner him.

  I asked him what the big new was and he told me that things were taking a turn for the worse in the lower 48. When I pressed him, he just said that the President had suspended Congress and that the Bill of Rights had been stripped from the Constitution. I already knew most of that.

  Why did they hold such a big pow-wow about it? I mean after all, how did that affect them and what were they thinking about doing about it? When I asked him that, he was really evasive. The harder I pushed, the less talkative he was. I don’t know what this all means but the fact that people are starting to recognize that we are no longer living in a democracy is a good sign from my perspective. Maybe enough people would finally say enough is enough.

  After lunch I worked with Tim on the electrical but once he showed me what I had to do, he worked on one side of the deck and I finished the other. Tomorrow the derrick would start to go up and that meant we would be working to install the electrical for that as well.

  ***

  Day 90 Journal Entry

  I am still not feeling great. I’m better than I was thanks to Tim’s shot but my head still throbs and my ear feels like I need to run a bristle brush inside it. I try to keep my nose and ears covered at all times but that isn’t always possible.

  A freak accident caused the death of one of the prisoners. A chain snapped allowing a piece of steel to break free and slam into his chest, crushing his ribs and puncturing his heart. It happened so fast no one even had time to yell to get out of the way.

  There is so much risk. You just never really feel safe. It could have been any one of us. It just boiled down to luck. They started raising the derrick this morning and Tim and I started running the cable up the channel and strapping it into place. With each new section, we went higher and higher.

  It was bad enough on the ground but the wind seemed to pick up in intensity with each foot higher that we went. It took all day just to get the power cables to the top cap. That meant we would have to come back up and connect everything again tomorrow. Oh goody.

  ***

  Day 91 Journal Entry

  Okay, something big is definitely going on. The head honcho was back again. His truck had hardly stopped before he was calling all of his men to the mess hall. Once again we were told to stay in our barracks.

  I wanted to know what was going on so badly I even gave some thought to sneaking over and trying to listen through the door. Fortunately my common sense kicked in and I decided to just wait like everyone else.

  The previous meeting had lasted a couple of hours. This one took over three. When they came out, we watched as they started right to our barracks. Now what?

  When they came in, the owner NorthStar Drilling, Ron Glass, introduced himself. He told us that he had just been down to Washington State to arrange some details about the pipeline. He has family, his mom and dad, who live in a bedroom community of Tacoma, Washington. When he got there, he learned that his entire family had been arrested and charged with treason. The crime, it seems, was that he had been involved in a protest about the ISS removing the mayor and the chief of police.

  No one knows exactly where they were taken but speculation was running high that his family had been sent to an internment camp that had just opened on Stockton Island in Alaska. He was willing to release any of us if we would help him get his family out. Once they were free he would help us to get into Canada and then we could do whatever we wanted from that point.

  I was one of the first to step forward. I’m not a big brave guy but I knew I would never live long doing this kind of work and in this environment. Maybe I’m a just a lily-livered coward but I felt my chance of survival was better trying to help get his family back.

  In the end, every one of us decided we would do what we could. He asked a lot of questions, mostly about military service and could we kill someone if necessary. I told him I had served four years in the Army and yes, if push came to shove, I could certainly pull the trigger without hesitation.

  It was big talk and I wondered in the back of my mind if it was true. He told us all work would stop while he was gone and that he would be back with as many guns and as much ammunition as he could get his hands on. We were to rest and wait for him.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  - THE PENTAGON -

  The tension was evident to everyone in the room. Taylor Spears was sitting across from General Douglas. The other two present were Chief of White House Staff, Perry Mills, and Secretary of State, Elian Far. Douglas had called the meeting to make sure Spears was on the same page.

  “Tell me about the internet,” Douglas said.

  “The internet? What do you want to know? It’s a huge subject. Could you narrow what you are asking a bit?” Spears asked.

  “Alright. What about the subversive postings and websites. How are those being handled?”

  “Ah. We have several programs or diggers as we call them. They essentially search the web nonstop looking for key words. We have literally thousands and thousands of words we look for or combinations of words. Once the program finds one, it red flags it and we then analyze the actual content to see if it has any subversive connotation. If it does, the ISS tracks them down and arrests them. If we are unsure, we bring them in for further questioning.”

  “And how effective are these programs?”

