by Robert Boren
Mary and Kurt walked up. They had several bags in their hands.
“Found chips, I see,” Frank said.
“Yep, same kind, same location,” she said, handing the bags to Frank. “We figured you might need some to take apart, so we yanked three of them out.”
“We have the men who were supposed to be in that chopper coming over. The condition we put on it is that you check them for implants.”
“They survived that crash?” Kurt asked.
“They bailed out. Left the chopper on autopilot. This was all a ruse to help the General get away.”
“Clever,” Mary said. “Yes, I can check them. These are easy to see. You think three is enough for testing with?”
“Should be,” Frank said. “I suppose you could yank the one out of the Islamist in the smokehouse.”
“Alright,” she said.
“By the way, did it look like that Islamist was dead before the grenade went off?”
“No,” Mary said. “They both still had their zip ties on.”
“Lying cretin,” the Sheriff said, laughing.
“Any reason not to burn the bodies out there?” Kurt asked.
“Not that I can see,” Frank said.
“Great, I’ll tell the boys to go ahead. They have them all uncovered already.” He turned and walked to the meadow as Mary walked back over to the smokehouse.
Jerry came back over. “The men agreed to the chip check….they’ll be here in about two hours,” he said.
“Why so long?” Charlie asked.
“The crash was several miles away, and it’s not an easy walk,” Jerry said.
“Oh,” he replied. “Didn’t think about that.”
“I’ll go get the equipment, Frank,” Jerry said. “I’m going to borrow Gabe’s wagon, though. It’s a lot to carry.” He headed off towards the barn.
“We can work on it in your rig if it’s easier,” Frank said.
“No, we don’t have internet out there, but we do have it in the clubhouse,” Jerry said as he was walking away.
“Good point,” Frank said. “Thanks.”
“No problem.”
“Hey, Jeb,” Frank yelled.
“Yeah.”
“There are going to be several privates approaching the park in a couple of hours. Don’t shoot them.”
“Who are they?”
“The men who were supposed to be in that chopper.”
“You know, I thought I saw somebody coming out of that chopper, but it was so low to the trees at that point that I couldn’t get a good look. This was all a setup, wasn’t it?”
“Yep,” Frank shouted.
“Good,” Jeb said. “I was thinking the General was a jerk, sending those boys up. Guess not.”
“Keep your eyes open,” Frank said. “We’re going back inside.”
“Will do.”
They went back into the clubhouse.
“So, those chips?” Rosie asked.
“Yep, these are them,” Frank said.
“Look like capsules,” she said.
“Yes, they do,” Jane said. “Looks like you can pull them apart like a capsule too.”
“Maybe,” Frank said. “I’d be surprised if they aren’t sealed with something, though. It doesn’t look like any moisture is in them. Hard to tell until we get them cleaned up, though.”
“Well I’ll be damned,” the Sheriff said, getting a close look into the bags.
Frank pulled out a pen and wrote ‘Simon’ on the first bag. Then he wrote Grave 1, Grave 2, and Grave 3 on the others. Mary walked back in about that time with the one from the Islamist in the smokehouse. She handed it to Frank, and he wrote ‘smokehouse’ on that bag.
“We need to guard these with our lives,” Frank said. “If we can figure out how to use them, the enemy will be done.”
“Pew, what that smell?” Rosie asked.
“They must have the fire going,” Charlie said. “Bodies.”
“Remind me of home,” Rosie said, shaking her head. “Bad.”
Kurt walked into the clubhouse with Gabe.
“How big are those things?” Gabe asked, walking up.
“Not huge, but we’d like to be able to leave them in the bags,” Frank said.
“Alright, I’ll go get to work on the lead box,” he said. “It won’t take long.”
“Thanks, Gabe,” Frank said.
“You alright, honey?” Kurt asked as he walked up to Mary. “That was grisly stuff.”
“Like I said, I’ve seen worse,” she said, putting her arm around his waist.
Jerry came in through the door with Jasmine. “Can somebody give me a hand with this stuff?”
