The Brigade

by H. A. Covington

  “With alcohol and with a Scotch pad, clean as a whistle,” said Lockhart.

  “Good. Don’t touch them again without gloves. We’re going to be leaving them behind and I don’t want them to find a single fingerprint. I hope you’re as good with a lockpick as you say you are.”

  “When no one will hire you, you gotta make a living somehow,” said Lockhart with a shrug. “I never starved yet.”

  “We have to hope the roof door isn’t alarmed,” said Hatfield. “I haven’t been able to actually get up there and take a look. It should be okay as a firing position, but if it isn’t we’ll have to go to Plan B.”

  “Which is?” asked Charlie.

  “If for any reason we can’t get up onto the apartment house roof, or the roof isn’t suitable, we’ll have to break into one of the third floor apartments on the north side of the building, with a view over the river, and fire from one of the windows,” said Hatfield. “That may involve hostage taking and restraint, if anybody’s home. I’ll be carrying a bag that will contain duct tape and some of those plastic ties we used to truss up Iraqis all the time, and also this little gift from Len.” Hatfield took out a Ruger .22 automatic with the front sight filed off and the muzzle threaded for about an inch and a half down the barrel, and a long tube made of two concentric lengths of iron plumber’s piping, the inner tube drilled full of neat holes and the space between the two cylinders filled with shredded Brillo pads. It was a silencer. “I hope we don’t have to use any of these things. I’d especially hate to have to shoot some poor sod who simply doesn’t know when to sit down and shut up. I really do want us to kick off the revolution here on the North Shore with no dead white civilians.”

  “All of this assumes the FBI will even show up at 39th Street,” said Washburn. “Suppose they don’t?”

  “Once we know they’re in town, if they haven’t showed at last night’s crime scene after a reasonable time, we’re going to have to clock them, improvise and take them on the wing somewhere,” said Hatfield. “That’s why I want you guys in two other cars.”

  “We have last night’s transport and I have that old blue pickup of Jules Corman’s, with bogus plates,” said Len.

  “Okay, Len, you and Tony take the truck,” ordered Zack. “You need to roll over to Warrenton in case they head for the Coast Guard air station to use the federal computer system or secure communications or to put up in the guest quarters for the night. Brigade tells us they’ve quit overnighting in motels completely, and they always stay on military installations or in some cases in special safe condos the feds are setting up for such purposes. See if you can find some excuse to hang around in the Walgreen’s parking lot on 101, just off the Youngs Bay Bridge. If they’re headed for the base they’ll have to pass right by you and you can pick them up. Charlie, you and Lee need to float in the area of the sheriff’s office because that’s where we hope they’ll show first. If you can spot them, fine, let me know. Otherwise wait until I contact you. We’re all using the same code, but Christina will call me and me only; she doesn’t even know you guys are out and about. I will pass on whatever she says to both your cars. The main info we’re hoping to get is a head count and any description she can give us, plus what they’re driving.

  “Now, on that subject, the brigade adjutant was able to give me some interesting info when I went up to Portland Sunday,” continued Hatfield. “Apparently when 10/22 happened, some kind of contingency plan kicked in, and the FBI’s first concern was for their own safety, which is typical of them. They have trotted out a whole fleet of specially armored vehicles for the use of their agents, not all one make. Our targets could be driving anything from a Lexus to an SUV to a low-end Ford or Chevy, but appearances will be deceiving. These fed rides will all have normal Oregon plates, not government tags. The idea behind all the diversity is for them to be able to blend in to traffic and not be spotted as fed but they made one dumb-ass mistake which kind of defeats that whole purpose. The windows on these vehicles are all tinted so we can’t see inside, which is against the law. You can assume that any motor vehicle you see with fully tinted window is a federal car. Don’t ask me why they missed something so obvious.”

  “Because they’re stupid,” said Ekstrom.