  “I don’t know, somewhere around eighty percent. Maybe more, but there is no way of actually knowing. What we do know is if someone makes a remark about the government in a negative way, they are immediately arrested and hauled off to an internment camp.”

  “But new sites turn up every day, do they not?” Douglas asked.

  “Certainly. Also posts on YouTube and social media, but we constantly monitor them. If they come up, we block that site immediately and trace it back to the poster.”

  “What if the post is about a particular person?” he asked.

&nbs
p; Careful Taylor, he was thinking. Obviously the general is going someplace with this. He needed to head it off before he sprung his trap.

  “We have a list of government people that we look for as well. Of course we have to be informed that they want their name on the list. The last thing we want to do is to read personal information about someone in the administration. The former NSA may have done that but I feel that our staff and administration should be left in private.”

  “Ah, so if someone sent me a nasty post, all I would have to do is notify you that I wanted it traced or that I wanted you to monitor my private e-mails and such?”

  “Sure. We can do it on any of the social media. All it takes is your approval for us to monitor it.”

  “Humm. Alright. Then I guess I need to have you add my name to your watch list, especially the Pentagon e-mail address. Someone has been sending me some rather uncomplimentary e-mails. I would like to know who and to have them disposed of.”

  “Absolutely general. I’ll have the form brought over and you can check off whatever ones you want us to monitor. We will not monitor any that you do not want us to,” Taylor said.

  “Is the President monitored?”

  “Absolutely not. We informed her of the availability of the program but she opted to not have us listen into her conversations.”

  “Did she say why?”

  “No sir and I was not about to ask.”

  “Yes. Perhaps that was a wise decision.”

  “Do you want to share what was in the e-mail you received?” Taylor asked.

  “The general idea was that I would be one of the first ones executed once the uprising started. They indicated that my end was drawing near. They had some other rather colorful words for what would happen to me.”

  “When was this?”

  “Last week.”

  “Well I wish you had told me sooner. We could have traced it back to the server and eventually the poster. It is too late now. They will have shut that account down and moved on. If something like this happens again, call me immediately and I can get my people working on it right away.”

  “What are your people hearing about an uprising?”

  “There is always talk. We listen and try to trace it back to the person that started the discourse and then sweep in and arrest them. That usually takes care of the problem immediately.”

  “How often does that happen?” Douglas asked frowning.

  “A few hundred times a day. You have to keep in mind that we are monitoring all of the lower 48 states at the moment. We have an outpost in Alaska but there are not enough people there to warrant much of a presence. Hearing a few hundred people spout off isn’t really much of a threat in the grand scheme of things,” Tylor replied.

  “I want to be kept informed if you see a sudden increase in these incidents.”

  “Of course. The same thing goes for internet activity.”

  “Excellent. It seems I may have misjudged you, Director Spears. It looks like we may be able to work together quite effectively after all.”

  “Thank you. I’ll take that as a vote of confidence.”

  “Yes you may. Thank you for coming.”

  ***

  “Well?” Elian asked when Taylor left.

  “Smarter than I had given him credit for. He spotted my e-mail trap immediately and turned it around. Very clever.”

  “Do you really think you will be able to work with him? The President asked me to sit in and get an honest assessment.”

  “I guess the best way I can answer that is to say I found a new respect for Mr. Spears and want to make sure I do not underestimate him. Like I said, he is smarter than I thought.

  “Do you really believe he isn’t monitoring all of our private social media messages?” Elian asked.

  “I honestly have no way of knowing. Did you fill out the form he was talking about?”

  “I did,” Perry replied.

  “I did not. I don’t want NAS or ISS knowing my business,” Elian retorted.

  ***

  - ISS HEADQUARTERS –

  Taylor was feeling pretty good about the meeting. He had been able to see the trap Douglas was setting for him. He felt he had played it about as well as he could.

  Of course he was monitoring everyone’s personal messages. The President was no exception. The forms they had signed were just part of his dog and pony show. He had been listening in ever since he took over the ISS.

  He knew the general had lied about the e-mail message to his Pentagon account. He had never received such a message. The bastard was trying to trap him.

  What Taylor hadn’t told the general the truth about was the number of incidents concerning gatherings that were anti-government. They were not a few hundred a day but in the thousands.