“Yeah,” the Sheriff said. He walked over to the door with Charlie. Frank followed.
The wagon was in front of the steps. The men gathered around it and picked it up gently, taking it up the stairs. They set it down on the veranda, and then Jerry pulled it through the door and into the clubhouse.
“Let’s put the stuff over on that table by the PC,” Frank said. “There’s some power outlets close by.”
Jerry nodded and pulled the wagon over to that side of the room. Jasmine followed.
“Shoot, before I dive into this, maybe we ought to change out the wire for those security cameras,” Frank said. “Forgot about that.”
“I’ll go to the workshop where Gabe is and get the wire,” Jerry said. “I saw a couple of spools over there.”
“Good,” Frank said. “The ladder is still in the back of the building. I’ll move it over and get a closer look.”
“I’ll go to,” Jane said. They went out to the veranda and then back to the corner of the building where the cables came out.
“Gives me the creeps being back here,” Jane said.
“Yeah, I keep expecting the cretins to walk up to us with guns,” Frank said. He walked over to the far side of the building and picked up the ladder. It was a heavy old wood model, well used. He had to be careful to avoid getting a splinter. He put it against the wall under the wires and climbed up.
“How does it look?” Jane asked.
“I’ll have to replace about a foot of wire,” Frank said.
“You need to turn off the power?”
“The system is shut down, so they aren’t hot,” Frank said. “I hope the wires are different colors, though.”
“Here comes Kurt with the wire,” she said.
“Could you do me a huge favor?” Frank asked.
“Sure, what?” she asked.
“Go out to the coach and get my grey plastic toolkit. It’s in the rear storage compartment. I’ve got wire strippers and crimpers and some crimp connectors out there.”
“Sure, be right back, honey,” Jane said, as she walked away.
“This enough wire?” Kurt asked, putting the spool down. “The spool is only about half full, but Gabe’s got another full one in the shop.”
“I only need about a foot for this section,” Frank said, climbing off of the ladder. “Don’t know what we’re going to find in the trees over by the creek, though.”
Jane was back with the toolkit.
“Thanks, honey,” Frank said as he opened it. He took out the wire cutters, and climbed up the ladder to cut out the bad wires. He climbed back down in a second with the bad section.
“Damn, those little buggers went to town on this, didn’t they,” Kurt said, chuckling.
“Yep, they just love plastic. Look, red and blue wires. Perfect.”
“Looks like that wire came off of this spool,” Kurt said, holding out the end with the same colored insulation.
“Pull me out about two feed of that,” Frank said. “Maybe with a little more slack we can staple this onto the wall, so it’s not hanging loose. The critters tend to leave wires alone if they’re tied down against a building.”
Kurt rolled off about two feet and held it for Frank. He cut the cable with his wire cutters, and then stripped back enough insulation on both sides to get to the wires.
/> “This will do nicely,” he said, stripping the wires on both ends. Then he grabbed crimp connectors and put one on each of the four ends, crimping them on hard.
“That going to be waterproof?” Jane asked.
“No, I’ll have to wrap it with some of that black electrical tape when we’ve got it crimped together,” Frank said, climbing back up the ladder with the section and his crimping tool. He assembled and crimped the new section in place. “Hand me that roll of black tape, sweetie.”
Jane handed it up, and he wrapped the connections.
“Okay, that’s it. Let’s go fire this sucker up and see if it’s working.”
Frank came off the ladder and put his tools back in the toolbox. They walked back into the clubhouse, and Frank went over to the cabinet. He switched on the power bar on the floor, and then switched on the Driver/DVR unit and the monitor. The screen came on after a few seconds, and was showing the self-check.
“Well, it found camera one,” Frank said, looking at the screen. Each camera followed, and all sixteen of them showed good. Then the view on the screen changed to a multi-section view – the first four cameras, then the next four, then the third four, then the fourth, and back again. Frank pushed the menu button on the front of the DVR control unit, and navigated to the recording menu. He set it to record from all sixteen cameras, and set the over-write for the minimum timespan…one day.
