THE BEGINNING Book Two (THE EVENT)

by Marshall Huffman

  “Okay, say we do contact China, Russia, and the other countries. Then what? How do we open a meaningful dialogue with them? Our satellite photos show something is going on between the military and general population in both of those countries. Obviously the military powers still think they should rule.”

  “What if they looked here? Say the situation was reversed. They had the satellite and they were watching as we fought with first the group in Pennsylvania and then in Utah? They could conclude the same thing.”

  “That’s totally different,” Margaret said.

  “How? Because we knew what was going on? Maybe the exact same thing is going on there as well. Think about it. Maybe the people thought they could take over now that things had changed but since no one was in charge they became totally lawless, sort of like Utah. At some point, the military or someone would want to step up and restore a kind of normalcy,” Miller pointed out.

  “In Russia maybe but not China. The military there will never let the people have freedom. It’s a totally foreign and repugnant concept to them,” Kevin Brown said.

  “He’s right,” Margaret chimed in.

  “Even so. It doesn’t change anything. We still need to establish a dialogue with them as soon as possible. We need to know their intentions,” Miller replied.

  “And you think we can work with the Russians any easier?”

  “Given the lesser of the two evils, I would certainly choose Russia,” Miller told them.

  “Maybe we should attack both countries now,” Dan Pierson said.

  Everyone turned and looked at him. Even Randy was shocked. Pierson was notorious for being the fence rider. He never offered suggestions until he was sure which way the wind was blowing. Out of the blue, he suggests they eliminate Russia and China as threats. It was so uncharacteristic that they couldn’t believe he had actually said what they thought he had just said.

  “You’re kidding, right?” Margaret finally said.

  “Actually, no I’m not. You all know that I’m a history buff. I also happen to believe that history will repeat itself time and time again unless something is done about it. Look at the 50s and 60s. Hell, even at the end of WWII we made a classic mistake. Don’t get me wrong, Ike was a hell of a soldier but he should have listened to Patton. Ole George wanted to go ahead and kick the Russians' butts right then and there. Instead we tried to co-exist. That sure the hell didn’t work. Korea was another example. We didn’t want to upset the Chinese. They sure didn’t care about upsetting us. They sent thousands of troops to fight against the US. Truman should have listened to MacArthur. We had the means to kick China’s ass then, excuse my French, but were afraid to use it. Same thing for Vietnam and every place else. We have the big stick but we are afraid to use it. Well, now is the time. No television propaganda to interfere. We just do whatever it takes.”

  “My God. Are you serious? Just declare war on someone else because they don’t have the strength to fight back?”

  “I guess we could loan them a couple of planes if that would make it seem more sporting. Look, all I am saying is that they are going to come to the conclusion that either we caused all of this or that they can take over. Either way it will end up in a war. We cannot reason with either of those countries. They hate us, they don’t trust us, and they would love to see us eliminated. Either we fight a defensive war at a later time or we do what Patton suggested. Kick their butts right now while they are at their weakest.”

  It was silent in the room for several seconds.

  “Dan, I appreciate your suggestion, really I do, but I don’t think we are ready to take such an aggressive approach at this time. We are in no shape ourselves to go to war with anyone. Our entire population is still under thirty thousand people as of this week. No way could we take on another country.”

  “And if they sent an army to eliminate us here, would that work any better?” Pierson asked.

  “They won’t do that,” Margaret said.

  “Yeah, that’s kind of what Ike told Patton. They won’t be aggressive, we have the bomb and they won’t for ten years. Boy was he wrong about both of those things.”

  “Dan, it is an interesting proposal but at this time I think we need to concentrate on the things that will do us the most good right here in the US,” Randy said.

  “This is the most important thing we could do to secure the future of the country,” Pierson replied. Randy let it go.

  “What about those who want to leave?” Miller asked.

  “Let them go. They know the risks of leaving and if they are willing to take them, why should we stop them?” Brown offered.

  “That still leaves the problem of unprotected military hardware, precious metals, and chemical agents,” Miller replied.

  “I thought we had the gold and stuff covered. Didn’t they come up with a system to protect Ft. Knox and the other key places?” Margaret asked.

  “Yes but that still leaves a hell of a lot of stuff unprotected. We couldn’t possibly bring it all here nor could we protect it all. They could take anything they wanted. It’s not a problem now but what about later? Eventually we have to have a monetary system and it has to be based on something. Gold has always been the standard. If we let them go do whatever they want we may regret it later,” Miller said.

  “And there is the health issue. How many tons of rotten food is out there now? We have cleaned up Colorado Springs and most of Denver but what about the other places? Who knows what types of bacteria may be present that could literally wipe everyone out.”

  “Not if we don’t let them come back once they leave.”

  “Christ, what are we going to turn into? Survivalists at any cost? Kill this group, let this group die, don’t help this person? Is that what we want to become?” Margaret asked.