  “Bingo, and that’s encouraging,” said Hatfield with a smile. “Any agency dumb enough to pull a boner like that isn’t smart enough to catch us, eh, guys? Now, on the armor. We haven’t been able to get a look up close at one of these things yet, but it’s supposed to be state-of-the-art armored chassis, a combination of steel and aluminum alloy encased in a molded sheath of some kind of heavy plastic based on nylon so it’s not as heavy as pure steel. The windows and windshield are top-of-the-line bulletproof glass, which isn’t really glass. It’s what they call a polycarbonate compound, and don’t ask me what that is, but whatever this stuff is, it’s stopped whatever we’ve thrown at it thus far, and not just in Oregon. The gas tank is self-sealing and can allegedly stand a tracer hit. The tires are some kind of super-duper steel belted radial that’s supposed to be proof against caltrops and land mines and whatnot, and the underside of the vehicle is composed not of steel but these nylon-sheathed plates, so they’re not magnetic. Reinforced suspension to carry the extra weight, self-contained air-conditioning with special filters that keep out outside air and any tear gas or other fumes, you get the idea. These fed vehicles aren’t tanks. They can be taken out by a roadside IED just like our Humvees were in Iraq, and I’d be interested to see what an RPG could do against one, but the main thing is that when they’re in the vehicle, the FBI agents will be likely shielded from a single rifle bullet.”

  “I’ve got a full magazine of standard USGI tungsten armor-piercing .308, if that helps,” said Lockhart.

  “It might,” said Hatfield. “A lot of this so-called bullet-proof glass is quirky, and if you hit it at the right angle or velocity it breaches, as we found out on numerous occasions in Baghdad. There’s no such thing as being completely bullet-proof. But that’s not a chance we can take. We have to catch them out of their car. In certain extreme cases, we might be able to force them out. Len?”

  Ekstrom pulled a plastic sports bag over to his seat and took out two dark, cylindrical objects. “These are crude and not overly powerful, but they’ll make a bang. I decided against using PVC after all, because we may need a shrapnel effect, so they’re iron pipe, capped at one end, each bomb containing three sticks of common or garden variety dynamite, the other end capped with a nipple as you see here, and that’s the fuse dangling out of it. Both fuses should give you between six and seven seconds before detonation.”

  Hatfield nodded. “My idea is that if we get into a situation where we’re in place and ready to fire, and their vehicle is stationary, we roll one of these under the car or van or whatever. It may not be able to pierce their blast-proofing, but it should knock them around and disorient them, set them on fire or convince them the car is about to blow, and scare them enough to make them abandon ship. Charlie, you guys carry one of these and Len, you and Tony take the other. Now, weapons for this operation, again bearing in mind that we will be facing armed opponents who will return fire if we give them the chance. Every man needs a handgun, of course, not an e-piece, a 9-mm or heavier that you can use in a firefight if it comes to that. One man in each car should carry a shotgun. Len has brought two of those 10-gauges from Fields’s stash and .00 buck and slugs for both. In addition, the second man in each car will carry an automatic weapon.”

  “I call dibs on the Heckler & Koch,” said Len. “Charlie, I brought you the Uzi, since you did so well with it during our session at the quarry. Here are the mags for it.”

  “And me?” asked Zack with a smile.

  “You get a real blast from the past out of Bert Fields’s closet,” said Len with a smile, pulling out a small and sharp-looking weapon. “The old M-3 grease gun. I chose that one because we have more .45 ammo than we can shake a stick at. You seemed to like it at our firing sessions,
plus you need something small enough to put in that box you’re supposed to be delivering at the condos.”

  Hatfield nodded. “Good thinking. Okay, Charlie and Lee, if and when Christina or you can spot these feebs and you can make one car only, you need to follow them wherever they’re going, at a respectful distance, and let me and Cat know by TM which way they’re headed. Got it? Just one car. If there’s a dozen of them and they’re driving in a convoy, we’re going to have to pull back and circle them for a bit and see if we can cull one or two of them. I don’t want to take on a whole enemy task force; we need to make like the Swamp Fox, fight and run away, and live to fight another day. If they come out onto the 39th Street pier, Cat and I should be in position and we’ll take them there. Charlie, if they do turn in, I want you to keep on going about a mile along Leif Erickson and turn left onto Tongue Point Road, like you’re going down to Job Corps or those container docks down there at the bottom of the hill. Wait there at the turnoff for us to give you the signal and then slowly move back down into town. You should meet us going out halfway, in which case turn and follow us and be prepared to take on and take out any pursuit, maybe with that firecracker Len just gave you. If all goes well we turn off on John Day Road and take the back way into Knappa.”

