Chapter 8 -- XEQKKZWZHGOBYMTTPF
Carter finished packing and sat down to wait for Jessica to arrive. Almost three
weeks earlier Jessica and Tommy had installed him in the old mobile home, and
he was beginning to think of it as home. It was typical of its era, probably
twenty to thirty years old, but having been remodeled at some point. It
seemed to be an example of the most common type of the time, probably about
sixteen by eighty feet. Designed for at most a small family,
there was a large master bedroom and bathroom at one end, two smaller bedrooms
and a bathroom at the other end, with kitchen and living area in between. The
furnishings were minimal - a couch and chair, a good-sized bed in the master
bedroom, and not much else.
He was sitting on the couch now, his bags on the floor in front of him. He had
not yet completely absorbed the implications of the recent events. He had
been exposed to something he never suspected existed - could exist - given his general
disdain for the character of most of his countrymen. Yet it seemed serious
enough, that there really was a network of organizations with both the ability
and the will to actually challenge a tyrannical government with force, if it
came to that. Such an operation would require incredible discipline and
control. Especially with the ability of the government to spy on everyone,
everywhere, all the time.
He remembered the book his cellmate had been reading. In the story, a planet
was ruled by an all-powerful, tyrannical monarch. Yet large tribes of the
indigenous population were able to live untouched by the government, in part
by learning to live in an impassable, for the rulers, desert and by being
indomitable fighters. In the short term, at least, camouflage might serve as
the desert - the question was how tough would they be in a fight. He might
get some ideas, he thought. Jessica would be driving him to an enclave in the
south for some acclimation. He would meet members of several other groups for
orientation and training.
He heard a car outside and picked up his bags and carried them to the door.
Jessica was standing behind a Trailblazer which he first thought was the one
Tommy had been driving, but it was a slightly different shade, more like
beige. The rear hatch was open. Carrying his bags out and closing the
door he went out to meet her.
"Morning," she said. "Ready?"
"Ready," he replied, putting his bags in and closing the door. They got in
and were on their way. Jessica was dressed in what he had learned was their
most common attire - jeans and a khaki shirt like the ones everyone seemed to
wear. Leaving the farm they headed south.
"We'll stop in Chillicothe for breakfast," Jessica said. She had advised him
to be ready to leave early, and it wasn't yet seven o'clock. The town was
just a few miles away, and before long they were eating at one of the small
town's homegrown restaurants. Carter knew their destination was somewhere
south of Springfield, over in the Arkansas Ozarks.
"Are we going off-road?" he asked.
"Not quite," Jessica answered, "but there are some unpaved roads down there,
especially where we're going."
She had told him they were going to visit an enclave in the Arkansas Ozarks, a
large mountainous area mostly in south Missouri and north Arkansas. While the
mountains were not especially high - the highest being around 2,500 feet - the
area was mostly forested and provided cover for those seeking privacy. Their
destination was in those deep forests.
They didn't discuss any business during breakfast - security was the most
important rule in any public interactions, and even conversations at a
restaurant table were risky. Since they didn't much in the way of small talk
there was not much to say. Back on the road, Jessica filled him in on some of
the details. He knew he would be meeting the members of a fairly large
operation, as well as some from others. Back on the road again, Jessica
continued.
"The place we're going to is, ostensibly, a hunters camp. A small group of
patriots own it, and all of them live there most of the time, although they
have homes outside in various places. There only nine men in the group, and
several of their adult children operate the place. There are about thirty or
so of what are called associates, people like you who've joined, and for the same
reasons. Most of them are around your age and younger, and a lot of them have
military or law enforcement experience. To all appearances they maintain the
premises and do other work - actually they are, like you and Tommy and me,
operatives. The owners are men who have become wealthy and as they got older
decided, like my father grandfather, to put their money to good use."
"Do these nine men have families?" he asked. "Not all widowed like your father,
or single or divorced."
"Most of them are married, I believe none of them have young children - and
some of them have adult children who, like me, are involved in the operations.
"Dad says sometimes that it's kind of like being in the Mafia. Most of the
men, and it's mostly men, either have wives who know nothing about the actual
activities, or are actually involved. It's some of both. But always, secrecy
is our most important defense."
