 
# Not My Home

By Ed Hurst

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2012 by Ed Hurst

**Copyright** **notice** : People of honor need no copyright laws; they are only too happy to give credit where credit is due. Others will ignore copyright laws whenever they please. If you are of the latter, please note what Moses said about dishonorable behavior – "be sure your sin will find you out" (Numbers 32:23)

Permission is granted to copy, reproduce and distribute for non-commercial reasons, provided the book remains in its original form.

**Cover art image:** _Vardo Camper_ – image graciously provided by Tumbleweed Tiny House Company (<http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/>). Used by permission of Tumbleweed Tiny House Company.

#  Table of Contents
## Part 1: Not So Random

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

## Part 2: Coming Home

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

## Part 3: Epilogue

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

# Part 1: Not So Random

## Chapter 1

It was probably the oldest house standing in the city, aside from the two preserved landmarks downtown. The Realtor had listed it as "antebellum" – in this case, built before World War I. Older folks called it a "shot-gun house." That is, you could open the front and back doors, fire a shotgun through either one, and no pellets would hit any part of the interior before exiting the other door. The interior walls were like bulkheads between rooms, but each was a small open area in series, with a straight doorway alignment through the middle. However, sometime after Word War II, the owners had added a room on the back, then a screened-in porch. While the abstract at city hall showed a permit for building the room, the lean-to porch was simply acknowledged and taxed accordingly. This add-on meant the front and rear doors no longer aligned.

This was an important detail to the SWAT Team. A covert survey of the back porch from the alleyway indicated the newer back door opened outward. So while the front assault team would carry a steel ram, the rear entry team would use a crowbar if entry was needed. Both doors were relatively new, but cheap, with deadbolts and no windows. All exterior windows had been kept covered by cheap roll-up blinds. Interior lights had always been dim, and below the window level. SWAT believed there were only two terrorists. The wet clothing they found a half-mile from the house indicated one was rather large and the other fairly small. It was unlikely they had heavy weapons, but there may have been grenades in their possession. Still, they could not take anything for granted. Thus, they planned to mobilize the entire SWAT Team in full gear, with Level III body armor, helmets and goggles. They had rehearsed this kind of thing so often, two hours of planning time between warning order and execution was plenty.

There would be eight men in the front, the primary assault team. The other six would serve as backup from the rear. As soon as dynamic entry had been achieved, the rear team would wait to catch anyone trying to flee out the back. The sides of the house were a mere eighteen inches from the high steel panel fences on each side. These narrow zones would be watched by uniformed officers from the street and alleyway using vehicle-mounted spotlights; no need for them to expose themselves to unnecessary risk in getting too close to the house. If there was no resistance from inside, one of the front entry team would open the back door within 30 seconds. If there were signs of resistance, or it took longer than 30 seconds, the rear team was to enter using the crowbar.

The entire task force included the SWAT van carrying the front assault team, their extra SUV for the rear team, six marked patrol vehicles, and the Chief's pickup. A block away there would be two ambulances and three fire trucks. After some debate, they decided not to alert any residents. With steel fences to separate them, and moving in at 3 AM, there was little to gain and too much to loose by making the whole operation anything less than a complete surprise. If they captured the terrorists, they could call in the local TV and newspaper reporters. Each media outlet kept people on standby just for stuff like this. If they turned up empty handed, there was no point advertising the attempt. Their targets would know the house was compromised, but not before investigators had a chance to go over the place thoroughly. Thus, the vehicles approached silently from different directions. The rest held back until the rear security team signaled they were two houses away in the alleyway.

The van driver shut off his lights and engine at the corner, and rolled silently to a quick stop just past the corner of the house lot. Even before the vehicle stopped rolling, the rear doors swung open, and caught on latches covered in thick foam padding. The men came streaming out, slightly staggered, in two lines. The two men leading carried the ram between them, weapons holstered. The actual first entry pair was right behind them, running at port arms with their shotguns. The other four, including the driver who was only a few yards behind, carried MP-5s or handguns as well as various tools. Had you been standing across the street with your back turned, by the time you heard anything and could turn around, the ram was already drawn back for the first blow.

The door was much more solid in the frame than they anticipated, but the door itself began to yield immediately. Seeing this, the entry pair jumped from either side of the doorway and grabbed the extra handles of the ram with a free hand and gave it more momentum to break through the door with the second strike. It almost worked, as the door buckled inward, yet somehow still stuck in the frame. However, with all the adrenaline and focused effort, they had not heard the wooden _thunk_ of a frame dropping down from the ceiling 20 feet from the door inside the house. In this wooden frame was cradled a modified LAW rocket launcher, rigged to fire as soon as it dropped. The timing was perfect, for when the ram struck the second time, the missile hit the door on the opposite side at the same instant.

They could not have known about the legal-pad sized, quarter-inch steel plate attached to the door on the inside face. Its purpose was not to bolster the door, but to enhance the shrapnel yield from the shaped-charge warhead on the old anti-tank missile. The plate had been deeply scored in one-inch squares. The force of the blast drove the ram back into the four men who had made the mistake of clustering behind those swinging it. The force of the blast, the fragments of the plate, and the molten jet of metal produced by the warhead were mostly absorbed by the four men swinging the ram. Standard tactical body armor was no match for such weaponry, or the large, heavy steel ram, now with jagged edges, flying fast as a bullet. The ram spun across the lawn and embedded in the door of a cruiser on the street. For a short time, a few of the SWAT Team were semi-conscious, wondering what had happened, as they lay bleeding in a pile of splinters from what had been the front door and frame.

The security team outside the back porch heard what sounded like a double explosion. The old LAW rockets had solid propellant motors which ignited in such a way as to burn almost completely at launch, with a fairly loud boom itself. The warhead detonation was muffled somewhat by being inside the house, and also by being aimed out the front door. Still, the force of the blast broke out the windows in the front, and the rear team took it for a concussion grenade, a sign of resistance inside.

Charging onto the back porch, they forgot all the rules and clustered almost too close to the man wielding the crowbar. The lead man stepped to the far side of the door, turning his right side toward it. He planted his right foot on the back step below the door, reared back with the crowbar over his left shoulder, and slammed it into the crack between the door and frame level with the lock. Switching his grip while in motion, he swung is body around the other side of the door, brushing against two of his partners in the cramped space on the back porch. His body slammed to a stop as arms strained against the leverage. It held just an instant, and then suddenly the door burst open.

It's not likely any of them saw the claymore mine mounted at waist level on the inside face of the door. Stopped suddenly by the wall behind it, the door caught on a latch mounted in the wall just as the mine exploded. Even the steel fence outside the porch was perforated by some of the steel ball-bearings projected by the claymore. Later on, it required some careful DNA testing to determine what lump belonged to whom, scattered from the door, through the gaping hole in the porch wall, all the way to the fence.

To the neighbors on both sides, the whole thing sounded like three quick explosions, the first two in rapid succession, all entirely too close to their homes. Those three were followed by sirens clearly audible through now-cracked windows on the side facing the little old house. But that was not the worst of it, for there were a series of smaller muffled explosions, followed by choking fumes from burning plastic. There was another loud explosion, later determined to be from gas leaking under the house. Within minutes everyone was being evacuated, as the shattered wood structure was totally involved in flames. The black smoke and heat made it clear parts of the interior had been coated with highly flammable accelerants. It looked as if the stuff had been applied in long, thick patches from ceiling to floor, about a foot wide, puffed out like foam. Each patch was a column of blazing heat which could not be easily extinguished. Also, there were continuing small explosions from inside the home. This kept the firemen at a distance; all they could do was keep the fire from spreading by hosing down drifting sparks. They considered it good fortune the temperature had not yet dropped to freezing.

As the sun rose, all that was left was a low smoking heap. The outer layer of the roof survived from the sheer volume of water, but little of it had run down inside. Much of the spray directed from a safe distance at the open windows was evaporated by the intensity of the heat. Even the steel panel fences had buckled some from it. Residents on the entire block and the one opposite had been hustled out, some violently. A few had carried luggage, wisely reading the situation and packing for an enforced vacation. News crews were kept back. The remains of the rear security team were a little easier to find, because the back porch had somehow partially survived the flames. The front entry team was covered by a portion of the roof, as the house had collapsed forward into the front yard. What was found was badly charred.

The chief was still sweating in spite of the cold morning air. He was also covered in smoke and small cuts from the explosions, even though he had been standing on the far side of the street during the assault. There were gashes in his palms and a tear in one pants leg from trying to pull burnt splinters off the bodies of his SWAT crew. To one of his captains he said, "The Feds will be here, I'm sure. They can have it. Give them what they demand, if you can, and stay out of their way." He stood up from where he half-sat against the tailgate of his pickup. As he walked around to get in the driver's door, he turned and spoke back over his shoulder. "We're going to have all we can do with the City. They're gonna want our heads. Fourteen of the highest paid, best trained tactical officers in the state – gone in one operation, along with nearly all their equipment. Five million dollars in matching federal grants and we might have enough left to put in three caskets." With a choking laugh, he said, "Wonder what the City will tell the Feds." The tears in his eyes mixed with the sweat, cooling his face as he drove away in the crisp winter morning.

The Feds did, indeed, come. It was an assortment of FBI, BATFE, Homeland Security Officers and who knew what else. They arrived to find the municipal crime scene investigators had just finished locating and marking, but not removing, any of the human remains. Having been warned, the local police simply surrendered everything and tried to get out of the way. All the notes, cameras with pictures, drawings, etc., were seized. Some had quickly made copies, and already hidden them. It might now be a federal investigation, but it was their friends and comrades who had died. They had learned from the law enforcement grapevine if they complied with federal demands in an obvious way, no one would search them for copies of things, as long as no physical evidence was removed from the site.

In keeping with the new federal mandates, the city and county supplied the heavy equipment as "federalized assets" until further notification. The city government was too busy to argue much, trying to calm the residents after telling them the Feds would not allow them back into their homes until the scene was cleared. Everyone with a municipal paycheck who could be spared was assigned to help these new refugees keep their lives under control, and liaised with the Feds to evacuate pets, turn off appliances, and retrieve wallets and purses. Nothing else was allowed out of the secured zone. This meant giving them bus passes, loaning bicycles from the unclaimed property lot, opening retired unused buildings as shelters – the City did a lot better job than most. The churches pitched in with various kinds of help. The big Charismatic church opened their recreation building for emergency housing, and mobilized their Sunday School bus fleet. The mayor made it a point to ensure the news crews knew all about it, too. He was up for re-election soon.

By sunset the first day, the Feds had finished removing the human remains, and made requisitions of heavy equipment for the next morning. It started with backhoes and trucks, breaking up and hauling away the roof and charred scraps of wood. By mid-day, they discovered the old house had a half-basement, made of poured concrete. It was several inches deep in water from the fire hoses, and had to be pumped out. They also discovered there was a manhole cover in the lowest part, where one might normally expect a drain. Once it was cleared, the heavy equipment was idled. This cast iron cover had been welded in place, as it were, by what appeared to be molten lead. Given the age of the house, they decided the fire had melted whatever original lead pipe plumbing remained in the house, and it pooled in the lowest part, sealing the manhole cover in place. Tracks of molten lead across the floor seemed to bear this out.

They called for a cutting torch, and then visited a retired plumber who would know how to remove it. When he balked because of arthritis, they threatened to jail him and promised he'd have even more physical discomfort from an "accident" on the way to prison. Gone were the days of offering more money. With burly security officers breathing down his neck, he managed to clear the lead and lever up the edge of the plate just as the sun was setting. The officers drug him out of the way as others swarmed over the plate, lifting it quickly off the opening.

What they found was what appeared to be a vertical shaft filled with sand, very fresh sand with recently used cigarette butts and other trash. Ordering in flood lights, they called in City Water Department crewman and demanded they remove the sand, making sure to put it in buckets to be sifted for evidence later. Bailing and shoveling the fine grit, they found a second iron plate at the bottom of a four foot cast iron shaft. There were two climbing rungs on one side. The workmen couldn't climb out fast enough to avoid some rough treatment from the Feds, and the rest was cleared with a shop vacuum. They were ordered to stand by, then released conditionally when it was discovered this second manhole cover was welded in place by the more typical method.

They waited impatiently for daylight before the FBI Special Agent in Charge (SAC) could get hold of a bottled gas supplier to provide fresh tanks for the cutting torch. This would require an industrial gas, since the weld appeared to have been done quite professionally with heavy welding equipment. For the hundredth time, the SAC wondered how all this could be done without anyone seeing the equipment coming and going. Even with severe threats, the neighbors around the house remained truculent when questioned about the activity of the two men who had rented the place for the past month. The SAC had the most resentful neighbors arrested and questioned as terrorist sympathizers. Citizens had to learn not to question their government.

By mid-morning, the plate had been opened, and the worker chased out of the shaft by an overwhelming foul odor. Just below the plate was an old but still active municipal sewer line, running half full at that moment. Donning a full protective suit and mask, it took the worker another hour to finish removing the plate in sections. Then similarly suited investigators descended to check for any useful evidence. Finding none, they proceeded to put a plastic cover over the hole.

Barely controlling his heaving stomach, the SAC demanded over his cell phone the City send a Works Engineer with drawings. Meanwhile, the backhoes continued more carefully, removing the rest of the debris from the half basement, while avoiding knocking anything onto the opening. The smell had dissipated rather quickly in the cold air by the time the engineer arrived. The SAC scorned bitterly the "amateurs" in City Engineering who had no precise locations of these older sewer lines. Consulting ancient drawings, some of which split in places when unrolled, the engineer and his helpers finally discerned this was indeed an active sewer, still draining a significant number of houses and shops, but no others in this block. This was apparently the only house still standing old enough to be using the older lines. There was an old policy requiring new or remodeled homes to connect to the new line under the street. This older line also carried some overflow, directed by automated pumps which waited for low use times at night to empty holding lagoons a mile away. These pipes had not been empty in the past ten years.

This was obviously not an escape route.

The SAC cursed again, blaming the incompetence of locals for presenting such a puzzling problem. The terrorists had been seen entering the house late in the evening before the SWAT Team raid. Plain-clothes officers watching the house had not seen anyone leave, either by the front or the alleyway out back. The Chief affirmed once again the suspects most certainly had to have been there when the raid took place. Yet no remains had been found except the SWAT Team, and it was not humanly possible they had escaped down into the sewers. That was clearly a diversion, something to keep everyone busy for the past two days. Where did they go, and how had they gotten out?

Suddenly a workman yelled from the back of the concrete pit where the house had stood. He was waving for someone to come see something. The SAC himself walked up just as the workman was tracing with an iron tool on the back wall a jagged seam in the concrete. It appeared to have cracked at one time, then been repaired with some black sealant – except the sealant was rather fresh. It ran at an angle across the face of the concrete half-height wall in one corner. A small amount had also oozed out of the fold where the floor joined the wall, and where the two walls came together. It looked first as if it had been clumsily dripped there, but now it was apparent it was squeezing out of a closed seam, as if the thing had been pulled out, the pushed back into place.

