Steve

---

"Next right," Steve said. "Should be a white post on each side of the drive, red and yellow stripes on top."

Candi was driving Hugo, the 1970 Dodge Power Wagon Steve used whenever banging around the back country. It was still mostly the dark blue it wore when it was an Air Force vehicle. Brian Cornelius had bought four of them an a DOD auction back in the '80s and reconditioned them mechanically. The military markings had been sanded off the doors and tailgate and repainted approximately the same color as the rest of the vehicle.

She slowed and turned between the white posts. A wide gravel drive led to a small compound about an eighth of a mile away. Candi stopped at the first of two gates, open but attended by a couple of men in Campbell livery. A half dozen more waited by the second, close gate.

A twenty-something man walked to the driver's window.

"Morning ma'am. May I see your credentials please?"

"You certainly may," Candi replied, handing him a small leather folder.

"Do you have any weapons, drugs, or white slaves?"

"Just the one slave," Candi replied, nodding towards Steve. "And the usual weapons."

"Don't let the slave run at large inide the perimeter," the man said with a grin.

"I'll keep a leash on him," Candi replied. "You guys have a good day."

"We'll try, y'all do the same."

The banter was a cover. Candi and the guard had exchanged signals with a series of eye blinks. Even a watcher with a good look at them wouldn't notice. The second gate was opened and Candi stopped briefly.

"Mr. Campbell is in his office," one of the guards said. "He's expecting you. Use one of the reserved spaces near the door."

Most of the reserved spaces were unoccupied and Candi parked in one with empty spaces on both sides. Dismounting from Hugo they walked the short distance to the main entrance. The center of activity at Coldstar, the three story building dominates the area. A few small warehouses and shops are the only buildings of any size, while several small groups of housing surrounded it, merging with the woods that surround it.

The doors opened before they arrived and a young man and woman came out to meet them.

"Hi guys," he woman greeted them. Both were dressed in khaki, like military uniforms but without insignia or decorations except for a lapel pin and a larger pin over the left shirt pocket.

"Hi yourself," Candi responded. "Long time no see."

"Yeah, we missed you last time you were here. Come on in."

Maria and Marcus were twins, Campbell's grandchildren. Their father was Gordon Campbell, grandfather Malcolm's eldest son. They were in their early twenties, Steve didn't remember exactly how early.

"Got some new toys," Mark said to Steve as they followed Maria and Candi. "Some you'll like."

"You know me," Steve replied. "Always up for new toys."

They crossed a large lobby to a pair of elevators and Maria pressed the button for the top floor. They emerged into a wide corridor with closed doors along both sides and a pair of glass doors at one end.

"The inner sanctum," Mark said. "The nerve center anyway. Dad's in his office."

Gordon Campbell's office was to the left of the glass doors. The doors were open the desk was visible, Gordon wasn't. Mark and Maria walked in and Steve and Candi followed. Several computers occupied most of the desk space and three large video screens were mounted on a wall. A large digital whiteboard stood nearby. Gordon emerged from a door on the side opposite the screens.

"Grab some seats," he said, moving behind the desk."

"Anything else?" Maria asked.

"Not just now," Gordon replied. "We'll be having a late lunch up here. If you can have them here in hour it will give us some time go get started."

"Gotcha," Maria said. "See you guys later."

"Maria handles logistics," Gordon said. "Mark is in charge of security. They'll join us for lunch and show you around later. The place has changed a lot since you were here last."

"It was tree stumps and mud as I recall," Steve replied.

"It was that. We'd just gotten the area cleared had a couple of buildings up. It's been over six months, We have to move fast.

"You seem to have done that. What's up?"

"You know how things stand in Kansas?" Gordon asked.

"Not in depth. My understanding is it's pretty fluid."

"That's one way to describe it, I guess. The feds moved a lot of force in there, trying to secure the railroads and highways. If those are cut it could be the beginning of the end. Stop supplies into the east, they've already got enough problems. Rationing everywhere outside of DC, and things are tight there."

