Walter Williams - The Rift

She looked at them, saw wild hope mingled with scornful disbelief.

“I want national media here,” Nick Ruford said. “I want the networks. I want CNN.”

Well that is smart, Jessica thought. “I can arrange that,” she said. “I have about fifty of those reporters camping out at my headquarters with nothing to do but bother my people, so I imagine we can send them here to bother you.”

“I suppose you want us to surrender!” one man said. “I suppose you want us to put down our guns and walk straight into jail!”

Jessica thought about this for a moment. “No,” she said. “No, I don’t. I don’t have enough people here to guarantee your safety. I think you’re safest right as you are.” She nodded at the belligerent man. “Eventually, when we can guarantee your safety and reunite you with your families, I hope you will put down your weapons. If what I have heard from Mr. Ruford’s family is anything like the truth, I don’t believe any of you will be charged. I will take you all out of Spottswood Parish on military aircraft, and I will take you to my headquarters. You will have your media coverage. And I will protect you- you have my word on it.”

She still saw loathing on the man’s face. Most of the others looked thoughtful. She looked at them all again, and as she did so a wild inspiration struck.

“And in fact,” she said, “until I can move you to my headquarters, I propose to move my headquarters here. With your permission,” she nodded toward Nick, “I hereby declare this building the headquarters of the Mississippi Valley Division, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.”

*

“No, sir,” Jessica said, “I am not a hostage. These kind people let me move my headquarters into their building. I’m carrying on business as usual.”

Indeed she was. She’d persuaded the Warriors to allow her a couple of unarmed communications techs, and she’d moved communications gear into the Carnegie Library, set up a satellite dish on the lawn, and had been in touch with her command for the last six hours, deploying her people in response to the last major quake.

“This is a very singular thing,” said the President into Jessica’s ear. “Are you certain you know what you’re doing?”

“No, sir,” Jessica said. “I’m not certain at all. I’m way the hell off the map, is where I am, and I know it.”

The President seemed amused. “Well, Jessica,” he said. “If you survive, you’ll be a hero. I suggest that you try to live.”

“I will do my very best to follow your advice, sir.”

“I should mention that the Justice Department is expressing a considerable interest in what has occurred there in- is it Spottywood Parish?”

“Spottswood, sir.”

“Yes. The Justice Department would like to handle all criminal investigations.”

“I don’t see that would be necessary,” Jessica said. “I’m sure the Defense Department has all the necessary expertise.”

“The Attorney General tells me that the FBI has the finest forensic investigators in the world.”

“I believe that the Defense Department can match them, sir. After all, we have people that are regularly called to identify corpses found on old battlefields.”

The President paused a moment. “Jessica,” he said, “I suggest you concede this one with grace. After all, they won’t be investigating you this time. You haven’t shot anybody yet.”

Jessica smiled. Her argument had been pour l’honneur du pavillion, as it were, strictly for the record. She was perfectly happy to hand the investigation over to Justice. What if we bungled it? she thought.

“I’ll do as you advise, sir,” she said.

“Very good. You call me if you need anything, now.”

Jessica put the handset of her secure phone into its cradle. She looked up at Nick Ruford, who was sitting on the edge of the reference librarian’s desk.

“That was my boss,” she said. “He wanted to make sure you didn’t have a gun pointed at my head.”

“Well, that’s good,” Nick said. “I’ve had bosses who wouldn’t have cared one way or another.”

*

In the hours that had ticked by, Jessica had been able to make more deployments into Spottswood Parish. She’d put a guard at the broken Bayou Bridge to keep people from slipping out of the parish. Another guard went onto the Floodway. The guards were only of modest value, since people who knew the country could boat out elsewhere, but these arrangements would have to do until more personnel came along.

She wouldn’t be able to accomplish much until the Rangers came from Memphis, which should happen late tonight or early tomorrow morning.

Her guard on the A.M.E. camp reported that the place seemed undisturbed. They’d chased buzzards and dogs off a number of corpses, but were otherwise keeping the place pristine until forensics people could show up. Whatever had happened there, no one had yet had the notion of cleaning it up.

By tomorrow, she figured she’d have Spottswood Parish under wraps.

She’d also sent out for MREs and fresh water. It was the best she could do without setting up a field kitchen in the Carnegie Library. Still, she noticed that some of the Warriors didn’t eat a bite until she demonstrated the food’s safety by eating some herself.

Another call came in, from one of her scout helicopters she’d sent out to look for refugees, one with a mandate to check Spottswood Parish on the far side of the bayou in order to look for the refugees who had fled from the A.M.E. camp.

She received the message, acknowledged, then stood behind her desk, raised her voice so all could hear. “Excuse me,” she said. “I wanted to let you know that your families have been located. They are on the far side of the bayou, and apparently they are all safe. My pilot would like to know if he should attempt to make contact.”

What she did, in the end, was order the chopper to land so that she could put the Warriors and their families in direct radio contact with one another. She stood back from the radio and watched as the heavily armed guerrilla fighters laughed and sobbed along with their wives, husbands, children, and parents.

She felt tears sting her own eyes at the sight. She looked up at Nick Ruford, saw him watching the scene with the expression of a man just dragged by his hair from quicksand. “I really thought we were all going to die,” he breathed.

“Nope.” Jessica grinned. “I bet it’s nice to have a life in front of you, isn’t it?”

“Yes, ma’am.” The words sounded heartfelt.

Jessica looked at him. “I served with a General Ruford once,” she said. “He was my teacher at the War College. I don’t suppose you’re related?”

Nick absorbed this, then gave her a sly look. “Sun Tzu, right?” He laughed at her startled expression. “General Ruford was my father,” he said.

“He was a good soldier.”

Nick nodded. “I know.”

“You look a lot like him.”

And then, to Jessica’s surprise, Nick turned away, and sobs began to shake his shoulders.

The President watched on television as Jessica Frazetta and the people who had been occupying the Carnegie Library in Shelburne City left the building, stepped into school buses escorted by Humvees filled with Army Rangers, and drove to the field near Clarendon where helicopters waited. He watched as the helicopters rose into the Louisiana sky, then descended onto grassy Mississippi soil near Vicksburg. The President watched as the refugees stumbled out of their doors of the Hueys and ran across the downdraft-beaten grass to be reunited with the families. He watched the weeping, the embraces, the celebration, the cries of joy.