The SAC began yelling instructions like a madman, and no human there could move fast enough. Bent over behind the workman who was beating on several chisels he had wedged around the edges of this triangle of black sealant, the SAC was shaking from exhaustion. Still, he watched in the failing light of the winter afternoon, as the triangle turned out to be a sort of door. It fell away and thudded flat on the floor, revealing a very narrow passage, a simple dirt tunnel sloping down toward the alleyway. Screaming for the engineer, he demanded to know if any utility conduits aside from the sewer ran nearby. Without having to check, the engineer said the alleyway had the standard storm drain. Followed close on his heels by uniformed agents, the SAC was dragging a workman by the front of his jacket. He stopped at the edge of the alley, looked both ways, and pointed to a grating in the pavement.

Demanding lights be brought around, he ordered all the gratings in the two blocks both directions be checked for signs of recent opening. Turning to the engineer, he asked how likely the City crews had moved anything recently. The engineer had to call back to the main office and have the work order database queried. It took awhile, but the answer was a clear "no," not since the previous spring cleaning. Just then, an agent called from one end of the block. A workman was holding up a grating panel from a large drain opening, and the agent held a flashlight down where the concrete wall of the drain casing showed marks – scuffing from black rubber shoe soles. They were quite fresh, but impossible to judge how recent in terms of hours or days. The lip of the grating socket for this panel was free of loose sand which was otherwise all around the grating opening.

Looking up and down the street, the SAC noticed it was just the kind of place where no one would notice if people had come out of the grating hole at 3 AM or so. No emergency vehicles would have come from that direction, because it was a closed pocket. Cursing, he ordered a close examination of the probable route for any clues, then turned and stalked off around the corner, back toward where his SUV was parked. He was already deep in conversation with someone on his cell phone before he got the door open.

## Chapter 2

Michael decided he liked city buses. Unlike the interstate bus lines, you could carry your luggage right on the bus with you, and it was wholly unlikely anyone who mattered would wonder what you had in it. All the more would they ignore you if you smelled like a bum and paid with grubby currency. He limped a little from the bruise on his shin where his leg hit the police cruiser. He had forgotten he couldn't do a low sweeping kick without having a place for the leg to go beyond the target. But the limp added to his disguise as a bum.

Back when he had worked as an investigative journalist, he had needed to wear disguises from time to time, but nothing like this. Michael looked over at his sleeping partner, Burk, and marveled how the boy could snooze under the most difficult times. When Michael had first asked him, Burk had said there really was nothing else he could do. Besides, it fit the profile of wandering bums. Keeping awake would look suspicious, he figured. Michael had to admit he was right, and was at least pretending to sleep, even while his mind, and sometimes his heart, raced with tension. Michael was still trying to learn how to let things go, not to over-analyze what they accomplished. Intellectually, he knew once they had committed themselves, most of their choices were already made. Get it done, get out, and hope you don't get caught.

Of course, Burk really was a former "bum" – actually a hobo. His childhood began in the rural South, but he moved with his mother to a city in the Pacific Northwest at the start of his teen years. Burk's father, a mystery he never discussed much, had disappeared from the young man's life, and mom was trying to keep the two of them alive. She chose Salem, Oregon, very far from their southern home. They arrived in the summer, and stayed in a motel. She just missed being hired at the poultry processing plant, and started waiting tables in some hippy restaurant downtown. Pretending an interest in the Green politics of the manger, things were tolerable for her. Burk occupied himself wandering the fairgrounds, exploring downtown, then began spending some time in the city library. The library became his hangout. Mom usually found him there when she got off in the evenings.

One warm August evening, she was late. He figured she was negotiating with her boss for a loan to pay the motel bill. The motel manager had been bothering his mom because they got behind, pressuring her for sex or money. The former made her skin crawl, she said. When it was dark, he decided to walk toward the cafe. Two blocks away, he started running, because he saw a police car with flashing lights out front of the building where the cafe was located. That last half block, he slowed from simple caution, and joined the crowd of onlookers. Standing on tiptoe, he saw a couple of paramedics wheeling out a folding gurney, with the person on it completely covered, head to toe. For a few moments, the light from the cafe door and big glass windows showed the whole scene clearly. Just as he caught the discussion about an armed robbery, he also caught a glimpse of his mother's dress peeking out from under the blanket. It had to be her dress; people in the Northwest never made clothing from gaudy printed flour sacks like those used at the feed mill back home.

He turned away in shock, then vomited what little was left in his stomach onto the sidewalk. When someone came up behind and touched him, asking if he was alright, he bolted. Running back the way he had come, he finally stopped outside the now vacant library. Trying to stop the spinning world, he closed his eyes, sitting with his back to one of the large evergreens along the river bank. It seemed only a moment, but he was startled awake by a heavy vehicle passing on the street nearby. It was early morning. Jumping to his feet, he ran toward the southern edge of town, and simply kept going.

He had already learned about dumpster diving from sheer boyhood curiosity, but now it was survival. In the process, he encountered some hobos who took him under their wings.

Over the years, he had stayed with various hobo colonies along the West Coast, raised with an education no school could match. While he went hungry often enough to consider it a minor inconvenience, he managed to eat well enough to become rather larger than average, and quite strong. Oddly, the move to Oregon and the death of his mother were about the only parts of his past he seemed willing to tell in any detail. He seemed unsure and unconcerned how old he was, but was quite obviously not yet of legal age to drink alcohol.

When Michael first met Burk, however, the boy was doing just that. Rather than the stumbling drunk, the big kid was merely savoring a wine cooler outside an abandoned gas station in Northern California. Michael had been taking the scenic route home after checking out a story in Portland for the news publisher which employed him. He got a flat tire, and decided to roll on far enough to make the gas station. He could just make out the top of the sign when he realized his tire was flat. The place sat in a pocket cut out of the tall trees, so Michael was off the main road before he realized it was abandoned. Hoping and praying the spare and jack were still in the trunk, he got out to look at the flat tire on the right rear. Opening the lid, he saw the spare, one of those hard-rubber mini-spares. It was designed to roll well enough even without inflation. There was also a tire iron, but no jack. After ten minutes of fruitless poking in the trunk, he looked up at the building. That's when he saw Burk.

Realizing the well-dressed driver had seen him, Burk stood up and ambled over to the car sitting askew. Burk asked simply, "No jack?" His voice had a soft rasp to it, and was rather high pitched.

Michael realized immediately this large young fellow taking one last swig of a wine cooler could easily hurt him. Even with his karate classes, he wasn't sure he could fend off an attack. The boy was dressed in worn and stained overalls, and a t-shirt of no distinct color, but approaching orange. His shoulders bulged under the thinning fabric. The young fellow turned and tossed the empty bottle at a rusted out dumpster overturned on one side of the building. Falling just short, it shattered into many pieces, all of which appeared to slide and bounce into the opening of the dumpster. With a self-satisfied grin, the boy turned back, still standing at a comfortable distance away.

"Let's make a deal," the boy proposed. "I help you get this tire changed, and you give me a ride. Okay? I realize you are rightly suspicious of whether I might have bad intentions. All I can do is give you my word I'm not interested in hurting people. I just need a ride into the city."

Michael never expected this sort of persuasive and literate speech from someone with such an appearance. Shaggy hair topped a round face, and youthful red cheeks with clear skin, but thinly covered in long, pale whiskers which had never seen a razor. His face said he was an inbred idiot mountain boy. His words and actions said otherwise. "Okay. I'll bite – how do you plan to help me? You look rather stout, but I wonder if you would be able to just lift the car that far, for that long."

"It's possible I could, but there's no need. Front wheel drive, right?" Upon Michael's affirmative nod, he walked over behind the dumpster where there was a pile of automotive junk, and retrieved a bent wheel rim. Walking back, he placed it near the rear corner behind the flat tire, one face down. Then he got down and looked underneath the car. Dragging the steel rim across the pavement, he placed it carefully, and bent to look under the car again. Then, too quickly for his bulk he was on his feet again walking back toward the pile of discarded car parts. He waded around for a moment, then pulled up a long heavy pipe. Looking about, he snatched up another, somewhat thinner pipe of similar length.

Michael judged his own body could not have lifted either pipe easily using both hands, but the boy carried one in each of his. He dropped them rather noisily on the pavement behind the car, and then sauntered yet one more time to the junk pile. He pulled up an old tire, blown out on one side. With a whimsical half-grin, he walked back again. Stooping down, he slid the old tire up under the rear bumper, and then motioned Michael to hold the outer edge up against the curved underside. "This will protect the paint, and keep things from slipping," the boy announced. Then he slid the rim over a couple of feet behind the tire, stood it on edge, and dragged the larger pipe closer. Lifting the near end, he placed it in the valley atop the rim. Blocking the rim from rolling with one foot, he stretched the other foot back up the length of the pipe as far as he could. Michael wondered if the overalls would hold up if he reached any farther. Then he wondered if the boy would do the splits. Not quite.

Lifting the pipe a little, the boy slid the end, which was slightly bent in a short turn, up under the tire. Michael moved his hand just before it was crushed between the pipe and the underside of the old tire. The boy moved it around a bit, making sure the bent end caught like a hook on the undercarriage, then pulled the other end down until the old tire collapsed. Once there was pressure holding the rim in place, he removed his foot. Keeping one hand on the far end of the pipe, the boy slid farther back, caught up the second pipe in one hand and slid it part way into the larger. Still keeping the pressure against the old tire pinned to the frame of the car, the young man worked his way out to the end of the second pipe just over his head, and pulled down on it.

By now, Michael realized the intent and grabbed the tire iron. The car shifted upward a few inches. The young man stopped halfway down; "Now, while the flat tire is still on the ground, turn the lug nuts until they're loose." Michael swore the fellow sounded like a science professor he had in college, and applied pressure to the lug nuts. It took him long enough he felt embarrassed about it, but once all four were loose, he stood up. The young man then leaned mightily on the pipe and the car lifted off the ground, just far enough to pull off the flat. Michael felt obliged to work quickly, spinning off the lug nuts, losing and chasing two of them under the car and getting his nice clothes dirty. He hurriedly swapped the flat for the spare, though need not have worried. He glanced up to see the young man sitting comfortably on the pipe just inches off the ground.

Spinning the lug nuts finger tight, he said, "Okay!"

The stranger then shifted his weight, turned and let the car down as fast as he safely could. Michael could only gaze at the scene and say, "Wow!" Upon the boy reminding him to finish snugging the lug nuts down tight, Michael moved energetically to the task. Before he had finished putting everything back in the trunk, the young man had carried or tossed the junk back on the pile.

He turned to Michael with a self-satisfied grin, put out his hand and said, "My name is Burk." The two shook equally dirty hands, and loaded Burk's bags in the trunk. As he settled himself in the passenger seat, Burk said, "You can find a tire shop about 20 miles ahead, just before the turn off heading into town."

## Chapter 3

Michael smiled and told Burk his name. It dawned on him the young man didn't smell as bad as he expected, just a whiff of fresh perspiration. "Burk, I'm an investigative reporter. I just came from Portland, Oregon this morning."

Burk asked what he could be investigating there. Michael explained the military recruiting station downtown was facing accusations of bribing prospective recruits for the latest war half-way around the world. It seems they were offering not just cash, but drugs, which never seemed to show up in the urinalysis portion of the entrance physicals.

"I don't suppose you've been in the military yet, Burk?"

"No. I'm sure I'd do just fine, but I don't have anything proving who I am. I don't officially exist." He told the story of moving to Oregon and losing his mother. "After what I've seen of government behavior, I think remaining an official nobody is a pretty good idea."

Michael asked what he meant about government behavior. Adding yet another surprise, Burk discussed a litany of things of which Michael knew only from a reporter's angle. The young man described a sampling of things which had annoyed Michael, as well, but from a different viewpoint, as if he had been a victim of it. Burk had an underlying vision of what was behind it all, too substantial to be mere conspiracy theory. It was an apparent plan Michael had always suspected, but was never too clear in his previous investigations.

"I call them the Shadow Government," Burk said. He reeled off facts and figures, bits of history and obscure details not commonly known. "Most of them claim to be Jews, but it's not about Judaism. They seem to be more like parasites using bits of Jewish uniqueness to hide their behavior. I believe they've hijacked a much older conspiracy. Since the seventeenth century, this one bunch, mostly related by blood or marriage to the Rothschilds, has steadily gained control of every nation's currency. Along the way, they've stirred up various false conspiracies, most of which appear to have been a diversion. At some point the tight family unity became diluted and it's no longer their game alone. You can stand in the middle of clear and open facts, but if you focus on the wrong things, you'll miss the obvious."

"Like how to jack up this car with junk?" Michael asked.

Burk grinned, looking out the side window for a moment. Then he turned back and said, "You know about investigating and writing. You know how government works in person, and how bureaucrats think." With a shrug he added, "I know how other things work."

"You seem to know a lot about who's actually running the world today."

"I read a lot of history," Burk said. "I've hung out in libraries a lot since Mom died. At first, I'd read anything. I'd play a game to occupy myself, and grab a book at random. One day it was a book on European History. It was a bunch of stories about ordinary people during the Middle Ages, and how they lived day to day. I'm not sure why, but it just grabbed me. So I found out it was called 'social history' and I've been reading as much about that as I could ever since. From there, it seemed important to know more about history in general. Then it was geography, and I've just recently started on economics."

"All this without ever going to school?"

"Yep. There's the tire shop," he said, pointing.

Michael pulled in and was met by the lone attendant before he could fully exit his car. After showing him the flat, Michael was not surprised to discover it had to be replaced. The attendant turned it over to reveal a blown out bubble on the back sidewall. Michael spotted a cafe across the road, and realized it was lunch time. Leaning back in the open door, he said to Burk, "Let's eat!"

## Chapter 4

Older, but not yet ancient, she stood at the cash register. She spotted them over the shoulder of the truck driver as she gave him his change. After exchanging pleasantries with him, he turned away and she tilted her head to one side. Muttering to herself, she tried, "Mutt and Jeff?" No, the difference wasn't great enough. The one was clearly better than six feet, and muscular. The other might be a half-foot shorter, rather slight, with a handsome face. "Certainly an odd couple," she said. The shorter and obviously older man wore nice clothes: khaki-gray slacks that fit perfectly, a pin-stripped blue and gray short-sleeved shirt with a dark red tie, shod with stylish black loafers. There were telltale stains on the knees of his pants. The big one looked like a bumpkin, a regular farm boy – he never changed from the first time she saw him. She arranged the loose currency and closed the drawer.

As they came in the door, from behind the cash register she looked up. Placing her arms akimbo, she demanded, "What are you dragging in here, now?"