  “What we want to become may not be possible at this time. We will constantly have to make adjustments. We cannot possibly sit here and determine the future of the country. The very best we can do is work on the problems at hand and continue to adapt as time goes on,” Randy said.

  “But what we do now could impact the future. If we don’t start out on the right foot, we will never be on the right track,” Pierson said.

  “It’s not the foot, it’s the direction that is important. I don’t want to have us start determining what others can and cannot do. We have what, five major religious groups here now? What if we tried to either eliminate them or said everyone had to believe the same thing? No matter which foot you started on, it would still be the wrong direction. We have to consider free will. We wrote it into the new Constitution and we simply can’t abandon it now. If people want to leave, I think we should let them. If they want to return, we let them as long as they carry no contagious diseases and are willing to abide by our rules,” Randy said.

  “I honestly don’t think you want to do that. Letting them go, I’m okay with, but coming back, that I’m against,” Pierson said.

  “What about the rest of you?” Randy asked.

  “They leave, they don’t come back,” Miller said.

  As they went around the table it became apparent that most felt that they should be afforded the right to leave but not to return. It wasn’t personally what Randy wanted but he accepted their logic and decided to allow the decision to stand.

  The next three days were spent on prioritizing the list and deciding which could be accomplished give the manpower they had. The flow of refugees had slowed to five or six a day except when a large group was found in Missouri in a network of caves. They had been living in them ever since and had no idea others had survived.

  One of the more pressing agenda items was the opening of the road from Denver to the east and south from Colorado Springs. Getting the cars off the Interstate system was necessary for future expansion and for food transportation. The other big item of concern was getting more electrical power without the use of fossil fuels. An all out effort to use solar and wind power was undertaken. While they had ample gas and oil on
hand, at some point they would start to run out.

  The remaining item was to contact as many other countries as possible to discuss the situation with them and share information. Dan Pierson was more vocal than he had ever been. Miller suspected it was because he had been intimidated by Colonel Webber. Now that Randy was in charge he was sure Pierson felt less threatened.

  CHAPTER THIRTY -TWO

  RUSSIA

  Kronowski looked through the binoculars one last time and then handed them to Andreev.

  “What am I looking for exactly?” he said taking them from his eyes after several minutes.

  “See the three men leaning against the barricade?”

  “Da.”

  “They are asleep. Now look at the man on the machine gun. He is slumped over, asleep also. They are expecting no one and are so sure of themselves that they have become lax and now sleep on watch. I am sending ten men to eliminate the entire group,” he told Andreev.

  “How do you know a relief group won’t come along?”

  “Because the next change of guard is at 0400 hours. That’s two hours from now. We will be in Moscow by then.”

  “It is your show,” Andreev said, handing the binoculars back to him.

  Kronowski tapped one of the men on the shoulder and nodded his head towards the barricade. The man nodded back and within a few seconds they were gone from sight. Try as he might, Andreev could not locate them any place once they left the area.

  “They are very good,” he whispered to Kronowski.

  “They had better be, I trained them myself,” he said not taking his eyes off the binoculars.

  He watched intently for several minutes before he lowered them.

  “Move out,” he said and the troops fell in and started towards the barricade.

  Moving into the city was much less eventful that Andreev had expected. No one challenged them or gave an alarm. In fact, they came to a second barricade that wasn’t even manned.

  “Is this a trap?” he asked Kronowski.

  “I doubt it. Just a leaderless army that doesn’t know exactly what it should be doing. Once we took Vladimir, they probably fell apart to some extent. He wanted to be in control so badly that I doubt he shared many of his plans with anyone else. My best guess is that we will have a minor skirmish at most. He had hardly gotten the words out of this mouth when a shot rang out. Most people ducked but Kronowski stood tall.

  “Who are you shooting at,” he demanded.

  “Who are you? You don’t look like the New Freedom Army to me,” the voice came back.

  “You stupid ass, of course not. We are the Russian Federation Army and we have come to kill all of you traitors unless you lay down your arms right now and surrender. We have already taken your so called Chancellor. We will not tolerate traitors in control of Russia. Did you really think we would let that happen? Now throw down your arms and we will not kill you. If you resist you will all be rounded up and shot. You have exactly one minute to do as I command or we will wipe you all out,” Kronowski shouted.

  “We will not give up to the likes of you,” the voice came back.

  “Then you will die today,” Kronowski replied and gave a signal.

  Several rounds of mortars were let loose and exploded in the direction of the area where the challenge had come from. Automatic weapons followed, sending out an array of red tracers. The fire that was returned was weak and soon Kronowski had his men advanced. Several fire fights erupted but quickly ended. By 0500 it was all over. All of the so called New Freedom Army was either dead or sitting in Red Square being watched by Kronowski’s men. Three of his men had been killed and nine wounded which made him very unhappy. They had killed thirty-one of the Freedom Army and wounded another sixty-seven.

  “Who is in charge?” he asked.