“Why not set it for a week?” Kurt asked.
“Quality will be too lousy,” Frank said.
Can you rig this up for iPads like you did at Hilda’s park?”
“No, we don’t have enough internet bandwidth here,” Frank said. “Some of these camera lenses are filthy. We’ll get better quality if we can clean them. Look how much better the interior ones look.”
“I can take my crew out there to do that later,” Charlie said.
Jeb walked in the door. “Sorry, have to use the restroom and get some coffee,” he said, “and besides, I’m pissed. You guys didn’t invite me to make S’mores. We had a nice fire going out there.”
“You really are one sick bastard, Jeb,” Charlie said, laughing. Hilda looked at the two of them laughing and just shook her head. Jane and Rosie joined them in the laughter.
The sound of the backhoe was approaching, as Jackson drove it back to the barn. Earl and Kurt came walking into the clubhouse.
“Well, that was gross,” Earl said. “Reminded me of when somebody pees in the campfire.”
“We tossed Simon Orr and pajama boy in there when the fire was still going,” Jackson said. “They didn’t have their chips anymore, but we didn’t want them stinking up the joint.”
“Oh, wow, you guys got the camera system working,” Earl said, walking over towards the cabinet. “That was quick.”
“It was easy,” Frank said. “Just had to replace a couple of feet of wire. Varmints chewed it. That reminds me, we need to staple that down to the wall.”
“And we need to clean camera lenses too,” Charlie said. “You guys up for that in a few minutes?”
“Sure,” Jackson said. Earl nodded in agreement.
Gabe walked in the door, carrying a lead box. It was about the size of a large cigar box, with a lid that fit on top tightly. He put a screw into the top for a handle.
“This good enough?” he asked.
“Yeah, looks good,” Frank said. “Is it still hot?”
“It’s still a little warm. Give it about ten minutes.”
“Frank got the camera system going again,” Kurt said. “Look.”
“Wow, that was quick,” he said. “Thanks!”
“No problem,” Frank said. “I’ve only got it recording for 24 hours before an overwrite. Figured we’d want better quality.”
“Sounds reasonable,” Gabe said. “After we get settled, we ought to talk about that moat idea.”
“Yeah,” Charlie said.
“Frank, I’ve got all of my stuff set up and plugged in,” Jerry said from the back of the room. “We can connect to this PC too.”
“Good,” Frank said, walking over. “Nice stuff.”
“Well, since we’re full-timing, I had to bring anything I really wanted to keep. Jasmine and I argued a little bit over this stuff.”
“Yeah, Jerry is kind of a pack rat,” she said, laughing. “I didn’t see any reason to bring this crap, but now I’m glad we did.”
“Well, if you find you’re missing something you need, there’s a good electronics store in Eagle,” Gabe said. “All the propeller heads go there.”
Jerry cracked up. “Haven’t heard that term for a while.”
“I better get back on the roof,” Jeb said. “I want to be up there watching when our friends arrive.”
“I’ll go with you,” the Sheriff said, picking up his rifle. “Terry, you coming?”
“Yeah, Uncle,” he said, picking up an AK-47. They walked out the door.
“How long do you think it will take to crack those things?” Gabe asked, looking at the equipment laid out.
“Well, at this point, I don’t know if I can crack them,” Frank said. “We’ll see.
Chapter 12 – Privates Fly the Coop
“Here come the soldiers,” Jeb shouted from the roof in the front of the RV Park.
Frank and Jerry got up and grabbed their weapons. They headed to the door, followed by Jane and Jasmine, also carrying their weapons. They got out onto the veranda and watched as the men walked up to the gate. Gabe trotted over and opened it.
The men were tired, their uniforms dirty and torn and their backpacks tattered, but they were all smiles. They slowly walked to the veranda, Gabe alongside them chattering happily.
“Which one of you is Private Peterson?” asked Jerry.
A tall lanky man raised his hand and walked forward. He had light brown hair, and appeared to be in his mid-20s.
“You Jerry?” he asked, with a southern accent.