Michael was stunned by the familiarity of her tone, and was about to make some stiff reply about Burk, but was cut off by the younger man's surprisingly gruff response in a mock Appalachian accent. "Don't matter, woman. You jest get us up some grub and be quick about it!" She looked shocked for a mere second, and then both she and Burk burst into laughter. She came out from behind the counter and gave Burk a hug.

"It's been a long time, Sonny. Where have you been?"

"Lookin' fer my mama," he continued the phony Appalachian accent.

"Honey, I've been right here all along. You're the one who keeps wandering off." She stepped behind the counter and began assembling cups and saucers. As she poured coffee in them, she turned and said, "Sit where you like, boys."

As they took opposite sides of an empty booth, Michael said, "Well, I didn't realize I was in famous company."

Burk grinned. "I try to make friends and treat people right wherever I go. I let them decide if they'd rather be enemies. I don't like to talk about what happens when things get ugly, but I'm here and don't have too many scars."

The woman set their cups of coffee down, then placed a menu in front of Michael. Turning to Burk, she said, "I already know what you want." Burk shook his head once sharply and grinned. To Michael, "Since you're his friend, I recommend you try the ocean catfish today."

That suited Michael, and he took a sip of coffee. While Burk still held his to his mouth, Michael noted, "Now that's good stuff. I'll have to remember this place, if only for the great coffee."

"Mama knows what she's doing," Burk agreed quietly.

"I have a brown belt in karate," Michael began, "but I haven't had to use it much. I'm glad I didn't need to try it against you. I'm better at asking questions and typing on computers than fighting."

"I wish I had access to computers more often." Burk explained he learned all he knew from library computers and a couple of Internet cafes. "I know just enough to hate Windows."

"I wish I had time and inclination to learn something else. Macs are popular with a lot of news rooms, but I just can't see spending that much money on a Mac notebook, when I'm sure I'll drop it sooner or later. I've lost three laptops that way."

"Ever heard of Linux or BSD?" Burk asked.

"Oh, I'm no hacker. I know my way around the Net really well, and can break into some systems when it really matters. Still, I can't see myself being a complete computer geek," Michael snorted.

"It's not like that," Burk countered softly. "The main advantage is you can be sure there are no back doors in the system. You know the NSA has keys to every version of Windows so far? Well, researchers keep finding something in the latest version which still responds to outside prompting from certain government servers."

"Well, it's not like there aren't enough security holes anyway. How many active Windows viruses are out there now? A million? Then there's spyware, rootkits – you name it. I'm more paranoid about taking my company laptop online than I am about investigating drug-running street gangs first person."

Burk grinned, shaking his head slowly. He looked up as Mama approached with their plates. He spoke again in that faux Appalachian sharp tone: "It's about time, woman!"

She winked at Michael. "Oh, hush up and eat. You look so starved, I'll bet your friend could whip you all over the parking lot," the woman answered playfully.

Grabbing her hand, Burk kissed it and spoke in his normal voice. "You take such good care of me! How did I live before I met you?" She grinned and walked away, just as a large group entered the cafe.

After a few minutes of stuffing their faces, Michael continued. "So you say those other systems aren't just for geeks?"

Over a mouthful of chicken-fried steak and gravy, Burk managed to say, "No. It's about people determined to be free from interference. Lots of ordinary people use them." He swallowed and took a sip of coffee. "I know a guy in Texas, an old disabled veteran. He writes a blog and some articles about the Bible, politics, history, privacy issues – and he does it all on a system he built from spare parts running FreeBSD. Probably knows less about computers then you do, just surfs the web like anyone else. He's not a guru; he just decided to take the time to learn enough to use it. You'd be surprised how many of those underground patriot militia types run Linux because the government can't easily snoop their systems."

"What about viruses?"

Burk took a moment to chew and swallow. "There aren't very many, and all of them are obsolete. That is, they only work on software nobody runs any more. It takes an active and attentive effort to crack even those poorly secured."

"You mean their fans aren't like Windows users, some whom are still running XP, for goodness sakes?"

"The core group of people who use Linux and BSD are better about paying attention to security updates. It's all free to begin with. You can buy nice boxed sets, but the copyright they all use requires them to offer it free in some form. Nobody owns it; it's just shared among people who believe it's important to keep it free and open. People all over the world, and plenty of them hate governments – ours especially – and they'd never knowingly give any secret keys, nor build back doors. There's no way to hide them, since the source code itself is there for anybody to see."

Michael's left hip was beeping out a lilting tune. "Excuse me," he said as he pulled out a cell phone. Looking at the face of it, he formed a silent "uh-oh." With a forced cheery note, he said, "Hello, this is..."

He never got to say another word, aside from the occasional "yes" and "mm-hm." Finally, there was a short, "Okay." He tapped the screen a couple of times and returned it to carrier mounted on his belt. He stared at the table a moment, with his hands together on the edge, fingers interlaced. The sound of one foot tapping was just audible from under the table.

Burk offered, "I'm not keeping you from your girlfriend, am I?"

Michael looked up with a half-grin. "No such thing. That was work." Lifting his cup, he took a sip while staring out the window.

By now, Burk had cleaned his plate – literally. During the whole meal, he had kept his fork in his left hand, and his knife in the right. With the latter he cut, and loaded the fork with anything he couldn't simply stab. The entire meal, gravy and all, had been scraped neatly onto is fork and then poked into his mouth. Michael decided he was finished, and slid out of the seat. He dropped some bills on the table and prepared to leave. Burk had already moved to give Mama a parting hug. "Maybe I'll see you again in a couple of days."

"Looking forward to it, big boy."

Michael lavished praise on the food without slowing and went out the door. He could see his car now sitting level across the highway. Turning, he checked to see Burk hurrying behind him. Making sure to get a receipt from the tire man, Michael quickly got in his car and started the motor. Burk figured if he hadn't already been buckled in, he'd have been left there, fifty miles short of his goal.

## Chapter 5

They rolled through the woods, and then descended into the valley with open fields. Michael seemed far away. Then, as they were just entering the edge of town, he turned suddenly and asked Burk to recite some of the names in the Shadow Government. He listened, and recognized two or three as names of bankers not far from his office.

As they pulled up near the city library, Michael asked, "How would I get hold of you, say, a week from now?"

Burk mulled it over for moment. The thin whiskers attached to his upper chin stood out straight as the boy bit his lower lip a moment. Then he pursed his lips and frowned. "I don't know. I don't even have an email address right now. I lost the last one when I didn't log in for three months."

"Here," Michael said reaching into a briefcase lying on the seat behind him. He pulled out another cell phone, and a cord with a wall wart on one end. "This one is older, but it still works just fine. The battery stays charged pretty well unless you actually use it. Just plug it in whenever you get close to electricity. Surely you can find a pocket to keep it in. The real advantage is it's got a stronger than average signal and a better receiver. If you are within five miles of a service area, especially on high ground, it should work fine. If I don't call you by this time next week, you call me. Okay?" He scribbled the number on back of a business card, and passed it over as well.

"Why does it matter so much? These things aren't cheap, I know."

"Burk, I may need your help and expertise. That last call was to cancel the story in Portland. That leaves me with another I've been mulling, but you've given me a much better angle. I'm going to check on that Shadow Government business in my own town. If I can sell the story, I'll be glad to share the pay with you, or buy you anything you might want or need."

Burk half-grinned. "Okay. That might be useful."

Michael added, "Who knows? I might need you along for some of this later."

Burk looked dubious as he got out of the car. Michael popped the trunk lid from inside. When Burk had gotten his bags and closed it again, Michael knew he had to move right away, or risk getting any more of the police officer's attention, which appeared about ready to turn around as he passed going the other way. Pulling away, Michael wasted no time hitting Interstate 5 and heading south to beat the sundown getting home.

Burk took a short detour to the alley behind the library, then came in the side entrance and followed the hall around to the front desk area. As he strode in the door, the librarian smiled at him. Burk's size was imposing, but his round face and fuzzy, never-been-shaved teenager's beard made people underestimate his real strength – his intellect. As he approached her desk, she pulled out some books she had been saving. He stretched out his hand, his face one big grateful smile, and thanked her profusely for going to so much trouble for him. Patrons like him made her job worthwhile, in her opinion. He retreated to his favorite corner, sliding down into the well-worn soft seat, and lost himself in the first book. It had been translated from French, and went on at length explaining how feudalism contained the seeds of its own destruction.

Having taught himself speed reading, he was nearly finished with the small stack of books when the intercom gently notified him the library was closing in ten minutes. Nine o'clock already?

Once back out in the alley behind, he retrieved his bags from the old lady who kept them for him. They exchanged pleasantries, and he handed her a cling-wrapped stack of homemade cookies Momma had slipped him as he left the cafe. He turned and headed to the reservoir where the hobos camped. Despite having almost no teeth, the old woman had already devoured one of the cookies before he cleared the end of the alleyway.

As the sun was setting out his right window, Michael was praying. Though he hadn't attended a traditional church in quite some time, he met with a Bible study group when he was in town. The leader arranged to hold meetings at odd times during the week, and Michael usually made at least one in every seven days. Some sessions were in members' homes, sometimes a private dining area in a restaurant, or wherever they could gather such that quiet singing wouldn't bother anyone else.

He might not quickly claim the label "Christian," since it often came with baggage he didn't own, but Michael considered himself a follower of Jesus. That in itself left more than enough room for debate and study.

"Lord, I was wondering if Burk might be an angel. I realize he's just a human, but I seem to recall Your friend Paul talked about messengers from You who would provoke significant change, and he called them angels. Somehow, I get the feeling I'll need to cling to You like never before in the coming days. Please, help me to see what You value in all this."

## Chapter 6

To say he was stunned would be an understatement. With his mouth still hanging open, Michael stared at his editor for long moments. Before he could unleash the piercing questions for which he was famous, the editor, a retired Marine sergeant, snatched Michael by the front of his light rain jacket. This, too, was completely unexpected. The editor dragged Michael out the door, then a short way down the hall between empty cubicles. In one swift motion he snatched open the door to the janitor's closet and swung Michael in, spinning him around. Before Michael could focus, the powerful middle-aged man stood with his right index finger in Michael's face. Michael could imagine him wearing a Smokey hat.

It was intense, just above a whisper. "Do you have any idea what you have stirred up? These bankers are not your average businessmen nor bureaucrats. Those kind of people only _think_ they have power; these bankers _are_ power. Not just money, though I assure you any one of them could buy and sell the entire staff of here as individuals, and the whole publishing company, too. Most people want power to get money. These people already have money, and use it to maintain their power. It's not just a matter of you getting hurt. They can hurt everyone you know, and keep you and them in constant fear and misery over a long course of life!"

Michael swallowed hard and thought up something he hoped would at least give him more information. "I take it you weren't just a standard combat Marine."

"Hell, no! I'm not telling you anything about my security work in embassies across Europe. I'm not telling you about the things I had to pretend I didn't overhear when people who can put God on hold chatted about the things that worried them. I'm not telling how I heard all the same family names you listed in your notes. What I am telling you is you are in way over your head. If you want to fight, pick an enemy in the lower ranks. Find a battle you can afford to lose, and stop putting in jeopardy people you don't even know."

The editor's chest heaved, and the mop closet was getting very close and stuffy. He glanced at his watch. "I have ten minutes to call and tell someone you have cleared the building and aren't coming back. They will be here to check, and will be ransacking your office and our computers. If they find anything that makes them unhappy, I'll be the first to come looking for you. Better I should feel bad about killing you quickly than to face what they can dish out, to me and every one in this building. Now move it!"

Some time ago, Michael had already rehearsed the possibility of being fired. This was just a more expedited version of what he imagined. He frequently backed up all his files to a jump drive which seldom left his pocket except to work on the contents. Now it was time to erase the temporary versions from his desktop computer, as well as the company laptop he used. The latter was sitting open and running on the left side of his desk, while the desktop system sat at an angle on his right. On both systems, he clicked an icon which ran a high security file wiper yet one last time on the folders where he had kept his notes, then removed itself the same way. Every scrap of paper he had not already turned over to the editor was neatly bundled in one manila wallet. He pulled that wallet out of the clip which held it to the bottom of his lowest desk drawer.

He took just a moment to make sure he had missed nothing. Then he nearly ran to the back stairs, hesitating to listen a moment. Descending as fast as he safely could, he dropped seven floors, all the way to the basement parking garage. The outside entrance was gated, closed to everyone without an employee parking permit. Even with his efforts to stay in shape, he was somewhat out of breath. Still, he ran to a service door, opened it and stepped into a dusty, darkened room. Feeling his way, he slipped behind the rust-streaked furnaces, just visible in the light of their own fires. Pushing aside an old full-length cabinet door leaning against the wall, he stepped into a narrow stairway behind it, and then put the metal panel back into place. Trying to avoid touching the walls, he descended the narrow stairs to another rusting steel service door. He turned the lock, stepped around the door, and reset the lock before closing it firmly.

Standing in an old municipal service tunnel, he stopped to catch his breath. He retrieved a line from an old evangelistic film, whispering, "Pay attention, Jesus!" Then he walked quickly and quietly toward the former city hall, now used for storage. He had learned of the route connecting to his publisher's building when digging into some shady dealing where a councilman was getting kickbacks from new equipment declared surplus. The councilman had directed it sold to a single dealer without auction. Finally making his way back to the street level, Michael chuckled to himself how his exposure of it created political fireworks.

If even so much as ten percent of what he had learned, and what the editor had told him, were actual fact, there was probably no detail of his life the Shadow Government didn't know by now – or couldn't find if they wanted it. Still, he wasn't taking any chances, he decided. Thus, before starting any research he had already moved a couple of boxes of absolute essentials to the commercial storage facility on the edge of town. An old flame still worked there, and allowed him to leave his compact pickup in one of the units, without fee or contract. It was completely dark by the time the taxicab dropped him there. He had purposely chosen the one taxi outfit everyone, except perhaps the drivers, knew he hated. The owner kept his substandard cars in service by payoffs and favors to the city manager, who had direct control over licensing cab companies.

With his pocket flashlight, he checked to make sure everything was in place, the boxes sealed precisely the same way, an odd pattern he memorized. The camping gear was especially important. Throwing his bundle on the front seat, he started the motor and backed out. Closing the door and locking it back, he drove to the gate with his lights off. There was a mild nostalgic feeling driving the little truck again, with the five-speed manual shift. He didn't miss the occasional engine stumble while idling, but that was another matter. He parked in the visitor's lot at the apartment, and made quick work of changing clothes, grabbing a couple of bags, and tossing them in his truck. Zigzagging across town to a truck route which would intersect with Interstate 5 just north of the city, he smiled as he pulled out his cell phone.