"Sounds good to me," Steve said. "How are the denizens of the urban cesspools taking it? As if I couldn't guess."

"Just that way. It's really ugly in Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis, even the smaller pools are boiling. A lot of resources are tied up there, and they're using auxiliaries. And it looks they're putting them into Kansas."

"To secure the lifelines?"

"Especially that," Gordon said. "And what they're using in the cities are the dregs, I can't imagine the ones in Kansas being any better."

When the Republic finally fractured there had already been flight from blue states to the red states as they were called. Even more had fled when the fighting started and those unable to flee were still trying. Conscription for the army had yielded only more substandard types.

"They won't find it as easy as riot control in the cities," Steve said. "What are they going to do, with five hundred miles of roads and rails?"

"Suppression." Gordon replied. "They're trying to root out any potential saboteurs, round them up and detain them. They've got hundreds of agents in there, they're already arrested quite a few, taken them to a camp near Topeka. Some others may be at Leavenworth. That place has been beefed up some more lately.

"And?" Steve didn't like where this was going.

Don't expect I like where I'm going.

"We have thirty-something cells in there," said Gordon. "The Northern Alliance has at least half that many. Call it close to fifty cells, average four or five men. They can take care of themselves, avoid detection and capture. But they rely on assistance from the locals. As many guns as people have, especially in places like Kansas, there are a lot of people that don't have them. They're vulnerable, and potential partisans now that this has started."

"Meaning they're willing to fight?"

"Correct. Some just want to be able to defend themselves, others want to hunt down the enemy in their midst. We're preparing - and this needs to be done yesterday - to get some ordnance to them. Particularly insurgency weapons. It's after noon, let's get a drink."

He got up and went to the room he had emerged from earlier, Steve and Candi followed. One end of the room had a modest wet bar.

"Wine and some decent beer in the fridge," Gordon said. "Brandy or bourbon?"

"Whatever you're having," Steve replied.

Gordon poured two glasses of Henessey while Steve opened the fridge, revealing several bottles of Arbor mist. He took out a bottle of strawberry white Zinfadel and held it up for Candi's approval. She nodded and he poured a glass. Gordon walked over to the large window, set his glass on the wide sill and took out a cigar case. He offered one to Steve. Candi joined them as they lit up.

They smoked and sipped their drinks as they waited for lunch to arrive. They had just finished their cigars when it did. A couple of staff pushed a cart into the conference room on the other side of the office. Mark and Maria followed them.

"That looks good," Gordon said. "We'll take it from here."

The cart contained an assortment of sandwiches, beverages and other items. They served themselves and sat down at the table. When they were finished Gordon resumed.

"We need training for the partisan cells we're developing," he said. "The members of the cells are dictated by location, they members will work where they are, and we'll coordinate them with our cells. So it'll be a lot of family and friends and neighbors. Some are comfortable with weapons, guns especially, others not so much. We're putting in a load of Liberators. They're easy enough to learn, but people who've never used any kind of gun will need the basics demonstrated."

"Liberators?" Steve asked. "Anything else?"

"A few dozen .40 caliber carines and pistols. We want the experienced ones to be as well-armed as possible. And for those that may find themselves at close quarters unexpectedly, some of those little Mingus .38 five shooters and an assortment of knives. It's likely some will find themselves being raided and hauled off to detention even if they're not actively involved."

"How many trainers do you figure on sending in?"

"We'd like to have a couple dozen. Any recommendations?"

"Probably none you don't already have in mind," Steve replied. "I can ask around."

"I'd appreciate it. Want to have a look at the tools?"

---

One of the small warehouses contained samples of the tools. Steve was familiar with them but hadn't used any in operations. The Mingus revolvers were the most polished of the bunch and were limited in quantity as far as he knew.

"They've got production up some," Gordon said. "The plant in Amarillo can crank out about two dozen a day. Barrels and cylinders are the bottleneck - they're all CNC'd. Casting frames is pretty trivial. They're supposed to have another dozen or so mills up before long."