  The organizers were well prepared. They would hold a rally against the President or ISS and the leaders went to great length to remain anonymous. They had only been successful in capturing a few of the real leaders. Most of the time they escaped and only a few of the older and slower protesters were captured.

  The increase in incidents was growing almost daily. People were realizing that freedom of speech was becoming a thing of the past. Just making a derogatory reference could land a person in an internment camp.

  The internment camps had now become common knowledge no matter how the media tried to put a spin on them. Telling people they could no longer gather in groups of fifty or more had caused a much bigger backlash than anticipated.

  Taylor had lied because he did not want to give the general a reason to start looking over his shoulder and trying to find a way to get rid of him. Instead, he just quietly began to cover it up. His reports were totally fabricated and since there was no media to report the truth, he could get away with it.

  The one thing he was glad about was that the President had quit asking him for reports and what he was doing about the rogue officers, as she liked to call them.

  Since all she had to rely on about the conditions around the country were his reports, he felt fairly secure in his position. Unless there was a massive uprising, and that seemed unlikely, he could get away with this indefinitely.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  - Barrows Point, Alaska –

  Day 96 Journal Entry

  For the past four days we have done nothing but wait. The good news is that we have been getting three meals a day and the quality of the food has improved a great deal. Obviously they want to keep us healthy. They have authorized Tim to do whatever he can to make us well. I was given a second shot to make sure that whatever I had was totally knocked out.

  It has definitely worked. I feel the best I have felt since landing in the government’s ‘guest’ camp.

  Ron Glass finally showed up late this afternoon. I could see why it took so long. His truck was almost dragging the ground and it was a three-quarter ton pickup. It was loaded with guns and ammunition. Some were pretty nice and others looked like they had been around a long time.

  He gave me a .45 1911 Government Issue semi-automatic and a 1903 Springfield 30-06 with a scope. He said the rifle was really from WWI but used in WWII as a sniper rifle.

  This was all suddenly coming home. We actually had guns and were about to take on a military facility like the one in New Mexico. I don’t know how many soldiers they had but surely there were a hundred or more. I was hoping that we would find a way to get the people out without having to resort to violence. Once the first shot was fired, I was pretty sure the government would come after us with a vengance.

  ***

  Day 97 Journal Entry

  We are headed to this place they call Stockton Island. Now that gives me pause to think. Stockton Island. I can envision us rowing a boat out to an island and taking on the ISS or whoever is stationed there. We sure aren’t going to jump out of a plane so what is the plan?

  I wish I had asked this a little earlier but the island part didn’t sink in until we were riding along in the trucks. When we sto
pped for our first bathroom break, I tried to find Ron but he had gone ahead to scout the place out and make some arrangements.

  Great. We have no idea what we are going to do or how we are going to go about doing it. I love a good plan. Not.

  ***

  Day 98 Journal Entry

  Another day of sitting on our duffs in the back of the truck. We would stop every four hours and everyone would pile out take care of business and walk around for a few minutes. Then it was back in the truck for another four hours. This went on day and night. A fuel truck traveled with us to service the semi’s so we never stopped for more than an hour at any one time. While they were filling the trucks, we ate and just shot the bull until they were ready to roll again.

  ***

  Day 99 Journal Entry

  What can I add? Same old crap today. The driver said if we keep making this kind of progress we will be there by late tomorrow. How would I know? Every time we get out it looks like the exact same place as the last time we stopped.

  ***

  Day 100 Journal Entry

  We are here at last. It is pitch black out but we are finally out of the trucks. We were taken to a large barracks and told to get some sleep. Get sleep? All we have done is nod off for the past three days.

  They did bring in hot food and that was a welcome change from the sandwiches we had been eating since we left Barrows Point. I broke down my .45 and inspected it. It seemed clean enough and well cared for. I loaded the magazine and inserted it in the handle. I did not, however, put one in the chamber. I checked out the 1903 and found the scope was a 6-24 X 50AOE. Like the 1911, someone had really taken good care of the rifle.

  I went to sleep wondering how all of this was going to play out.

  ***

  Day 101 Journal Entry

  Ron was waiting for us when we got up. He said that he had been to the island and that it was totally unprotected from the south approach. He had been as far as the internment camp and found that they didn’t even have barbed wire up, just a fence and some signs. He said he had found a path that would get us right to the edge of the camp and there were just two guard towers.