Driving north through the darkness, it took several tries dialing. Eventually, an hour before dawn, Burk answered. "Sorry, Michael. I was sound asleep and I'm not used to listening for a cell phone."

"Burk, can you tell me where you are?" The noise from the wind made it tough to hear, but he felt the need for cool moisture from the summer rain to keep him alert, and this old pickup didn't have air conditioning.

"Well, right now I'm about twenty-five miles northeast of where you dropped me. There's an old abandoned orchard off in the country. Some of the trees are ripe for picking, and we have a sort of festival eating the fruit in various ways. You'd be welcome to join us, especially if you can get us another bag of flour and some sugar so we can make a pot-cobbler in the morning for breakfast. We've got plenty of butter."

"How much flour and sugar? And how do I find you?"

## Chapter 7

It was uncomfortable sleeping in the cab of his pickup, but he felt peaceful and safe for the first time in a long while.

He was glad he had left his old road cup in the pickup the last time he drove it. You could only get a cup of hobo coffee in your own cup. Burk had traded some trinkets he found walking the highways and back-roads for an extra spoon. It was brunch, and the promised pot-cobbler smelled of Heaven, served in recycled number 10 cans. The shade had just shifted over the pickup, and the two sat on the tailgate.

Michael savored the taste, not just the coffee and cobbler, but of the sense of freedom and release. He had often asked himself if he could return to the standard of living he managed when struggling as a freelance writer, just out of college. While his apartment and year-old car might be waiting when he returned – if he returned – along with all the fine haberdashery in his closet, he decided it didn't matter. The Bible studies of late had carried an under-current of searching: Would we let God have everything if He asked, and do without? He knew as he fled the publisher's building the answer was a solid "yes."

The fancy duds were back in the big city. He had brought comfortable work clothing, his old laptop, the pickup, and a bit of camping equipment he had gathered over the years. Even now he was deciding how to hang the pup tent over the bed of the truck so he could take a nap to make up for the light sleep from which he had stirred that morning. The weight of the excellent cobbler in his stomach was a siren call even this strong hobo coffee couldn't overcome. Still, he needed to hash some things out with Burk.

"I got close enough to the Shadow Government to realize it was more powerful than I'd ever dreamed." He waited to see if Burk would comment.

"Yeah." The younger fellow chewed some cobbler, then took a sip of coffee. "The only way you can defeat something like that is to live where they can't touch you, outside their sphere of interest."

"Explain."

With a boyish grin, and the wisdom of old men, he said, "You're seeing it right here."

Of course. Who noticed hobos? Only other hobos and a few residents who decided to take exception to them. "I'm not quite ready to go that far just yet. Will I be safe enough living on the fringe of this?"

"For awhile, at least."

"Okay, so I keep my truck and stuff, and my driver's license. I know better than to use my bank cards anywhere near a place I plan to rest. However, I don't know any other means to tap my reserves of cash."

Burk looked into his empty can, as if to find words to answer. Finally he looked out across the orchard where the other hobos socialized in clusters. Nodding his head in their direction, "They don't keep much cash."

"No, I'm sure they don't. However, I had one other piece of advice and I intend to take it. I was told to pick a battle on my level, something I could afford to lose myself, without hurting those uninvolved. Not that I should quit fighting, but to choose an enemy I could reach. I can't just run away. I'm not content to leave the world as it is, spiraling down into a nightmare police state. I most certainly cannot stop it, not with my resources and skills. But I can make it clear someone knows what's wrong, and make it painful for evil to grow in at least one place in this world. I want to do what I can do, with whatever help I can get, and make the process costly for someone."

"Bitterness?"

"No, Burk. It's a totally different kind of anger, something which has dirtied my soul. I have this vision I can do something to rescue just a few, a handful of innocents, give them hope to hang on. I already know if God wants me alive in the future, He'll make me hard to kill, as long as I'm not foolish. I'm pretty sure He wasn't going to protect me facing the Shadow Government directly, but they have servants lower down the scale whose hearts are equally dark, even if they don't realize they are pawns. I'm just about the level of a pawn in this game, and I want to disrupt the game-plan one time. If ordinary people can see that evil costs something, maybe they can hold on and resist, too. Even if it's just in small, subtle ways. A rebellion can spread, and I refuse to surrender to evil." He turned to Burk. "I know I'm just rambling, but does any of it make sense?"

"Sure, sure," Burk nodded, then leaned back against the baggage in the truck bed, locking his fingers behind his head. "You'll probably need someone to watch your back. You might not need me to change a tire without a jack now, but I know a whole lot more things like that. I've done lots of different work. Hobos don't avoid work, but avoid being controlled too much."

Michael also leaned back, moving his stuff around until he had a nice reclined position, his feet propped up. Even as his eyes closed in sleep, Michael reached out a hand and grabbed Burk's. "Welcome aboard, partner. It won't necessarily be fun, but it will be very interesting, I promise..." He trailed off into sleep.

The library in this town had a decent parking lot, shaded by huge pines. Michael decided to back into a parking stall against the trees. Grabbing his laptop bag, he let Burk lead the way. The old man at the help desk smiled as he saw Burk approaching. "Does every librarian in the state know you?" Michael asked.

"Most of them," he said without turning his head. He greeted the elderly man warmly and asked about some kind of DVD.

"Sure," the man said, his face lighting up even more. "This is the latest update, with some new packages."

Burk took the plain white optical disk envelope and led Michael to a table with a single terminal and two chairs. "This is the best time to come. With so few users, I don't have to sign up for a mere half-hour or anything. I get to use this all morning long. Here, put this in your DVD tray." He handed Michael the disk.

"Is this going to install something I can't undo later?"

"No," Burk chuckled as he began typing on the desktop keyboard. "Save your battery and plug into that outlet; just lift the brass plate." He pointed to a shiny square in the carpet under one edge of the table. As Michael was doing this, he went on, "That's called a 'live DVD.' The entire operating system loads itself in RAM and runs like the CD is a hard drive. You got plenty of RAM?"

"Four-gig. When I bought this it was a high-end machine. I was a hard core gamer in those days."

"That should be plenty. Now watch," he said as Michael hurried to insert the CD while the laptop powered up. "You'll see a screen letting you choose some options and the language." Michael hesitated, so Burk reached over and hit some keys for him. "There, that should work. Once it gets started, it'll throw up a cover screen while it checks the hardware and tests a few things."

It was pretty artwork. "Wow. Somebody really put some work into this."

"That's not even the best part," Burk said, typing and clicking on the desktop machine. "Parts of it will work just like Windows. But underneath, the thing is totally different. It's so stable it doesn't crash until the hardware fails."

The display on the laptop screen indeed bore some similarities to older versions of Windows, Michael decided, but there were icons the length of a slide out menu bar down one side. "Too much like a smartphone interface, if you ask me."

Burk had been reading something on the library's computer monitor. "You can adjust that if you ever install it. Anything you change right now you'll have to do again if you shutdown, but you can save your changes to a memory stick, and it will load them the next time."

"And all without writing anything to the hard drive?"

"Only if you want it to. That open window is one of several web browsers, and it shows a copy of their website. Look." Burk pointed to a similar display on the monitor in front of him.

They studied the options and played with the laptop for the next couple of hours. Everything seemed to just work. Michael checked his email accounts, scanned a couple of weblogs belonging to friends, and became more comfortable with the system. Then he made some more adjustments, saving them to a spare jump drive he fished out of the laptop bag.

"Okay, so we can go war-driving all over the country. And wherever we find an unsecured wireless node, we can logon and do what we like. But, my wireless card has a MAC address and it can be traced. Just like using a bank card at any ATM in the world, anyone trying to track me can see where I've been. It's like electronic fingerprints you can't wipe away." Michael went on to explain how several child pornographers and terrorists were caught that way.

Burk sat thinking only a second. Turning quickly back to the desktop system, he said, "I believe there's a way to change the MAC address..." After a few moments he said, "There. It's a package offered by the same folks who made the software on the DVD. You can download, and save it to the memory stick, since it's a pretty small package."

Michael went to the same site on his laptop, saved the package to his jump drive, then installed it. A small window popped open and asked if he wanted a specific number, or a random choice. He chose random. Almost immediately the window reported his new MAC address, and reminded him he could reload the original, and how. Saving it to his jump drive, he closed the application. Now the library's wireless server was asking him to login in again, as if he had just tried to connect for the first time. "This is gonna make things much more comfortable."

## Chapter 8

Michael decided this hobo campsite wasn't too bad. They had driven quite a ways into the forest preserve, crossing a couple of high passes between mountains, and he wondered why this one was so far from the main roads. Most of the campsites they had seen in the past weeks were surprisingly close to some highway, yet he would never have known where to look if Burk hadn't known they existed.

"There's a major rail line running down along the valley," Burk pointed down slope to the east. "Lots of zigzagging in the track makes the trains slow down, and provides easy jumping on and off without being seen. I don't much care for hopping freight trains, but I've done it a few times."

They both lay back against an earthen berm, covered thickly with pine needles. The weather was still rather warm in this valley, now early in the fall. "I also don't much care for hurting people, if I can avoid it," Burk finally added to the conversation.

"Nor I." Michael thought for a moment, running through his mind the bits and pieces of philosophy and political theory they had read on numerous oddball websites. The overdone graphics on some gave them an air of idiocy, like screaming madmen on the street warning of black helicopters, dodging non-existent "hidden cameras" which could see through your clothes. It occurred to him, "But somebody is going to die, one way or another. It's never clear and simple, I know, but the way the system is turning... Sometimes it's pretty obvious. If nothing is done to stop the thugs with badges, more innocent people will die. Or their lives will be destroyed, at the very least. And it tarnishes the badges worn by folks who aren't thugs."

Burk's sad face turned to a grimace at the memory. "It's not so bad when the city cops hassle me, because I know how to handle it. Hobos have lived with that forever. But I couldn't help it when they roughed up the old ladies and men, or tried to take kids away from parents who just don't want to live the middle-class dream... Yeah, I roughed up a few cops; I admit it. When I first learned police forces were created to uphold just one narrow idea of public order, and had nothing to do with real safety or stopping actual crimes, it made me cry."

Musing almost to himself, Michael said quietly, "The gangs in one barrio I visited said the local police were just the government's gang. When there was a big federal official visiting in the city, the officials pulled all the extra policemen in to provide security. With their presence in the barrio reduced, violent crime actually went down. The major gang in that neighborhood provided order better than the police." Turning to face Burk, he went on in stronger voice, "I never understood it at the time. It wasn't the sort of thing you could easily put in a newspaper article, but the gang there was the real government. Residents trusted and supported them, and it was simply a handful of pretenders involved in the neighborhood council sponsored by the city government."

They mused awhile longer before Michael sat up. "Burk, we have to be very careful. We can't undo Western history. There will always be some sort of police force, but what are they really supposed to do? What are they for?"

Still lying back with his eyes closed, Burk ventured, "Seems to me I saw on some police cars, 'to protect and to serve.' I suppose that means they are supposed to protect and serve citizens."

"And when they don't?" Michael pressed. "Sometimes they protect and serve only those in power. Like the Shadow Government, they only allow their side of things to be published, so most of the sheeple keep voting for them. But regardless of the party affiliation, it's the same bunch."

"Two uniforms, same team," Burk mumbled.

"Burk, do those tracks down there run back to my city?"

## Chapter 9

This being the wet season on the West Coast, the three day ride was definitely not fun, Michael decided. Hiding under the piggy-backed trailers while moving was only partial protection from the weather. The three mile hike to the barrio was a welcome relief for cold and cramped muscles.

"I'm going to show you some of the best breakfast burritos this side of the Border," Michael promised as the sun rose behind them.

Not much had changed, just some faces. The little convenience store still made great food. Michael was careful to observe the protocols and approached the young men whose duty was to watch for trouble from rival gangs. Using the rapid and slurred version of Spanish he learned when writing about gangs, he discovered the same man was still in charge. He waited for the guardians to make a couple of calls on cell phones, and then went precisely the path they advised. It was not the same abandoned garage where he last met the leader. Now it was a much larger place, probably a former department store of some kind.

The guards near the back door were older, larger than the lookouts. They watched without expression as Michael and Burk went through the freight entrance in the alleyway. Passing a couple more men playing dominoes in the back room, they went into some sort of office suite. Sitting in a recliner, watching a Spanish soap opera on an old TV, was a rather well-dressed Latino. He looked up as they came in, and smiled. Pointing the remote to kill the TV, he stood to greet Michael.

Burk had trouble following the conversation. His knowledge of Spanish was very limited. At least he could understand more of the words now, because it was less of the street dialect he had heard on the way. Obviously the man liked Michael, and there was an air of mutual respect. Motioning for them to sit on the big, overstuffed couch along one wall, the man returned to his recliner, but remained sitting upright.

At one point, Michael asked a question Burk knew involved wireless access. Apparently the answer was yes, because Michael reached into his backpack and pulled out the laptop. This time he booted into Windows from the hard drive. After a moment, he showed the screen to their host. The man got up and grabbed a chair from the side of a table, and placed it next to the couch near Michael, who had turned so they both could see. After much discussion and pointing, during which the man became more animated, they shook hands. The man took out a cellphone from his shirt pocket, returned to his recliner and leaned back to chatter for awhile.

Michael turned to Burk, and spoke rather quietly, "I'm making a deal. I set up a website for him, and help him get the right kind of publicity. I've convinced him he can fight the official neighborhood council this way, too. He's got a niece who can run the site for him; she's been learning about this some. Turns out he had already asked her, but she didn't know about publicity and where to find free hosting. We're going to setup a couple of free blog accounts on the same hosting outfit as the city council so he can post on the their blog. Then he's going to purchase some cheap webspace and create a forum in Spanish. Once it's all set up and running, he plans to start contacting the local Hispanic news organizations."

Michael paused for a moment to answer a question from the man in the recliner, who shouted back into the phone a single word like a slogan, punctuated with his index finger pointing in the air. Then in one motion he snapped the cell phone shut, folded down the leg rest and stood up. He shook hands with Michael, smiled briefly at Burk, and then led them out into the back room. There was a rapid exchange in the street dialect, and Burk caught none of it. Then one of the men slapped his dominoes face down and walked out the back door. Michael pulled Burk behind him and waved one last time to their host as he went the same way as the domino player.

Outside, Michael led Burk in the other direction than their arrival. Once on the street, they turned and headed toward a park where children frolicked on old playground equipment. It had obviously been repaired, and was still functional, though hardly with original parts. They sat on a shaded concrete bench, which had been taken from some bus stop somewhere. These were the tiny kids, too young to be in school yet. A few mothers with cheap, gaudy strollers, and a couple with modified shopping carts, stood or sat watching. Occasionally one or another would yell something at the kids. One was comforting a crying tot.

They watched for a moment, feeling like visiting tourists in a foreign country. Turning to Burk, Michael asked, "Where do hobos go around here this time of year?"