The little revolvers looked cheap but the important parts were high quality. Polish and fancy grips wasn't important. Steve could put all five shots into the kill zone at twenty feet shooting double action and that was more than good enough.

The Liberator, officially the Liberator II to distinguish if from it's namesake, was being produced in large quantities. Several examples lay on a table with some boxes of shells. One looked smaller than the others.

"That's the .410," Gordon said as Alex picked it up. "When we had numbers up enough on the twelves and twenties we started cranking out a few of those. They have their uses."

Steve broke it open and looked down the barrels. It was considerably lighter than the others.

"Women and children?" he asked.

"Mostly," Gordon replied. "Most adults can handle the twenty if the twelve is too much, and the punch is adequate at the ranges where these get used. But anyone can handle the .410. About like a .44 magnum, and easier to hit with than a handgun that most. You ever use one?"

"No. Fired one a few times when production started, they had some at a meeting in Amarillo. Got a place I can try it out?"

"Out back. Let's go."

Mark and Maria helped as they carried two of each model out the back doors. Some targets and shooting benches were set up. Steve broke open one of the .410s and loaded it from a box of slug loads. Taking a position facing the row of silhouettes he activated the laser sight and aimed at one of the targets, then fired all four barrels at roughly one second intervals. It was heavy enough to be controllable while still being considerably lighter than the larger ones.

"Real smooth trigger," he commented.

"It's been cleaned up pretty well," Gordon replied. "It's not critical, heavy as the weapon is, but if it can be improved, improve it. It's the same as the original, and like the one in the old COP derringers."

"Those were awful," Steve said. "I had one, had it cleaned up so it was tolerable but forget shooting anything not near close enough to touch."

"Yeah. But it works fine in the Liberators. Training will be easy even for people not accustomed to it. Just activate the laser, put it on the target and squeeze."

"Simple enough. Wanna try it?" he asked Candi.

He handed it to her and showed her how to break it open. She was familiar with weapons and had used doubles. He handed her four shells and she dropped them in and closed it. She moved into position and rapidly fired all four rounds into another target.

"Pretty smooth," she said, handing it back. Steve broke it and ejected the empties, laid it on the table.

"That does have potential," he said.

"There'll be about a hundred of those going out with our guys," Gordon said. "Thee hundred twelves and about half that many twenties."

"How about the regular stuff?"

"We've got a hundred pistols allocated, mostly Glocks and Sigs, some Rugers and Smiths. The carbines - about two hundred of those - are a mix that all use Glock mags. There won't be much time for training but they'll mostly go any experienced shooters we can find, to increase their firepower."

"How much is not much?"

"Really not much," Gordon replied. "We need to be moving yesterday, so the sooner you can get in place the better."

Candi doesn't look happy. I should have expected this.

"Where is in place?" Steve asked.

"We've got an advance force in there already. Two locations, one south of Dodge City and one south of Wichita. Each one is close to a rural airstrip used by crop-dusters and some private aircraft. Most of our guys, about two dozen, have infiltrated over the past several weeks and are already working with some locals while providing intel on fed operations. They don't have much but we need to keep track of them."

"We're operating just in the south?"

"Right. The Alliance has the north covered. We've got about four weeks to get the civilians ready. Can you and a partner account for a dozen or so, all in the southeast corner. We'll get the weapons and other stuff distributed - you visit each cell and give them the basics. These are primarily for defense - it the goons come after them they'll be in for a susprise."

"You got a partner in mind," Steve asked, "or to have to come up with one?"

"If you have someone..."

"I'll call Reggie, unless you already have."

Gordon grinned.

"Saves me the trouble. How soon can you guys get to your base? All the hardware is being shipped now. Little town called Fowler, south of Dodge City, far enough out they won't bother with it unless something draws their attention."

Candi not going to be happy, but..

She saved him the trouble.

"I know how important this is," she said. "Do what you need to do, we'll be all right."