“Sure am,” Jerry said. “I’ll bet you guys are hungry and thirsty.”
“Yup,” he said. He turned to his companions, who were still walking up. He pointed to the young Hispanic soldier. “That’s Private Sanchez.”
“Good to meet you,” Frank said. He nodded back. He was shorter than Private Peterson, with a shy smile. He looked very athletic and strong.
“That’s Private Jennings,” Private Peterson said, pointing to a red-haired kid with freckles, who didn’t look much like a soldier. He smiled.
“Nice to meet you,” Jerry said.
“And finally, that’s Private Brown,” he said, pointing to the large black kid. He looked tired and worried, but he managed a smile.
“You look a lot like General Hogan,” Jerry said.
“He’s my dad,” Private Brown said. “All of these guys are my friends. Dad managed to cherry pick them out of where we were. We all grew up together.”
“I was wondering why you guys were all from different units,” Jerry said. “Was about to ask you.”
“You’ve been in the military?” asked Private Brown.
“Yep, it’s been a while, but I know what the markings mean,” Jerry said. “Come on in, and we’ll find you guys something to eat and drink.”
Everybody went into the clubhouse. Gabe and Hilda and Kurt went into the kitchen and started getting something ready.
“So what can you tell us?” Frank said. “Why this little charade?”
“My dad has been speaking out about martial law, and he’s influenced most of the commands that are outside of Washington, but the guys at the Pentagon were going to make him disappear. Luckily, he found out.”
“So he decided to high-tail it,” Jerry said. “What are you guys going to do now?”
“Get into our civilian clothes and blend into the woodwork. When it’s safe, we’ll re-join my dad.”
“You look pretty worried about him,” Jane said.
“He’s got bad people after him, but he’s smart, and he has good men with him. Especially that Lieutenant.”
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“I’m not quite getting why he cherry picked you guys,” Jerry said.
“He knew we’d be targets,” Private Brown said. “All of us grew up together, and spent a lot of time with my Dad. He was our scout leader, for one thing, and our house was always the hangout. He’s like a second dad to my friends.” The other men nodded in agreement.
“You’re dad’s a patriot,” Frank said.
“Yes, he is,” Private Peterson said. “He’s a great man. He takes our constitution seriously.”
“Good, then I hope he’s able to pull off what he’s planning,” Charlie said. “Hope there’s more out there like him.”
“Wow, nice stuff over there,” Private Sanchez said, looking at the equipment in the corner of the room. “You guys are going to crack those implants, aren’t you?”
“Yes, that’s our hope, anyway,” Frank said.
“That’s why my dad decided to come here on the way out of Dodge,” Private Brown said. “He wanted to let you know about them. He heard you might be smart enough to figure them out.”
“Who did he hear that from?” Jerry asked.
“General Walker,” Private Peterson said. “He was my uncle.”
“Oh,” Jane said. “I’m so sorry.”
“I know, I miss him every day,” Private Peterson said, his eyes momentarily misty. “He was also a patriot, and General Hogan’s best friend.”
“Here’s some food,” Gabe said. He and Hilda and Kurt brought out bowls of chili, a pitcher of ice water, and four glasses.
“That smells great,” Private Brown said. “Thanks.” The men dug in.
“Let’s leave them in peace to enjoy their food,” Hilda said. The group walked away.
Charlie, Earl, and Jackson went out to the veranda with a handful of towels and some glass cleaner for the camera lenses. Gabe and Kurt sat down in a far corner of the room, starting to work out the moat idea. Jerry and Frank went back over by the PC, followed by Jasmine and Jane. Frank started looking at one of the capsules with the magnifier.
“This thing looks fairly normal,” Frank said, looking through the binocular eyepiece.
“That’s from the Islamist that was in the smokehouse?” Jane asked, looking at the bag.
“Yep, Frank said. “Before we open any of these, I want to look at them to see if there’s any difference at all on the outside.” He put the first one back in its bag, and then picked up the one from Simon Orr. He removed it from the bag and put it under the magnifier.