"I don't know," Burk said, with a rising tone. "You see, hobos are fairly democratic, but they are organized almost along feudal lines. There are established communities, and a few groups floating between them. There's a couple of really crooked gangs, but they're well known. They know better than to mess with the established communities. There's a truce as long as their actions don't present a risk to the community." He paused a moment, then went on. "But the whole thing is still rather territorial. The region I've lived in is sort of a northern, mostly white culture, but nothing of middle class habits. Where we're sitting right now is just beyond the southern end of that region."

"You don't have connections in this area?"

"I don't think there are too many hobos here, not as I know them. Maybe some honorary members of the community who live in the city, and keep a regular life. They keep their membership up by paying dues, so to speak. They supply the community with things that can't be found, made or traded. Sometimes they'll take a bunch to breakfast when we have gatherings." Looking around at the totally urban environment, he said, "These folks here take up the spaces and resources northern hobos would need to use. Hobos can pass through, but they have to be careful. This isn't hobo country."

"It's a shame our government has let this happen. This isn't immigration; it's migration. A whole nation moving in to displace another. On the other hand, our predecessors pushed them out in the first place, a hundred-fifty years ago. The Shadow Government has decreed we shall all be united in a single continental super-state. Borders don't mean anything. This silent invasion isn't something we can fight. Don't you find them in the northern region, too?"

"To some degree, but not like here. For hobos, this is just northern Mexico. Mexico has its own hobos."

"Okay, so it's up to me. I'd rather not stay in the barrio, either. I need to find an ATM for the card I don't use much. I think we'll pass through the local Chinatown for that, then stay in a motel I know. Ready for a long hike?"

They headed west, where a major highway divided the barrio from a pricier beach front area. Lunch was fast food, served with stares from the well-heeled and hip. The two made a game of holding a conversation which included their backpacks, sitting upright in booth seats next to them, like girlfriends on a double date. Burk offered his some fries. Michael stuffed a packaged pastry in the outer pocket of his and asked if it was yummy.

In Chinatown, Burk stood guard while Michael got some cash from the ATM. While the oriental setting was entertaining, and the smells quite exotic, they both agreed it was a tough hike on concrete and asphalt. They could move faster, but it made the feet and legs much more tired than forest paths carpeted with pine needles. They were making almost four miles per hour, but with the sudden rush of school-aged children released from the government's daytime warehousing, they decided to stop and rest at a cafe. The mist blowing in from the ocean was blocked by the building and its generous awning, so they sat at the last table on one end of the sidewalk section. The house tea served hot was just right.

"This should hold us `til dinner time. There's a decent cafe a block from the motel," Michael promised.

"Will it take us that long to walk there?" Burk asked.

"No. But we can sit here for an hour, then catch a city bus. I haven't ridden one in years, but I saw a schedule posted at a stop on our way here, and we can go back and wait there. It'll take us that long to ride there, though."

Putting his cup down, Burk held it in both hands. "I like city buses. You don't feel so out of place dressed like we are. Even with gas pushing six dollars, prissy folks won't ride the bus very much. Real traveling hobos tell me in some areas of the country, you can ride city buses across state lines because of how the routes run."

"Well, I've never liked them much in the past," Michael said. "Maybe I can get used to it. Even if they look clean, it seems they all smell like dirty diapers. But then, I haven't bathed in over a week, so maybe I won't notice." Then he added, "At least the motel will have showers."

## Chapter 10

When Michael awoke the next morning, the sun was in his eyes. He rubbed them, and his eyelids felt like sandpaper. Finally he could see clearly, and he noticed by the angle of the sun it was mid-morning.

Burk was sitting in chair, feet on his bed, reading a Gideon's Bible. "I heard a lot of hotels and motels have been bought up by Muslims. They removed the Gideon Bibles, sometimes replacing them with copies of the Quran." He gestured at the open page, "I wanted to find the story of Ehud assassinating the King of Moab. I'm glad they still have Bibles in this one, and the Berkeley Translation at that."

Michael fumbled in his backpack for clean clothes. "Why did you want to know about that? Oh, and sorry about making you skip breakfast."

"I ate your pie from yesterday's lunch," he said absently. Moving to an upright position, he picked up a styrofoam cup from the floor beside him and walked over to the little counter near the bathroom where the "in-room coffee" consisted of a water heating pot and packets of instant coffee. As he dumped a packet of black granules in the cup, he said, "I was looking at the motive." After pouring hot water on top of the granules, he stirred it with a little plastic straw. Turning to sit back down, he continued, "Ehud is called a hero. He rescued his people from oppression. He took advantage of his talents, including being a lefty in a time and place where it was rather unusual. He also took full advantage of the evil king's constant fear and suspicion about his own court." He sat down still holding his cup, then slumped and put his feet back up on the edge of his bed, just as Michael had found him upon waking.

Pulling on his hiking boots, Michael asked, "So let me play Devil's advocate for a moment. How does this carry over into the New Testament, where it's about grace instead of law?"

"I don't know how to answer that, but I'm noticing these ancient Semites took a totally different view of assassination than we in the Post-Modern West. We call it cowardly. They called it heroic."

Standing up again, Michael responded, "Yes, and Jesus was a Semite. However, He was not about fighting political enemies of His nation. His mission was otherwise. Yet again, His cousin John the Baptist never told the penitent Roman soldiers they had get out of military service. Nothing in the Gospels condemns the Roman soldiers for being soldiers. They were condemned for being cruel to Jesus after His arrest, but not for doing their job."

"Are we trying to be some kind of soldiers?"

"Rebels," Michael answered. "Soldiers or not, we'll be fighting a war against our own Moabites. I rather think Ehud's methods will work for us, too."

They walked down to the cafe and enjoyed a large brunch. As if discussing the change in weather from wet to sunny, Michael explained how, in return for the website and so forth, the Latino gang boss was putting them in touch with a munitions supplier from Mexico. "How much stuff do we need?" Burk asked, sipping his milk.

"I think it's more a matter of what kind. My editor back at the paper was a retired Marine. During social occasions, it was sometimes possible to get him talking about tactics and such. Once, he even took me to a private range to fire various weapons. I'm pretty decent with a rifle and scope..."

"I'm pretty good without the scope," Burk interrupted.

Laughing, Michael went on, "Anyway, assassins will probably need at least one good sniper rifle, and surely some explosives. I don't know how much the gang leader will get us, but he promised to see if any of his connections needed something similar to what I offered him. I'm not sure I could actually pay outright for much."

They had frittered the day away reading newspapers and watching TV, while taking turns on the laptop. They had managed to pick up a wireless signal, and ran the Linux CD to tap it. There was a more concrete discussion of identifying suitable targets. At one point, Burk stumbled on a patriot forum. Most of the chatter seemed bluffing, big talk from armchair generals who probably never wore a uniform with dirt and sweat. However, there was one member who clearly knew what he was talking about. Michael commented he wouldn't be surprised if it was his old editor, but if not, it was surely someone like him. The tone and content was consistent with some of the numerous conversations they'd had.

One forum comment rang a bell with Michael and Burk: "If you're going to do assassinations, you'd better work a long way from where you plan to hide out."

It was late evening, and they were about to retire, when Michael's cell phone rang. The deal was on! The conversation was short. Putting his phone away, Michael opened the laptop and booted into Windows. "Rest if you can, Burk. I've got a couple of websites to build, emails to send, and I won't be sleeping until I get it all done." He waited impatiently for the busy cursor to go away, then began clicking and typing feverishly.

Something in the Italian dinner they ate didn't set well on Burk's stomach. He woke from a nightmare about dodging bullets, being chased by rabid dogs with faceless demons holding them on leashes, and other un-pleasantries he didn't remember. It must have been well past midnight, but Michael still had his face to the glowing laptop screen.

## Chapter 11

Coming out of the cramped bathroom, Burk found Michael stumbling around trying to get dressed. He insisted they had no time to waste, and encourage Burk to get dressed and packed. It was just past dawn, but the renewed cloud cover tinged it with red. They stumbled out into a somewhat cool breeze and headed to the nearest bus stop. Even the poorest people had cell phones these days, and Michael wasn't the only one chatting away on the ride back south.

Four changes later, the bus line ran out just a few blocks from the barrio. They had been standing on the last bus, as workers had crowded the seats before they got on. Michael had trouble hearing, and lost the signal twice. He kept checking as they walked into the barrio, in an area bearing little resemblance to where they had been two days before. In front of a dingy convenience store, which bore not a word of English, Michael felt he had a sufficient signal, and dialed. During the conversation in the street patois, he turned suddenly, looking east. He shaded his eyes, not from the sun, which was hidden behind clouds, but from the drifting mist which had just begun. He hesitated a moment, then spoke a couple of words, and began walking down the street as he put the phone away.

Dodging a sign advertising _cerveza_ , Burk caught up. "We have to catch the guy before he leaves," Michael informed him. "He's going to make a re-supply run, but has some stuff in stock, which apparently includes the items you and I had discussed. He's going to give us as much as we can carry, and it's up to us keep it out of sight. If we get caught, we're on our own."

"They use that stuff around here?" Burk wondered out loud.

"Oh, no. This is just a transit point. The stock comes into a Chinese freight company, at a terminal they own all to themselves near here. This is the same company caught supplying gangs a couple of years ago with Chinese arms. To avoid such close inspection in the future, they made a secret deal with the federal government to buy out a run-down port of their own. You might recall the big brouhaha over them trying to get the old Long Beach Naval Base."

"Oh yeah. Some of the veterans in the hobo community were cussing about that."

"Yes, veterans groups made a lot of noise about that. Anyway, this guy works out of his truck. He picks up arms here, drives them down to Nuevo Laredo, and exchanges them for drugs. He makes several drops on the way back, then brings the rest of it here. Several drug gangs are working in a sort of co-op."

Burk frowned at the idea of drug dealing. "I wonder how he avoids searches and stuff."

"Let's ask him! He's right there."

They had rounded a corner. Peeking out of an alleyway was the nose of what turned out to be a bob-tailed refrigeration truck. It appeared just barely safe to drive. A man jumped out of the driver's seat and waited for them. Michael greeted him in the street dialect. As they walked around the truck, Burk was surprised there were no guards, until he spotted dark eyes peering at him out from under a filthy baseball cap on top of the cargo box. The driver was all business. He opened the side door, with just an inch to spare against the wall of the building. Inside, there was nothing but a couple of wooden cases. Both had been opened. From the top one, he produced a bundle wrapped in newspaper covered with tiny oriental printing in columns.

Michael unwrapped it part way, just enough to see what was inside. His eyebrows shot up. He wrapped it back up, and raised his head with a smile on his face. A little more chatter, and the man passed him what had to be a few ammo boxes. These Michael passed to Burk, who shed his backpack. They were followed by an odd looking cartridge magazine. He poked these and the first bundle into his pack, making sure the clothing was against the outside surface.

The driver moved the now empty crate off the top, and removed the loose lid on the bottom one. There was a green bag, with a bundle of wire peeking out of one exterior pocket. There were also three squat, round canisters with black paper walls and metal lids. These last Michael passed to Burk, whose pack was pretty tightly stuffed once he pushed them in place. Michael shrugged off his pack and pushed the green nylon bag inside, plus a long cylinder with odd-looking ends, a square ridge running down one side and a bulge on top of that at one end. Burk wondered to himself, rocket launcher?

As if he almost forgot, the driver handed over two small automatic pistols. They were used, but still in good condition. He finally handed over a paper sack, about the size of a good lunch, but obviously heavier. Burk found out later it held loaded pistol magazines and ammo boxes. Just before they turned to climb down, Michael asked a long question, followed by a couple of sentences of explanation. The driver burst out laughing. After he got his breath back, he said a few rapid sentences, at one point making a sort of pedaling motion with his hands. At least twice he shrugged broadly and turned his palms face up. Then he finished with a dismissive wave in their direction. Michael half smiled, then shook his head and lead the way out the little side door. The whole thing was so comical, Burk laughed, even without a clue to what was said.

They walked briskly back toward the railroad tracks. From where they collected the weapons, it was about two miles. Moving north along the tracks, they were trying to find the place where they thought it would cross a creek. Sure enough, just a quarter mile up, there was a sturdy wooden rail bridge. While the creek hardly held any water, its bed was nearly fifty yards across. The bridge was not wide, but along one side there as a low railing, with a narrow walking space outside that. Somehow – he didn't explain – Burk could tell by the engines and the load when a train was heading back in the direction of the campsite upstate where they left the truck. Burk had been adamant it was safe to leave it there. They let two trains pass overhead while they sat through the middle of the day. It was hard to avoid being nervous about the weapons they had.

Burk took a seat just under the edge of the walkway, high up on the bank. Michael sat down near the edge of the creek. He hauled some foil-wrapped burritos from an outer pocket of his backpack, tossing one to his friend. Burk chewed thoughtfully, then sipped a wine cooler he had produced from somewhere, and said, "So what did the driver say when you asked?"

Michael stared at the bottle in Burk's hand, and couldn't remember when they had bought one. Losing the puzzled look no his face, he looked up and said. "CIA."

"CIA? What about the CIA?"

"He said he was contracted by the CIA to move the drugs from the Rio Grande Valley out to southwestern markets. He carries a regular manifest, accounts for everything he delivers and how much he's paid. He gets here, calls some number from any of a couple dozen pay phones, and tells them where he's parked. Within an hour, some guy comes by on one of those three-wheeled Mexican Ice bicycles, checks the manifest, takes a flat percentage, and rides off. In return, they get even his speeding tickets thrown out on the grounds of national security. He's never had his truck searched in two years."

"Then why all the cloak and dagger?"

"Other gangs not a part of the co-op." Michael stuffed the last of his burrito in his mouth, folded the foil neatly and put it back in the outside pocket of his pack.

There was the silent vibration in the bridge indicating another train approaching. Michael looked on hopefully as Burk stood and glanced both ways. He crouched back down, and signaled to be ready. Michael turned and jumped the narrow trickle of water in the creek bed, then sprinted up the slope just under the far end of the bridge. With their packs in their hands, they watched as the engines passed overhead on the bridge. Once they made the turn, Burk popped up, looking back along the line of cars. Motioning with his hand, he hopped up on the bridge, clambered up on the rail, and then steadied himself. Michael was up onto the bridge on the far side, waiting. With consummate grace, Burk leaped onto a passing flat car, tossed his pack on the deck, grabbed a tie-down strap and leaned out with one hand. Michael was wearing his pack as he jumped up on the railing just in time to be scooped up in Burk's free arm.

Trains had to move quite slowly inside the city limits, or they would never have hopped it so easily. Night fell before they got across the huge metropolis. Initially, they huddled close to the harvester strapped down on the flat car. Waiting until the city lights faded behind them, they scrambling along the blind side of the next long curve. They chose the third flat car back. There was a huge piece of unidentified machinery there with a large open space facing the rear. This time they managed to stay relatively dry. Over the creaking, singing rails and wind, Burk asked, "So the stuff I read about the CIA running drugs must be true."