"I would think at some point, if the operation is big enough, secrecy would be
difficult," said Carter, "unless you are prepared to take some extreme measures
to preserve it."
"You mean the most extreme?" Jessica said, not completely a question.
"Yes."
"I suppose that, when everything blows up and all bets are off, we will. As
for killing infiltrators - at this point we're just making sure there aren't
any. And that at the lower levels individuals don't know enough to do much
damage. Maybe damage one part, but no way to get to all of us. But at this
point, we are mostly dependent of thorough vetting of members, secure
communications, and camouflage."
"I haven't been south that much," Carter said. "You said we're going to the
Ozarks. I know they're mountains in the south part of the state, but not much
more.
"They're mostly in Missouri, but also cover a large part of north Arkansas"
Jessica said. "And small parts of Kansas and Oklahoma. The highest mountains
are actually over in Arkansas."
"Mountains?" Carter inquired. "I hadn't thought of that area that way."
"They're not that high, as mountains go," said Jessica. "Maybe a little over
two thousand feet. But like the Appalachians, they have something or a
reputation for being backwoodsy. You hear some of the same jokes about them.
But there are a lot of tourist attractions and resorts. Still, there are a
lot of heavily forested areas, and they provide places to hide, discreetly,
operations like ours."
"I guess living in the city all my life I didn't think about how much of the
country is mostly empty."
"Even Missouri is dense compared to some areas, out west. Most of the
population is on the coasts and in the north. If it ever comes to it, it will
take a long time for the government to hunt down all the outliers. Which is
why they're working to get more people into the cities, make it harder to
travel outside them. I suspect if we're forced to it, we can wage a long
guerilla war before they get us all. But we hope for a different outcome."
"You mean for a final solution... excuse me, a more decisive outcome."
"Essentially," replied Jessica. "The general agreement among the leaders is
that we don't let it come to that, going down without a fight or becoming
hunted fugitives."
"The alternative would seem to be a preemptive strike at some point, I would
think."
Jessica turned to look at him briefly, something she seldom did even while
talking.
"It's the only viable solution, particularly in terms of being humane," she
said. The other options leave the majority of the population living miserable
lives, if they live at all, under a tyrannical rule that would make China and
the old Soviet Union seem mild. And while you can rightly say that most
people deserve exactly that, for their indolent, selfish way of living, there
are many who don't.
"It would be wrong for us to have the means to prevent that sort of
catastrophe and not try, even if it means losing our own lives in the process."
"So does it end that way? Or is there any hope for a different solution?"
"Unlikely," she replied, looking over at him again, looking more serious
than he had seen her before. "With the entire government in
enemy hands, president and congress, with the supreme court simply being
ignored it it disagrees, they've got it all. Every election is now pre-decided,
so there's no going back."
"How long do we have?" Carter asked.
"We're probably looking at a few years until it's all over. They can, but won't,
go out confiscating weapons right away. Most likely it will be done with
some pretense of legality. They will pass laws, let them be challenged and
upheld by the rubber stamp courts. The only thing preventing that now is the
handful of states that seem to present a real threat of armed resistance when
that happens."
"Will any of them actually do that?"
"There are some, Texas for example, that will refuse to enforce the laws. They're
already doing that with some of them. So if the government wants to disarm
the population, they won't get any help from the local authorities. And at
the same time the locals probably won't stop the people from resisting."
"It would seem that if that happens, there would be actual warfare, the states
would have to have militias for defense. I'm afraid I don't see them doing it,
or even being able to," Carter said.
"We believe that's why the government will take some time, given that society
continues to deteriorate on its own. In time even those states will fall. That's why we
have to act."
She looked out the windshield, silent. Carter sensed she was
preparing to say something critical, and was uncertain if the time was right.
"We don't know when," she continued, "but we're certain of it. It's a matter
of being prepared in time, which we can do, but the actual execution is the
hard part. There's a reason you were recruited. Tommy believed you were a
good candidate, and we investigated you. You were always a straight shooter,
and you got thrown overboard by those you loyally served, and trusted. You
learned the hard way how rotten our society is, and you're not the first cop
to do so. As you know."
