Glen Tate - 299 Days - The Restoration

“Yes, Myron,” Hammond said, not knowing that other soldiers were listening. Since they were of the same rank, Hammond could call Brussels by his first name, “Matson knows his shit. He’s done some great stuff since this all started.”

“This Matson guy has put out a pamphlet saying Limas will be considered for pardons,” Brussels hissed. “Did you know anything about that?”

It was silent for a moment.

“No,” Hammond said. Grant’s heart sank.

“But it makes a hell of a lot of sense to me, Myron,” Hammond added, speaking peer-to-peer to Brussels. “Let him do his thing. Besides, I know for a fact that the Interim Governor is a big fan of pardons. It’s how the General wants to do it, too. Mercy, not a bloodbath. Copy?”

“I don’t appreciate your irregular people fucking with my operations here,” Brussels said. That’s about all he had.

Hammond was used to his special operations activities making regular units mad. It happened all the time.

“Want me to get the General on the horn?” Hammond asked without any emotion. Hammond knew that the man who didn’t get emotional was perceived to be the one in control.

“Not necessary,” Brussels said abruptly. “I have a city to pacify.” That was the end of that.

Brussels looked at Grant and said, “Watch yourself, Lieutenant. Now go pass out your little pamphlets while we fight a real war.”

Fuck you, Grant thought. You idiot regular units will be fighting insurgents in this town for months unless the Limas have an incentive to give up. Dumbass.

“Yes, sir,” Grant said and then stood there waiting to be dismissed.

“Dismissed,” Brussels snarled.

When they were out of earshot of everyone, Ted pulled Grant aside and whispered, “You know he’s going to try to motherfuck you at every turn, right? You do know that?”

“I do now,” Grant said. He knew that he’d have numerous challenges to his reconciliation mission. He just never thought it would be someone on his own side, and so early in the process.

“What else could go wrong?” Grant asked. Then he saw Mark’s truck pull up. And he looked in the back.

“On your knees! Hands to your sides!” screamed the man in military contractor clothes and gear.

Nancy Ringman wondered who he was talking to. She looked around. There was no one there.

“Me?” she asked in bewilderment.

“On your knees!” the man screamed. “Yes, you!”

Nancy fell to her knees. The man’s rifle, one of those assault weapons, looked terrifying to her. She started to cover her face with her hands.

“Hands to your sides — now!” he screamed.

She froze. She could not move to save her life.

She heard a click and, without knowing anything about guns, realized it must be a safety to the gun. She’d seen that in movies. This man was about to shoot her. Suddenly, she realized she needed to put her hands to her sides, which she quickly did. Her hands were shaking uncontrollably.

“Spud Six, Oscar Romeo, got a prisoner here by the football field,” he said without pushing a button on a radio mic. He had a voice activated Quietpro headset for his radio.

“Roger, Oscar Romeo,” a voice said into the man’s earpiece. “On the way.”

“How many of you are here?” the man yelled to Nancy.

She couldn’t talk. She was so scared that her mouth wouldn’t move. The man gave her one more second to talk before he would seriously consider her to be a decoy or ambush bait.

“Spud Six, Oscar Romeo,” he said into his voice-activated radio, “Prisoner won’t say how many more are here. Expect lots of bad guys. Smoke ’em if you gotta.”

Hearing that made Nancy realize these soldiers or contractors or whatever were deadly serious — and that they considered her a threat. She felt herself losing bowel control. She felt so embarrassed and helpless as she realized she has just shit her pants.

“No more,” she said meekly to the man.

“What?” he yelled at her, as he was moving with his gun trained on her head. He wanted to be mobile so he’d be harder to shoot.

“No more people here,” she said a little louder. “I’m the only one.”

“Right,” he said dismissively.

“Prisoner says she’s the only one,” he said into the radio. “Whatever. Expect bad guys.”

“If there is anyone else here,” he said to Nancy, “You’ll hear a loud noise and a tremendous burning sensation as I shoot you.” He let that sink in. “It’ll hurt. A lot.”

Nancy started crying.

“So,” he said, “I’ll ask again: how many others are here?”

“I’m it,” Nancy said between sobs. “Everyone else left.”

“Where did they go?” the man asked.

“I dunno,” she said. “They just left. This place isn’t safe.”

“Like the football field?” he screamed. “Yeah, it’s pretty dangerous out there. We know what you guys did.” He wasn’t going to tell her that the Patriots had captured several of the Clover Park guards who confessed to the massacre at the football field. He was one of the Patriot special operations troops behind the JBLM line who conducted raids and executed other impromptu missions, like liberating prison camps. He’d seen some awful things, but a mass killing like this was the worst he’d heard of.

“We had to make room for refugees,” Nancy blurted out, realizing that she was incriminating herself. While she suspected this man was a teabagger, she still couldn’t fully believe they were operating behind the JBLM line. That wasn’t supposed to happen.

“So then, you were part of the football field incident?” the man asked, thanking his lucky stars that he seemed to be getting a confession from this prisoner.

“I didn’t do any of it,” she said. “Others did.”

“Why are you here?” the man asked. He turned when he heard people running up to his position. They were his teammates.

“I,” she started to say and then the other contractors started talking to the man about other threats and where to search next.

“You what?” the man finally said, after talking to his teammates.

“I told them to do it,” she said. She realized she shouldn’t have said that, but she wanted to get it off her chest. She immediately felt better.

“Spud Six, Oscar Romeo,” the man said, “I got the ringleader.”

Patriot EPU agent Mike Turner heard what he’d been waiting for… for years.

“Carrot cake.”

That’s what the radio operator at the Think Farm said.

Mike felt a surge of adrenaline when he heard those two magical words.

“Cream cheese frosting,” Mike responded into the radio, which was the encoded reply showing that he received the code phrase and would carry out the mission.

This was it. Mike’s years of watching the government slowly imploding. The corruption. The outright theft. Putting innocent people in jail. Letting guilty ones go. Maintaining a secret membership in Oath Keepers and worrying about getting caught, then defecting from the State Patrol’s Executive Protection Unit, or EPU, a few months ago and becoming a guerilla behind enemy lines. All of it. It all came down to “carrot cake” which was the code phrase for the order to bring the Interim Governor and his staff in to Olympia. It meant the Patriots had taken the city and were holding it. That they would start governing and fixing things. Everything Mike had risked his life for during the past several years was finally here.

It was 11:32 p.m. Time to get going while it was still dark. Mike alerted his fellow former EPU members that it was time to go. They woke the families, who had been expecting this.