Michael stared out into the darkness. "Schizophrenia. With one hand the federal government spends millions of tax dollars on anti-drug education and interdiction. It has nothing to do with actually stopping the drug trade, but simply keeps the private prisons filled with slave labor. With the other hand, they run drugs to fund activities they can't hide in the black budgets before Congress."

The two managed to get some sleep this time before arriving back at where they left the truck.

## Chapter 12

"So we target the principle, by going after its chief promoters, or primary users," Michael said as the pickup rumbled down the rutted track.

"Well, we can't really go after any politicians," Burk offered.

"Except for targets of opportunity," Michael added.

Burk's answer was cut off by the jolt from a crater in the forest road. To Michael's questioning look, he repeated, "Of course." As they turned onto a better road, he continued, "The main problem is the increasing gulf between the people and the first line of government presence they deal with: the police. Aside from a few corrupt sheriffs, the county-based law enforcement is the only one fully legitimate under the Constitution. We should try to leave them alone."

Michael carried it further, "We also leave alone most street officers, because we can't turn the clock back. Good cops are good cops, and it appears they dominate for now. Despite all the noise about abusive incidents, an awful lot of time passes in a awful lot of jurisdiction with hundreds of thousands of officers behaving decently. Since we can seldom tell them from the bad ones at a distance, we operate under the assumption most patrolmen aren't the real problem."

"That leaves SWAT teams and the like. We've seen how their whole purpose in life is to destroy, and make no provision at all for innocent by-standers." Burk's voice had a hint of anger. Softening a bit, he added, "So how do we go after them?"

"We don't," Michael shot back. "We get their attention and let them come to us. As we move aast, let's spend some time reading articles which reveal standard tactics, determine the earmarks of what gets cities to call a SWAT raid. I'll dig through policy papers and find out what the federal bureaucrats favor when they agree to fund the equipment and training. In the process, I'm sure I'll identify places where we can find a likely first target."

Having already encountered snow showers on one high ridge coming out of the forest, they decided to take a southerly course across the Continental Divide down in New Mexico. Gas prices had come down a bit, and they found themselves often in the company of snowbirds, many with Canadian plates. They enjoyed the scenery, taking back roads where possible. Michael was surprised by some of the odd places where the laptop wireless found a signal. At one point, they stopped at an old military rifle range in the desert. It was still in use, clearly, but equally obvious was the civilian nature of the use. There were shards of clay skeet, some empty black powder canisters, and other odds and ends. It was vacant that afternoon, so they practiced unhindered.

Both were better than they had hoped with the handguns, so saved the ammunition. Since it was easy to download a manual on the rifle, they spent more time with the rifle, first taking turns assembling and disassembling it as quickly as possible. Then they practiced a few rounds each, with and without the scope. True to his word, Burk was deadly without the scope, and flawless altogether with it. When they realized they were down to one unopened box, they decided they'd have to stop and save the remaining ammo for the real thing. Michael discovered cleaning weapons was a time-consuming task.

Frequent reading on the subject of SWAT raids indicated a perfect first target. There was a college town, almost a suburb of a big Midwestern city. The university there had on the faculty a PhD little known outside his campus for much of anything, but well connected inside the Beltway. This man was by far the most influential writer encouraging federal policy for grants, special training of police SWAT teams, and tons of surplus obsolete armored vehicles. The underlying theme of this professor's work was to disregard by-stander safety, lest there be an even greater risk to the rest of the population from failure to act quickly and decisively. No surprise then, the small city nearby had one of the largest SWAT teams as a percentage of officers on the force. They had just added two new officers to make fourteen.

Two birds with one stone.

## Chapter 13

Wiping his face with a wet cloth, Burk came out of the motel bathroom. "Hey, look at this." Burk came to look over Michael's shoulder at the laptop screen. "See this? The foundation which endowed our boy's chair, I happen to know, is a front for the Shadow Government."

Mumbled Burk, "That explains why he encourages casual disregard for human life. To the Shadow Folk, the bulk of humanity is just an economic resource, completely expendable."

The room heater started knocking again, but they ignored the noise. For all the racket it made, it barely worked. The gaps around the door and the one window on one side of the room let in the highway noise and the gusty cold wind. It hadn't snowed this far south, but Michael was reminded why he had moved to the West Coast. Did that wind never stop? No, not in the Midwest, not until the hottest part of the summer when you wanted it most did the wind ever stop.

They had been lurking on various forums and chatboards sponsored by the university. Aside from the self-important Student Government Association, and a few specialty groups, most of it was the same airhead chatter. They found a small group of Linux users in the Computer Science Department. Two of the servers were Linux, and one was NetBSD. Still, it looked like the university was owned by Gates and Company. Aside from those three machines, the campus servers they could identify ranged from XP to Server 2010. One department was behind some kind of automatic firewall-switch. They could tell there were multiple machines behind it, but nothing more.

From their room in an ancient motel near the truck stop 20 miles out, they had begun searching also for real estate companies in the surrounding three counties bunched together. The list was compared against the BBB, to identify the worst one. Michael explained, "This is the one most likely to take a bribe to break all the rules in our favor."

To their surprise, it was some old woman in the college town. After viewing her listings, they chose a first, second and third best guess listing and made plans to view them. First, Michael wanted to stop at the city library and scan microfilms of old city papers. How long had it been since he visited a library which still used microfilm? With a good sample of stories about her past shenanigans, he felt even better about dealing with her. The first house was too far out, and it was no surprise her ad lied about "convenience." The second house was perfect: ancient, high fences on both sides and an alleyway in back.

The next day, they were traversing some country roads, hoping to find a place to hide the pickup. As they slowed in sight of a large, dilapidated barn, Burk put up his hand, "Wait!"

Michael stepped on the brakes, and the tires came to a crunching stop in the gravel road. Leaving the door open, Burk stepped across a weed-packed ditch, and examined something hanging from the lone strand of rusty barbed wire where a stock fence had been. He got back in quickly and said, "I think we're in luck. Hobos frequent this area. Check the barn first."

Set back a ways from the road, there was a gate over the twin wheel tracks where weeds had been crushed often enough by tires to leave only patchy grass, leading almost straight to the barn. That grass was yellow and brown, both from a dry fall and from temperatures just above freezing during the middle of the day. There were prints left by worn shoes in the sandy places, running both ways. Burk got out and examined the gate where a chain secured it to a pitted iron post. He found the back side was just wired together where the chain had been cut, leaving the lock in front. He stepped around the gate to a place where the fence wire was gone altogether, pushed the tall, dried weeds apart, and found his way back to the twin tracks. Approaching the barn, he said something unintelligible to Michael, in a loud voice. Directly, someone stepped out to meet Burk. Michael couldn't see more than a fuzzy, matted gray head past Burk's wide shoulders.

In a few moments, Burk came back the same way, and got in the truck. "Drive down to the end, look for another gate like this one. Follow the track over the crest and down into the trees. Should be a safe camp there."

This turned out to be precisely accurate. However, they didn't expect to find a huge, patchwork tree-house attached to a trio of large oaks. Michael steered the truck into what looked to him a likely parking place under this makeshift home. Burk made a sort of yodel, and then stepped out of the truck. He quickly climbed a rope ladder, making a few more yodels inside the maze of boards and tarps. A moment later, he was back down. "Nobody here right now. We can leave everything we don't need. It'll be waiting when we get back."

Michael had learned to trust such declarations from Burk. In the low place among the trees, the wind was less cutting. Still, Michael found it tough to change clothes in the cold air. Burk acted as if it were still summer, taking his time. Michael took out some large bills and hid his wallet deep up inside the bottom of the driver's seat. He shivered in the light jacket. His coat was attached to the outside of his pack. They still had a good five miles to hike back into town, and the coat would make him sweaty. They needed to avoid that if they were going to pass for college kids.

## Chapter 14

Indeed, they needed to look like conservative and prosperous college boys. Haircuts were the easy part. For Michael, shaving off more than a month's growth of beard was a welcome relief. Convincing Burk to shed his boy fuzz was not so easy. "Look, Burk. You step out of the shower, towel off your face and immediately slap on some baby oil. Rub it in, all over the area where the whiskers grow. Then take a fresh disposable razor, and carefully shave downward, nice and slow. Short, light strokes, repeated until the skin is smooth. Do that on both sides, all the way down to the collar bones. Shave under your nose last." When it was finally done, he didn't look any older, but he did look preppy. That was good enough.

Looking at his watch, Michael announced, "We've got just about enough time to catch the 4 PM if we leave now." Burk hurried to grab his backpack. These were matching new packs, which looked more like luggage than real camping equipment. It was five miles of brisk walking into the wind. They stopped in a patch of trees just back from the highway. Across and down to the right was a large gas station and convenience store, which also served as the bus line depot.

They had checked the schedules to see when buses were supposed to stop. The 4 PM was early, Michael noted, by some ten minutes. As soon as it passed, they jogged across the road, coming up behind on the driver's side where it nosed in against the front of the building. By the time the driver made it around to open the luggage compartments, they were coming around the backside, passing through the passengers who got off to smoke, or headed into the store. Only the driver and passengers who had been riding would know the boys hadn't just gotten off, too. They entered the store, milled around with the customers, moved into the fast food section on the far end, then eventually out the other front door.

Outside they stood next to the building where they found a city bus marker and schedule. There was also a taxi stand marker. This put them on the northern side of the building, and they waited until they were thoroughly chilled, then switched into their heavier coats, stuffing the light jackets under the top flap on their matching packs. When Michael was about to go back inside to find a pay phone and call the cab company, they saw one turning into the driveway near them. Waving to make sure the driver knew they were waiting, they even held the doors for the Goth girls who got out. They were still chuckling over it when they had settled in, and told the driver the Realtor's address.

## Chapter 15

She must have thought she was cute. Most people wouldn't agree with her, but that didn't seem to matter. Nor was it that the makeup was poorly applied; it simply didn't help. Had she concentrated more on character and personality, she might not have to work for her grandmother. Instead, she had chosen to emulate the woman who was often in court, and sometimes not far from arrest. Her grandmother was fairly well off, and paid her well. However, money could not buy enough cosmetic applications to justify her efforts to play off her looks.

It was not far from closing time, and the mail had come late, as usual. Sorting through the varied envelopes, she pulled out the one with a municipal seal on the cover. It could be very bad news. Upon opening and scanning the cover letter, she smiled with relief.

"Here you go, grandma. The city has granted your demolition permit for that old house you haven't been able to sell. Of course, they also note they would have ordered it demolished, anyway."

"Let me see," the old woman said. "They give me 60 days. Good, I can shop it around and get the lowest bid."

She looked up at the sound of car doors out front. It was a taxi, and two young college students, she thought. Nice looking boys, conservative types who probably had lots of daddy's money. She was altogether willing to take some of it. As they came in the door, she smiled sweetly, projecting that cookie-making-granny image that had beguiled so many prospective customers. She rested one hand on the four-foot high counter running across the office, separating visitors from the two desks behind. "Good afternoon, boys. I'm glad you made it before we closed up today. How can I help you?"

The shorter, handsome one spoke with a pleasant sounding voice. "Well, ma'am, I was hoping we could find a nice rental. Perhaps over on the south side, in that quiet old neighborhood. I believe we saw a couple of your ads for that area?"

They would have to be rather bright and industrious, too, wouldn't they? She tried to steer them to a couple of expensive places, but they seemed uninterested. Then the larger one spoke with a soft voice, proving his bumpkin facial features were deceptive. "Madame, I seem to recall a small house in that area. We really don't need much."

This wasn't working as she had hoped. "Well, I do have a place for sale, but I am not prepared to rent it. I'm getting too old to try and maintain older properties like that. And I could hardly afford to pay someone to manage it for me. We're just getting by, here."

As if totally innocent, Michael countered, "Really? According to the papers you've grossed not less than several hundred thousand annually for quite some time. Besides, we know the place is slated for demolition. Surely you'll let us rent it for a month or so? If you don't offer us a written agreement by which you could be held liable in court, we'll deny knowing it's been declared unfit for habitation. I believe I have sufficient cash to make you comfortable with that. Even if we annoy the neighbors, you won't hear about it for at least that long. Oh, and don't forget to have the utilities turned on."

Rowdy rich boys wanting a short-term party house, she thought. Without the slightest change in her demeanor, she stated bluntly a figure. As Michael was counting out large bills on the counter, she reached under the counter, fishing among keys hanging on several hinged panels. She pulled up two matched pairs of shiny new keys, murmuring the locks were fairly new, as were the doors.

The granddaughter was a little miffed she never managed to catch the big fellow's eye before they left.

## Chapter 16

There was no furniture, nor would there be. A few battered dishes and some cooking utensils, an ancient hot plate, and an ice chest were in the kitchen, all found in one or the other of two thrift stores just a block off downtown. There were two small unshaded lamps, kept on the floor. They added a used drop-light when they decided the smell emanating from below the house was too much. Burk had done some plumbing, and even managed to produce a pair of coveralls from his odd collection of clothing.

"I need to pull this up anyway, because for a gas floor heater, it's not putting out much at all," Burk explained. They had picked up a selection of used tools with the drop-light, and Burk had turned off the gas at the meter outside. Then he removed the fitting connecting a metal line with various shades of green powdery coating which was coming up under the stove, then the stove itself. Michael was surprised how light the stove was, and they set it aside. Burk tied a rag over his mouth, turned on the drop-light, checked what was below him and stepped off into the hole. His fall was arrested by a concrete floor, leaving him about chest level with the ragged carpet on the lip of the opening. Ducking down, he disappeared. The metal line wriggled a bit, and Burk announced in a muffled voice he had removed a kink.

Aside from the noise of moving about, he made little sound as he explored the entire basement. Suddenly he popped up, covered with dust and cobwebs, and asked for the section of stiff, tightly coiled wire he called a "snake." Disappearing again, there soon followed an odd sound of metal sliding on metal. He reappeared once more, and asked for the largest kitchen pot filled with water. When Michael returned, Burk ignored his puzzled look and disappeared more slowly, carefully holding the pot to avoid spilling the water. Michael heard him pour it out, then some more shuffling. Finally Burk returned and promptly climbed out.

As they were sliding the heater back down into the floor, Burk explained there was a drain almost in the center of the basement. "Apparently it drops straight into a sewer line. I could hear lots of water flowing. There was a drain trap, so I filled it with the water. What had been in there before must have evaporated. That should close off the smell from the sewer line." Sure enough, over the next two days, their normal movements allowed the fresh air from outside to dissipate the smell. Also, the heater worked much better.