  “That’s a big ten-four, Thug Buddy,” said Charlie.

  “Now, that’s if it goes down at the pier,” continued Hatfield “If not, if the FBI head out over the Youngs Bay Bridge to Warrenton, you tell me and I’ll pass it on to Len and Tony who should be sucking up an espresso or whatever around the Walgreens. Cat and I will abandon our position and come to you. They don’t have any Bremer walls up yet down there, just a new chain-link fence which can be seen through, and we’ll cruise around the station and see if we can get a shot, which Cat will take from the roof of the Yukon if one offers. That’s where we start ad-libbing, and it will be tricky.”

  “What if they go to some weird off-the-wall place like up to the Goldmans’ house, or go for lunch at Chez Cherie or something?” asked Charlie.

  “Risk a clear call to me. You can be the Reverend Mister Green and I’ll be Deacon White, and you can be calling on the Lord’s business. Make up some gibberish, but name the place where they’ve stopped. Cat and I will go there and try to spot them, and Cat can get up on the roof of our vehicle and take them through the restaurant window or whatever offers,” said Hatfield. “Guys, our little lady downtown says they’re coming soon. We need to go ahead and get this done. I don’t want to be following these mooks all over town all day. The longer an operation like this drags out, the more chance something can go wrong. One last little reminder, gentlemen,” Hatfield went on in a grim voice. “These are bad people and they’ve done very bad things. I for one think they still owe us for Sam and Vicky Weaver. There are times when vengeance is thoroughly justified, and this is one of them. But there’s more to it than that, much more. We’re not just sending a message to the FBI today, we’re sending our message to Joe Six-Pack. He has to understand that these people no longer rule the roost in the Northwest, that when he sees something he shouldn’t or he has some kind of problem with the NVA, the last damned thing on earth he wants to do is call the police or the FBI, because they can’t even protect themselves, much less him and his family. This is about destroying the occupation’s credible monopoly of armed force and convincing Joe and Jane Six-Pack that whatever their options may be, picking up that telephone isn’t one of them.” The cell phone beeped. “I, on the other hand, need to pick up this phone.” He did so and saw LUNCH DATE CONFIRMED IF U WILLING.

  “The FBI has arrived at the sheriff’s office. Damn, they’re early!” said Hatfield. He texted back, HOW HUNGRY ARE U?

  After a minute came the reply, PIZZA FOR TWO SHOULD DO.

  TIRED OF PIZZA. SOMETHING ELSE PLS responded Zack.

  HOT DOG FOR U, CHINESE FOR ME came the reply.

  WHAT TO DRINK? asked Zack.

  GREEN BEER, SNT PADDYS DAY EARLY, appeared the words on the little screen.

  GOT IT, LET ME KNOW WHEN replied Zack, and closed the phone. “Jeez,” he said softly, shaking his head. “Luck is with us. This couldn’t be better. Only two FBI agents, one white male and one Asian female, driving a green SUV. Let’s roll, boys!”

  * * *

  FBI Special Agent Rabang Miller practically pranced into the day room of the Clatsop County sheriff’s office. In ten years with the Bureau she had mastered what she saw as the necessary combination of brisk efficiency, no-nonsense assertiveness and a touch of arrogance in order to show a wide assortment of local yokel cops what was what, that the real players were now on the scene and they’d better shape up their sorry slack donut-eating asses. She had grown up around the U.S. military and so had absorbed a lot of the jargon and Mickey Mouse attitude, which stood her in good stead in her job by never failing to impress her superiors. The opinions of lesser forms of life such as local police of any race didn’t matter.