  “Chancellor Vladimir,” someone spoke up.

  “No he is not. We have Vladimir. Who is currently in charge?” Kronowski asked again.

  “I suppose that would be me,” a short man with a huge mustache said, standing. Kronowski looked him over. He certainly didn’t look like he could inspire many to follow him.

  “You are?”

  “Alexia Bovinske”

  “And your rank?”

  He just shrugged his shoulders, “I guess it would be second in command. It was never really discussed.”

  “I see. I am Lieutenant Kronowski. Why did you not just surrender instead of fighting? Surely you knew you didn’t stand a chance.”

  “Because we are people of honor and we believe that it is better to be free than under the yoke of an oppressive government.”

  “And you see us as an oppressive government?”

  “Is Freedom in your name?”

  “Freedom is just a word,” Kronowski replied.

  “You are wrong my young Lieutenant. It is not just a word, it is a concept. Freedom is bought with the blood of men and women willing to die for it. It is far from just a word,” Alexia said.

  “And you see us as the enemy of this freedom you seek?”

  “If you come here to rule over us and tell us what we can and cannot do, then yes you are the enemy.”

  “I think you may be in for a surprise,” Kronowski said.

  The prisoners were taken to Lubyanka, the former KGB headquarters, where they were given food, clothing, and placed in holding cells until further determination about what was to be done with them could be made.

  Kronowski set up patrols around the city while Andreev returned to fill General Nitikin in on the situation.

  “We lost only three men?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Amazing. They seemed more formidable than that,” Yegor said.

  “They put up a fight but I have to admit, Kronowski is a great tactician. Every time they tried a maneuver he was two steps ahead of them. I am glad I went along, it was a very good learning experience,” Andreev replied.

  “Where are they now?”

  “Lubyanka.”

  “Then I want to start moving our people to Moscow immediately. We will leave a few people here to keep things operating but I want only a skeleton crew. We will rotate them every three months.”

  “Keeping in touch will be difficult,” Andreev said.

  “Actually I think not. A couple of important things have happened since you left. We have two planes that can fly again. They modified a couple with piston engines and they work just fine. We have a helicopter working as well. And to top it off, we how have communications ready to link to Moscow. It will take a little time but it can be done. They are even trying to get our satellites to respond. So far, that hasn’t been very successful but at least we are moving in the right direction,” Yegor told him.

  “That is really something in such a short time.”

  “I think once we get some of the basic needs met, things will progress much faster. Right now we need to get Moscow up and operating again. Other countries are probably doing the same thing and we don’t want to appear to be less advanced. Getting communications established with America is a very high priority,” Yegor told Andreev.

  “How do we know they didn’t cause all of this?”

  “Because even they don’t have this kind of destructive potential,” Yegor replied.

  “Are you moving back to Moscow?”

  “Yes. Matryona and I will be heading back in the next week. For now, I would like you to return to Moscow and assess what needs to be done. How much electrical capacity do we have? What is the situation with food, water, petrol, and other items that we will need to survive the next year? Find out what the general population knows and what they have seen along the way. I would like a full report by the time I arrive. I am going to have the plane take you back so you will not have such a long and difficult drive.”

  “Now that is the best news yet,” Andreev said.

  “Yes I thought that would cheer you up. Now, if you would like, Matryona and I would love to have you join us for dinner. We could talk about the fut
ure of Russia and what needs to be done.”

  “I would be honored, General.”

  “1900 hours then.”

  “Thank you General. I will be there.”

  When Yegor arrived home he slipped in the fact that he had invited Andreev to have dinner with them. She did not say anything for several seconds. Yegor felt like the room had just become colder.

  “That was very nice of you,” Matryona said finally coming out of the kitchen.

  “I am sure all he ever gets is military food. I thought it might be nice to give him a taste of real cooking.”

  “So, what are you making?”

  “You imp. I am a General. Generals tell others what to do,” he said.

  “And I am the General’s lover. I rule the General, if he wants to stay happy.”

  “Humm. You have a point there. How about we split the duties? I’ll choose the wine and you cook the meal. What do you think?”

  “I think Generals aren’t much for splitting things 50 – 50.”

  They enjoyed a meal of mushroom soup followed by zharkoye and topped off by pirozhki for dessert.

  “My God, I haven’t had food like this for ages,” Andreev said, wiping his mouth.

  “I am glad you approve. This is why I am getting so fat. Matryona is trying to thicken my arteries so she can take over Russia,” Yegor said.

  “Never underestimate a woman, Andreev. The General does and I will get him one of these days,” she said laughing.

  “Let me ask you something, Andreev. What do you think about holding an election at some point and making Russia a Democracy?” Yegor asked.

  “A Democracy? We have been moving in that direction for some time but if you mean like America and Europe I am not so sure.”

  “Time for me to clear the table,” Matryona said, standing.

  “No, please. Stay. I would like to have your input as well.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely,” Yegor said, patting the chair. She sat back down.