"There's one other thing down there I should tell you," Burk revealed as they lay on their bedrolls the second night in the house. They both were stretched out at odd angles a few feet from the floor heater.

"What's that?"

Burk's soft, raspy voice was almost ghostly in the darkness. "In the back corner, under the kitchen, a section of the basement wall is cracked. The crack runs at an angle up from the floor and into the corner between the walls. It leaves a triangular section which is tipping inward at the top. Probably a root or something pushing against it."

"Does it affect us?" Michael had been considering two rough plans at once. The first was to credibly threaten the professor, which would probably get the police interested. Then they had to incite a SWAT raid, probably kill or wound them with the explosive weapons, and somehow escape.

"Well, you know there's a storm drain out in the alley. Looks like it's a little lower than the floor of our basement. It would be a ton of work, but that might make a good opening for a crawl tunnel to get out of here unnoticed. That would be totally unexpected."

Michael sat bolt upright. "Burk! You are a genius! Did you see any shovels at the thrift stores?"

## Chapter 17

The next day they decided to simply wander the campus looking like students. If they needed a story, there would be a couple of different directions they might go, but they had to stay with it once they chose. Their favorite option was the most obvious one, a writer and his photographer. Carrying an old Pentax 35mm SLR, which looked alright but had a cracked main lens, Burk shadowed Michael as they roamed about the sprawling collection of historic buildings, with the occasional new structure here and there. They need not have bothered with the masquerade, as the huge student population proved the perfect cover. Aside from certain areas, like the Botany lab, there was virtually no place they couldn't go. The greatest danger was from chatty girls trying to get their attention.

At one point, they passed a fenced off area where workmen were preparing a pit for some sort of concrete junction box. Down in the hole, someone was welding, using a fancy new generator. It was mounted on three wheels and small enough for one man to pull. The motor was incredibly quiet. Atop the concrete box was a cast-in steel tube, rather like an access shaft. Michael stared for awhile, then walked on, completely lost in thought. A couple of times he mumbled the word "diversion."

Suddenly he turned to Burk, "How deep does the drain in the basement drop before it hits the sewer? Do you have some idea?"

"I'd guess four feet or so. Why?"

"I wonder if they lock up that equipment up at night... Burk, could you run that welder?"

"I guess so." He knew better than to demand an immediate explanation of the fragments of thought left floating in the air. They also noted the lush heavy shrubbery all over the campus.

There was so much to do.

Suddenly, it seemed their month was about gone. Maybe another ten days and they'd have to be out for sure. Burk had ceased carrying the camera. They were tired from many late nights doing heavy physical work. Having slept late this morning, they both wondered if they'd be able to do anything at all. From the second floor of a newer classroom building, they could just see into the professor's office. Watching awhile from the lounge chairs in front of the wall of glass, he was easily visible at his desk in the next building across an open grassy area. It was a mere two hundred meters or so. Sadly, neither of them could imagine how to fire without shattering the huge sheet of glass in front of them. Worse, the professor's window, while tall, had a flower pot in it. They could just see his head and shoulders.

As they walked outside, Michael was joking about using a baseball bat to knock a grenade up by the window. Suddenly he froze, staring at the backside of the building they had just left. In the parking lot was a tar heater, such as one towed behind trucks. It was smoking, producing a dull roar as the heating unit kept a quarter-ton of tar in a molten liquid state. The men were dispensing tar from a valve into steel five-gallon buckets. These they placed each on a lightweight lift, with a small cage that shot quickly and smoothly up a track resembling a ladder to the edge of the flat roof. Burk spoke up, "Looks like they just got started on the job. That lift can carry people, too. If you look, there's no ladder; the guys on the roof rode up the lift one at a time. While its easier work up there this time of year, you have to be really quick with that tar. It hardens in just a few minutes on really cold days. Since we had the warm front move in, I'd guess they have as much as ten minutes once the bucket gets to the top."

He glanced at Michael, and realized what he saw wasn't the look of simple curiosity. Then it hit him. The roofing job would take at least a week, and he doubted the equipment would be moved after dark. Also, this was the start of finals week, and the professor would be in his office late every night.

## Chapter 18

Posted on several campus bulletin boards there was a short threatening statement. It demanded a certain professor immediately resign his seat on the federal advisory board for grants and policy regarding improvements in municipal police forces. The threat promised if he failed to comply, he would not survive Christmas Break. The post was made from an IP address in Pakistan. There was a sort of manifesto attached:

The people have had enough. It stops now. Back off and leave us alone. Those of you eating our tax dollars: Have you forgotten the term "public servant" means what it says? You serve us, not herd us. The people are supposed to be the government.

That hasn't been true in several generations, at least. The ruling elite are a closed group who only pretend to represent our interests. Instead, they rule only to enrich and further empower themselves, pushing us farther into the dust. The most ubiquitous symbol of this upside down state of affairs is the militarization of the civilian police. In effect, they are being made an occupying army, serving some other nation. In protecting the governing elite alone, they scarcely hesitate to destroy our lives, when they don't kill us outright.

No more. We are striking back. Whoever promotes empowering the police state, whoever promotes the increasing militarization of police forces, and any police officer treating average citizens with contempt, you are our enemy. We are declaring war. You have been warned. The last thing you'll see is our angry faces.

"Won't that make the campus security hang around him a lot?" Burk asked.

"Yep. They'll have very close to him because our threat falsely suggests close quarters violence. We want them there."

"Won't that make it risky for me? I'm ready to shoot this guy, but even at that distance, they'll have time to catch me before I get off the roof. I'm not ready to fight off a bunch of rent-a-cops to get away."

Michael grinned, "You won't have to. We just want them clustered around the professor's office building so we know where they are, and can't surprise us. When the grenade goes off in the parking lot next to his car, they'll come running. If any of them stay, I'll slingshot another closer to his office. With all those blind hedges they'll be too busy just trying to figure out where the action is, much less where it's coming from. Even if we don't get him, we've accomplished half the objective with the mere threat. His death just extends the message, which is by far the most important thing, so you can miss if you like.

"The city police are the real target. You know they've been watching this house lately expecting rowdy parties, and someone's bound to see us come home right after all the commotion. This place is primed for major fireworks, and the tunnel is finished. Even if everything we've planned fails and no one gets hurt, the message won't be ignored."

## Chapter 19

Naturally the professor insisted campus life continue as normal, and groused about too many campus officers crowding around him. Local police officials were reminded they had no jurisdiction until there was a real emergency. They tried placing plain clothes officers supposedly appearing inconspicuous among the students, but doing a poor job of blending. Several were nearly arrested by the campus security; this was their turf and they were touchy about it. The chief threw up his hands and ordered city patrol cars to stay close to the campus.

The two police officers in one patrol car a block off the sprawling campus on the south side, farthest from the action, were almost asleep. Suddenly the radio sounded an emergency tone, followed by an urgent broadcast alert. "All units, all units: Respond to explosion and gunfire on north college campus. Also, be on the lookout for two male suspects fleeing the scene on foot..." The rest was drowned out by the roar of the engine and ear-shattering twitter of the electronic siren as they drove away.

At the main entrance to the campus, they were directed to turn back out onto the street running down the east side of the campus, and take up a position watching to see if anyone came out of the small forest growing around the lake toward the south end of the campus. They stopped where the trees began, backed the car off the road, and turned so their headlights shone straight down the edge of pavement. They rolled the windows down so they could direct the spotlights while standing outside. They had been told other patrols were swarming the entire campus area because the emergency permitted it. On the radio, they heard about a professor removed by ambulance, pronounced dead at the scene from a gunshot wound. So this was at least a homicide. A few minutes later they were listening intently to a description of the two suspects who had been seen wandering the campus over the past month.

What they did not hear was the squish of wet shoes coming up behind them. They were completely unable to explain later that night, while the paramedics were patching them up, how they had been beaten senseless after being attacked from behind. The muddy footprints matched a pair of tracks coming out of the lake. Who would swim a hundred yards across a lake in winter?

So it was the next day, while the feds were tearing apart the remains of the old house, Michael was thinking to himself: Yep, city buses aren't too bad. This one would take them far south of the city to an industrial park. There was a collection of plants turning out various products. The next run would be crowded with workers, but this sunrise shuttle, the first of the day, was only sparsely populated. They would have breakfast at the convenience store deli, then slip out and start their long hike across the fields back to the tree house in the hollow.

It was necessary to split up for awhile from there. The descriptions of them issued to the press were pretty vague, but they were taking no chances. Burk was pretty sure he could pass along through the hobo camps unnoticed. Michael would drive down to Mexico for awhile. Who knows? Maybe he could spot the ratty old bob-tailed truck hauling cocaine back across the Southwest, and follow him home. After Christmas and New Year's, they would both try to meet at the orchard in northern California. Michael was going to look for a small camper to put on the truck. It would make it harder to hide, but easier to live in year-round. By then, they'd know if there were more targets, or if they had already done all they could.

Maybe – just maybe – a few policemen would hesitate before humiliating some random citizen minding his own business.

Meanwhile, it would some years yet when, in yet another round of renovations, workmen would find a badly corroded, inexpensive Chinese-made rifle and scope at the bottom of a sewer vent pipe in one of the campus buildings.

# Part 2: Coming Home

## Chapter 20

"Aqui, Ernesto – Plexiglas," Michael pointed into the bed of his pickup. The hand-crafted camper shell was almost finished, lacking only windows for the frames. It might have indeed been possible to find a large sheet of the hard clear plastic in Juarez, but he wanted that heavier grade stuff he spotted in El Paso on one of his shopping trips.

The elderly man pulled at the sheet and carried it carefully into his shop, which was actually just a lean-to on his house. It was open on the long side, but with a roof. He clamped the sheet to a frame and began meticulously marking it for the various odd windows in the camper shell. Michael had no idea where Ernesto found the window frames, but assumed they were just more of the kind of stuff the amazing man had scavenged from any number of dumps. He was pretty sure none of it was stolen, since the frames all had no more than a few shards of broken glass hanging in them. Michael decided Plexiglas was cheaper, and probably better for his use.

Any day now, the camper would be finished. Then he would mount it on his old pickup. Of course, this would remove his last excuse for staying here on the hillside above Ciudad Juarez. He'd have to head back to California.

It had been a marvelous vacation, and the hardest work he'd ever done. It was more labor than even the digging under the little house back up north. He tried not to think too much about that. Though news reports had never mentioned the SWAT Team, only an explosion and fire, he was pretty sure at least a couple of the officers had died. Also, reports hadn't tied the professor's death with the explosion. In fact, they never even called it an assassination.

Michael fastened his tool belt and shifted it to a more comfortable place on his hips. The nails in the open pouches jingled merrily, a sound he now thought of as almost music. That was due to something one of the very creative college girls on the first mission team had done. She was sitting on the bare planks of a new roof during a lunch break one day, and began shaking her own nail pouch, in a very engaging rhythm. To this, another student added a gentle hammer tapping on a loose board, producing another tone. Then a couple more students joined in, and the girl made up a little chorus about work as worship.

He'd never forget that group, a small Christian college choir taking a mission trip on their Christmas break from classes. The little community benefiting from this work did their best to put on a real celebration for their guests, and the simplicity of love made it seem lavish. There was more than one kind of love, too. Michael tried to stay away from Juanita, the young widow who served as one of the church cooks. He was pretty sure she had eyes for him. As he climbed a ladder to yet another roof in the same series of new homes, tears came to his eyes. He was the only Anglo on the building site today. There was another American, a volunteer from the big Baptist church over in El Paso, who was the master carpenter and instructor. That man had been born not too far from these houses. He was a local boy who made it big, got his legal citizenship in the US, them came back to help lift others.

So it was several days later, Ernesto had finished mounting the exceedingly lightweight custom-built camper. He signaled Michael up on the roof, and indicated with a flourish of his hands the job was done; it was worth more to Michael than he could afford to pay the man, but still more than what Ernesto could make on other projects. Wiping a tear, Michael drove a nail through the plank into the frame below, in three practiced strokes. He so wanted to stay, but he couldn't. This was the last nail on that day. Something deep inside told him this was the moment, time to go.

The leather belt held a good framing hammer, flat steel nail puller, wide locking measuring tape, a couple of carpenter's pencils, small level, and a few other odd tools, along with the nails. Holding the tool belt in his hand, he considered a moment, then called the teenage boy over. The young man had hung around most days, helping with odd tasks, such as fetching small pieces, helping to hold something large against the gusty winds, or whatever else was needed. He was barefoot, gaunt, and ate the free lunch like it was his only meal. He didn't speak much, but sang rather well the Spanish hymns often shared to brighten the work days.

Michael never knew his name, and simply called him _Hermanito_ , "little brother." Deciding it didn't really matter if the boy knew how to use the tools, that he might sell them for food, he decided to give it a chance. He handed the belt to him and quickly got into his truck. As he drove away, a look in his side mirror showed the boy, standing dumbstruck, looking back and forth between the belt and the rear of the departing little truck and camper. As he rounded the corner, Michael was sure he saw the boy wrap it around his waist and run toward the half-finished house.

## Chapter 21

He must have driven this way into El Paso a dozen times in the past five weeks. This time he would keep going. He crossed the free bridge, and at the junction with I-10 he saw another small pickup similar to his, waiting at the light. It took his mind back. As he crossed the double intersection and onto the Interstate westbound, he could almost capture the feeling of fear, weariness, and bewilderment trying to find the route over the border.

The day he left the little copse with the tree house, and his good friend Burk, he had managed to get all the way to Monahans in the Permian Basin. The relatively warm desert air, awash in the smell of raw petroleum, was quite a change to the previous night. He and Burk had arrived at the cache of dry clothing nearly frozen after their confrontation with the police patrol watching for them. Though the city there had been in a warm spell, it meant simply it didn't quite freeze at night. The basement was warm enough, where they waited for the SWAT raid to start. The entrance to the tunnel was okay, too, but the storm drain was cold. By comparison, the park at Monahans was quite seasonable. He packed the coat away that next morning, and hadn't seen it since. It had been fairly cool the next morning as he crossed the high ridges between Pecos and El Paso, but even with the high elevation of the Rio Grande Valley there, it remained fairly warm the whole five weeks in Juarez.

He originally had planned to drive all the way down to Chihuahua, maybe visit Copper Canyon. For some reason, with a bad wreck in the main intersection just across the bridge, and still driven by fear, he found that right turn rather inviting. Just a block down, he caught up with the bus load of college students, stopped for traffic at a corner. Having seen the squalor of Mexican cities before, he was mesmerized more by the sign on the back naming their college, and by the young adults in the back windows, just a few years younger than he. Overcome by curiosity, he followed them. When they climbed the hillside into the real gritty slums, he stayed with them. They stopped in front of a little mission church. After watching them a moment, he realized what it was. There was a couple of small building foundations, and some of the students carried carpentry tools as they unloaded their luggage.