"But what got Tommy's attention? My single-minded determination for revenge?"
"Do you think of it as revenge?"
"I suppose most people would think of it that way. Justice is more like it."
"Exactly," Jessica said. "The fact that you think of it as justice, even
though you would be committing a crime if you did it. What we propose to do
will also be a crime. Did you ever read 'Shogun'?"
"If that was about a sailor shipwrecked in Japan, I saw the movie."
"You might remember when he was being questioned by the Japanese warlord
about affairs in Europe. He tells him that there are no mitigating
circumstances when it comes to rebellion against a sovereign lord.
Blackthorne replies 'unless you win'. If we don't win it will not matter - we
will be dead. We must win, or it will be the end of what the founders
established, what so many men have given their lives for, all these years.
Including my brother, even if it was in a misbegotten affair. I was angry,
and still am, but there is no dishonor for the men who served.
"So, we are committed to win or die in the attempt. And I believe we can and
will. There is only one obstacle to overcome."
"What is that?" Carter asked. "And why does it seem that you are very high in
the operation?"
"I am," she replied. "My father and grandfather were in it at the beginning.
It was a group of wealthy farmers and ranchers who started it, and together
they are easily wealthy enough to pull it off.
"As to the problem with actually doing what has to be done, we must overcome
our doubts, when it comes to actually killing people. Because that is the
only way. And people like us, who only want our freedom and to be left alone,
are not the sort to resort to violence. For our enemies it's the first thing
they do when they don't get their way. Do you know who Michael Collins was?"
"Sounds familiar. Who was he?"
"He was the man chiefly responsible for freeing Ireland from British rule. Of
course the situation was a little different - Ireland had been occupied, and
generally brutalized, by the British for literally centuries. And for
hundreds of years there had been rebellions, dozens of them, always ending in
failure. And usually with the killing of a lot of Irishmen. The next to last
one was in 1916, and it ended as usual.
"But one of the participants was a man named Michael Collins. He escaped
being executed with some of the other participants, and returned to Ireland
after being released from prison. He then became involved in what would be
the final rebellion. Realizing that raising an army to drive them out would
never be possible, he organized an assassination squad to kill the British
agents and the Irish collaborators who were enabling them. He was ruthless,
and effective. The British eventually realized that they could only remain
in control by imposing martial law, which was impossible to maintain for even
a little while - much less permanently - they agreed to negotiate a treaty
that freed Ireland."
"Sounds like a real hardcase," said Carter. "My kind of guy."
"He wasn't, from all accounts he was rather easygoing, and fairly religious.
It is likely that the senseless executions of his comrades after the earlier
insurrection that made it possible for him to make the leap to ordering the
assassinations. And the fact that Irishmen were being murdered by the British,
with no consequences.As he said, of British were killing them without due
process, that he had had paid them back in their own coin. In other words,
the brutality of the British pushed him over the line."
"Where is the line for us?" Carter asked.
"It has already been crossed," Jessica replied. "Many times. Waco and Ruby
Ridge were only two of the more celebrated cases, a few years back. The
negative reaction caused the government to conduct its attacks on people more
quietly, but they continue. These days people are arrested on charges of
insurrection for being present at a demonstration, or accused of being 'white
supremacists', among other things."
"I always just thought they settled down for a while after the Oklahoma City
affair," said Carter. "Wasn't that supposed to be revenge for Waco?"
"That was part of the plan. McVeigh was planning to blow up the building, but
as anyone with sufficient knowledge would notice, his truck bomb would never
have done the job. So the government operatives decided to kill two birds, as
they say. Put some explosives in the right place, steal his truck and put it
in position, and you have an event to blame on right-wing terrorists, which was
a high priority for that administration."
Jessica looked over at him again, Carter said nothing and waited.
"Now I sound like a nut job, right?"
"No," Carter replied. "I don't how you know it, or if it can be proven, at least
to most people's satisfaction. But it doesn't matter because you and anyone
who knows or suspects the truth is going to be accused of being a conspiracy
theorist. That seems to be one of the main attacks these days on dissenters,
even when the facts are known. I know now how rotten everything is - I was
too busy with my life to think about it much."
"Most people are," said Jessica. "That's the problem."