  She was a short, orange-ish woman with long black hair in a severe bun, dressed in a dark green pants suit with matching jacket to cover the 9-mm sidearm in a clip holster by her side, a Glock with a specially modified grip to fit the generally smaller hands of female agents. Rabang Miller was Filipino, the child of a Subic Bay bargirl and prostitute. Her father was an unknown American serviceman of undetermined identity or racial ancestry, but judging from her appearance, most likely a Hispanic of some kind. After entering her mother’s trade at 14, she had eventually achieved the ultimate life coup that all Filipino bargirls dreamed of. She had fucked and sucked a dumb-ass alcoholic redneck Army sergeant from North Carolina into marrying her and bringing her to the Great Golden Paradise of the U.S.A.

  Rabang hadn’t waited the required two years for her green card; once she was past the airport, she had lost time to catch up on. Within three months after her arrival at Fort Bragg married quarters she paid a local Filipino dishwasher 50 dollars to take her out back of his restaurant and beat the living crap out of her, whereupon she went running to the local cops and thence to the base Provost Marshal on base, weeping and bruised and bleeding, with a terrible tale of drunken sexual and physical spousal abuse by her brutal husband. Under a special provision of U.S. immigration law, well known to every whore in the Philippines but somehow unknown to American GIs thinking with their gonads instead of their brains, Rabang had gotten her green card right away and Sergeant Miller had gotten five years in Leavenworth to try and sober up and figure out what the hell had happened to his life. From then on it was up, up, up all the way for this strong and valiant womyn of color.

  Rabang proceeded to ride every available affirmative action program out of Bragg, into Duke University and an eventual law degree, and then into the United States Attorney’s office, whence she slid into the Bureau as a trade-off for not bringing formal charges of sexual harassment against the federal judge who was her boss. She kept Miller’s name because all of her original immigration documents were in that name, and she didn’t want to provoke any official examination of them through a legal change that might reveal certain discrepancies such as her age and the fact that her marriage to the sergeant was technically statutory rape. She was now married to another judge in Portland, with a twenty-room Colonial mansion in a wealthy gated suburb, a 13 year-old mulatto son who was already on the crack pipe, and her eye on bureau chief if she could find some way to finesse it. She was already throwing the present SAIC two-hour Subic Bay Specials in an assortment of motels around town, looking for his weaknesses, anything she could use to bring him down, but a good case clearance or two on her record certainly wouldn’t hurt. Cracking the Goldman murders and reeling in a gang of white racist domestic terrorists would be just the ticket.

  Agent Miller’s partner was Special Agent Brian Pangborn. Pangborn was the kind of agent who would have gone far under the old régime of J. Edgar Hoover. He was tall and lean, with sandy hair and blue eyes, sharp from his freshly pressed suit and his spit-shined shoes up to his buzz cut, an
All-Conference quarterback in high school and later on a star for Texas A&M, a law degree he’d actually earned through study and hard work. He was married to a nice Barbie Doll wife with two kids in a suburban split-level ranch. Although he wasn’t one of the Mormons Hoover had favored above all, he didn’t drink and he didn’t smoke, and he was a regular churchgoer and active member of Promise Keepers and the 700 Club.

  Pangborn was Rabang Miller’s third partner in the two years since she had come to the Portland office. Her previous two had asked to be re-assigned, and he was about ready to do the same. Pangborn had come to admit to himself that he loathed the officious little Asian woman; being in her presence was like continually hearing nails drawn across a chalkboard. Pangborn had one serious drawback as an FBI agent—he suffered from occasional spurts of independent thought and initiative. Combined with his race and gender, Pangborn knew these character flaws were enough to blight him forever on the Bureau’s career track. He’d already made his decision to put in his papers after twenty years, and try for federal or corporate security, hopefully with NASA or one of the big oil companies back in Houston.

  Rabang Miller stomped up to the nearest deputy behind a desk. “Where’s the sheriff?” she demanded. She whipped out her badge and ID with a practiced flourish. “Miller and Pangborn, FBI.” She never identified herself to anyone without flashing the badge, and she always somehow gave everyone the impression that she expected her own theme music to well up in the background.

  The deputy was remarkably unimpressed. “I’ll see if he’s in.” He picked up the phone. “Ted, those people from the FBI are here.”