Pulling up beside the bus, he decided sight-seeing was not what he needed. He presented himself as a fellow Christian on vacation, and asked if he could join them, offering his services as translator. Without hesitation, they welcomed him.

Not everything had been sweetness and light. Some evenings he would pickup a wireless signal just strong enough to get online. Still somewhat fearful, he decided to install the Linux CD to his hard drive, wiping away Windows. The latter simply held too much risk for him. After figuring out how to get the firewall working, he felt much more secure, but changed his MAC address pretty regularly.

Naturally, he scanned for news reports of the incident back in that Midwestern city. As near as he could discern, his and Burk's diversion had served its purpose. It was after his second day there in Juarez he finally saw a preliminary report of the explosion, then an obituary on the professor. Then, there was nothing. Well, not exactly nothing. When he visited some of the underground patriot forums, they seemed to be saying there was a large number of SWAT officers killed. Over the next few weeks, it seemed also there was a slight up-tick in the number of shootouts with police in areas associated with patriot activity. A couple of police cruisers were bombed, and somebody shot up the front of an urban police station with a machine gun. There were other, similar incidents. It's not as if he and Burk had opened a flood gate, but he decided there was a distinct response among those who objected to the rising police state.

There also appeared to be a matching rise in police brutality. He found several stories like the city police beating and threatening with death a drug suspect because he refused permission to search his house without a warrant. There were a few national events, such as the brazen attempt to plant evidence in one Congressman's office. The Capitol Police announced a bomb threat and cleared the building. One staffer had been puking in the bathroom, and started to leave his office when he spotted someone who was not on any Congressional staff, but wearing one of the staff badges. This man was carrying a box into a certain Congressman's office, the door held by one of the police officers. In spite of dizziness, the staffer was quick-witted enough to snap a picture with his cellphone without being noticed. Congressional leaders and the White House got into a stand-off over possession of the planted evidence.

Of all people, Michael was not surprised the major media outlets played down most of this. How often had an investigative story of his been spiked? Or how often had he been ordered by his own editorial supervisors to use propaganda from some bureaucrat or company? His impressions came from double-checking each story against independent Internet outlets or those based outside the US. While they, too, could publish nonsense, at least he was free to choose – when he had time. He hadn't the time to investigate things too deeply. He was actually more worried about Burk. When he left Burk at the tree house, the young man promised he wouldn't stay. He would check again with the woman in the barn, then move north as soon as possible, before heading back to the West Coast. Michael kept telling himself Burk was probably smarter about avoiding the police in the first place. Still, he had insisted Burk take some of his cash just in case.

Michael had been forced into frugality during his first year out of college free-lancing. When he got the job at the publishing house, he never bothered to adapt to the materialism his co-workers celebrated. Sure, he dressed better than before, but that was a requirement for the job. He had traveled quite extensively as a mere reporter, then less often, but staying longer as a feature writer – all at company expense. The accountant congratulated him on avoiding frivolous expenses. He had saved up quite a bit, paid cash for the inexpensive new car he had bought last year, and had paid a year's lease in advance on his apartment in a distinctly middle-class area. Aside from the infrequent socializing with his previous editor, and mandatory office parties, he never spent a lot of time with co-workers. He also got the jobs they didn't. He had figured he had just enough to get by in Mexico for awhile without hitting an ATM. He left with most of the money he brought, though, because the mission insisted on feeding and housing him.

It was getting dark when he spotted the first cell tower near Blythe, and decided to call his old Bible study leader back home. Pulling out his cellphone, he realized it hadn't been turned on in nearly two months. Once he and Burk joined up, he had turned it off and kept it in the truck, since there wasn't anyone else he had wanted to talk to while planning their adventure.

No sooner had he pressed the "on" button, it rang. He nearly dropped it. Glancing at the number, he didn't recognize it. Letting it ring twice more, he decided something was telling him he better take this call. As soon as he held it to his ear, there was no mistaking the voice on the other end.

"Michael, turn off your cell phone and leave it that way. Then check your email."

"Terrell?" Click. He realized it was a recording, and did as the voice suggested, turning the phone back off. As the paranoia resurged, he took the next highway exit and headed south. He probably had just enough gas to make Brawley. It occurred to him his former editor was the sort of man who could easily have found someone at the phone company to program such a recording to play the instant his phone registered its presence on the air again. With mountains to his west blocking out the last few rays of the sun, it was suddenly quite dark. However, the dark had a ways to go catching up with the blackness of his fear.

At one point, as the road climbed over a ridge-line, he suddenly rolled down the window and threw out his cellphone into a deep canyon of the far side of the road. A few seconds later he remembered the older one, reached between the bucket seats and dug in a bag blindly while driving. That phone quickly followed the other. Wishing now he had decided to accept the invitation to stay in Juarez, he made it to Brawley with a couple of gallons to spare. He realized the camper was probably helping his fuel mileage; the memory of asking the old craftsman to make it aerodynamic as possible came to him. The camper allowed him room to sleep, have a desk and seat for his laptop, and still hold his gear. He had also asked for a hidden compartment. Having guns and grenades in his luggage made him a little nervous, in spite of the scrupulous observance of his privacy everyone practiced there in Juarez. He had had a tough time convincing Burk to keep his own handgun. These things occupied his mind while he refueled.

With the tank full again, he pulled over to a large empty parking lot. Michael was elated to find a wireless signal. He had been keeping up on his email, so it shouldn't be hard to spot a message from Terrell, his former editor. He checked each account, even reading the spam, to make sure it didn't slip through. There was nothing. There were a couple of interesting job offers, and he was glad to see them, since his cash reserves were getting uncomfortably low. Giving those two messages a preliminary response, he sat back and wondered what Terrell's recording meant.

_Flagstand_. He suddenly remembered that war gaming site Terrell had convinced him to join. It had been amusing for awhile, but he let it slide when he took a trip for a story. This was some obscure site based in Poland, and the connection was less than perfect. This didn't hurt the games, since they were based on strategy and taking turns, but it just wasn't his kind of thing. He really had tried to like it, and Terrell made so much of it, but it just didn't grab Michael. That is, until just now, when he remembered the membership came with a free webmail account. Wracking his brain, he finally recalled the user name and password, and stumbled around the site interface looking for the link to the webmail. The site had been updated, and Michael was lost for a moment. Finally, he spotted it and clicked.

There were a half-dozen game challenge messages, and right at the bottom something from Terrell. Growling about the lag time, he waited for the message window to display.

"Don't go home. Don't go near your car. Nothing you left here is worth your life. Meet me at the game room."

Michael sat staring at the screen for awhile. Then he closed the connection and put his laptop in suspend mode. He lay staring out the skylight for a long time before finally falling asleep.

## Chapter 22

Michael studied the menu for awhile. He decided something from the collection of wild fowl would be more palatable, and finally chose the roast ptarmigan. He just didn't think he could stomach any of the wild game animals with horns and hooves, and certainly nothing with claws. With little else to go on, he decided someone here would call Terrell to notify him Michael had arrived. Maybe it would be the waitress who had the hots for Terrell.

His former editor liked this little restaurant, and had once made a pun, calling it "the game room" because the entire menu was wild game. There was actually an ancient pinball game in one corner, so it took Michael a minute to catch on to the pun before he chuckled. Terrell loved the Sample Platter, which contained each time a slightly different random collection of bite-sized pieces of various creatures, variously cooked. Michael had turned down most of Terrell's invitations to return to "the game room," but not this time.

He had been staring at a teenager playing the pinball machine quite skillfully. The thing was making a racket, and Michael jumped when Terrell crossed his line of sight and sat down without speaking. The low lighting of the place made Terrell's dark complexion even darker. In full light, you would have seen somewhat rounded features on a long face, and a rather square jaw. With is silver hair cut permanently in a flat top, and no hint of facial hair, you could never guess Terrell's age or his ethnic background.

Staring down into a glass he had brought with him, Terrell said just loudly enough to be heard, "You were too effective."

"Too effective? At what?"

"I know the wire services avoided it for the most part, but I heard through some friends you and your buddy managed to kill the entire city SWAT Team." Terrell looked up with a faint smile.

Michael stared at his hands on the table in front of him. "I had no idea." Suddenly he felt oddly dirty.

"Where'd you learn about LAW rockets? That was some trick. And how did you keep the front door from opening? Most of the time, a tactical ram opens on the first knock."

It was Michael's turn to smile a little. "Well, we had read about rams, and had added an extra facing of two-by-sixes to the door frame. That would require them to actually break the door, not just knock it open. It was a pretty solid door. As for the LAW, the instructions are written right on it. Ran a very thin piece of nylon fishing line across the porch down low. It was tied to a pin holding everything up. When it was tripped, we had a frame drop straight down from the ceiling with the LAW cradled, already set to fire. An old heavy brick was rigged to fall on the trigger when the bracket was all the way down. I just looked up on the Net about shaped charges. Burk said something about shrapnel, and we added the plate as an afterthought. We found it in a bin outside a metal shop while looking for bars to form fake climbing rungs on our sewer shaft."

Terrell turned his head a bit, still eying Michael. "This is the first I heard of a sewer shaft."

Michael waited while a cup of tea was set before him. He turned to make sure the waitress was gone, then face Terrell again. "I had been wondering how we could divert attention from our tunnel, give us a little more time, when I saw some construction on campus. They had pulled some old iron pipe out of the ground. It was rusted, but still solid. It was next to a concrete junction box about to go into the ground. I saw the short access shaft on top of the box and it gave me the idea to create a fake one in our basement. It happened we had a floor drain running straight into a sewer below the house."

Talking into his raised glass, Terrell murmured, "That explains the three days it took them to release the bulletin." He took a slow sip, then lowered the glass and swallowed. "That trick with the claymore was sharp. I'd never seen that before."

Michael looked down self-consciously, "The hand generator was hidden on a frame member where the open door would hit it. The hinges were well greased. We really weren't expecting to kill very many. We were just hoping to make some noise and hurt a few of them."

"Eight at the front door, four from the force of the ram shooting backwards when the missile hit the same spot – good estimate you made there. Six from the claymore on the back porch. I hear the SAC was terribly angry about being fooled." Terrell grinned as if proud. "However, that wasn't the worst of it. You took out one of the Shadow Government's favorite sons."

"Literal 'son'?" Michael asked.

"Cousin by marriage to the Rockefellers."

"Well, that detail got by me. Still, I'm not sorry for his loss." He was still ambivalent about the others.

Terrell looked over Michael's shoulder. "I don't blame you. Here's the food."

They engaged in some fake chatter about the local football team while the waitress popped open a folding tray rest, then swung down the loaded tray with platters, bowls, and saucers, topped with a basket of warm yeast rolls. She flirted with Terrell while scattering the meal on the table, then slowly retreated, turning back at least once to wink at the older man again.

As soon as she was far enough away, Terrell's sunny smile faded quickly. As he rearranged dishes to suit him, he spoke with some of the seriousness he had in that closet three months ago. "Still, that's what will make it impossible for you and your buddy to do it again. Losing a few ground troops is no big deal." He took a bit of something meaty, and while chewing, "Taking down a family officer they won't overlook."

Michael picked at his bird, buttered a roll, the looked up. "So... Now what?"

"Glad you asked," replied Terrell with a grin.

## Chapter 23

It was Saturday, just a couple of days from New Year's. They stood on top of a sand dune. The morning was cold and thinly overcast, but the breeze was gentle. Michael had driven back out of the city after the game dinner, and slept in his camper. Then he had come back and met Terrell over breakfast, since he insisted Michael help him fly his radio-controlled glider. There were a few others in this semi-desert area outside the city, most flying motorized models. Terrell showed off with a few stunts, and then brought the glider in toward them, slowing it as it dropped, finally stalling it just over their heads. Terrell caught it in one hand.

The glider was quite large. Though made of featherweight materials, it was rather heavy because of its size. Had Michael tried that catch, he would have dropped it because of the weight. Terrell was six-two and quite athletic. Michael knew he worked out, but was not aware of the details.

Terrell set it down on the sand, dropping to one knee. Looking up at Michael, he asked, "Care to guess how much of a payload it could carry and still fly well?"

Michael was a little tired of the games, but Terrell could hardly be pushed along. "Oh, five pounds?" he ventured.

"Close," Terrell announced. "Five kilos. I tested it a couple of times. It's sluggish, and won't turn nearly as sharp, but is much more stable. Hard to launch single-handed without a good head wind and a high spot."

"And?"

"There are almost no metal parts. The radio receivers are tiny these days, and the servo motors have just a bit of copper winding. Only the battery is of any substance." Terrell went on like a salesman.

"Unless your payload has metal in it," Michael offered.

"Nah, just some wiring." Terrell stood up. "I figure the idea is good for just one hit. Right now, air defense around critical buildings won't pick up model aircraft below a certain density, and below a certain mass of metal. This one was custom designed and built by hand several years ago. Today, you can order a prefab which is stronger, lighter and a whole lot cheaper. It's not what a purist would do, but if you needed a dozen or so cheap and quick, they're good enough."

Michael caught on to the theory, at least. "One at a time by radio control? Aren't there risks with such a lag time between them? Even if you could teach me how to do it, that's still six separate flights for each of us to control. And wouldn't someone pickup the radio frequency?"

Terrell held up a plastic box, resembling a tiny MP3 player. "They call these tiny computers 'Arduino.' You can order them very cheaply with a GPS module and a weather receiver commonly used in meteorological balloons. With these, it's no longer necessary to have expensive tracking radar dishes for the weather balloons. Any antenna tuned to the proper frequency can receive the weather data, along with coordinates in three dimensions. Just add navigation software..."

"Okay." Michael asked, "How much of this do you already have? And why do you need me?"

## Chapter 24

Michael did not like those people. He didn't think it was a prejudice, because he didn't care what their ethnic or national identity was. What bothered him was the way they acted. It was as if he were three years old, and trying to convince some adults who spoke another language to fix a car. Their heavily accented English sounded almost like scolding. He didn't recognize the language in which they chattered to each other, so it was probably Persian or the like. Arabic he recognized by the unique sound, as well as Hebrew and Egyptian, but this was something else. Finally, they brought out the package and took the money Terrell had given him.

He assumed Terrell didn't want to be seen in this part of town. With his hair and beard regrown, Michael was an unknown. They dismissed him summarily, and he wanted to say, "Feelings mutual," but didn't want to set them off. As quickly as he could without looking like a man in fearful flight, he left the littered street in the smelly neighborhood, and drove back to the dunes. Terrell had also given him just enough cash to fill his tank on the way back.

There was a snack bar on the far side of the park, and he met Terrell there. Kosher dogs were something Michael had missed, and rather enjoyed his lunch. They ate in silence, watching the other model aircraft. "Finished?" Terrell asked.

"Sure." Before he could say anything else, Terrell was half way to his car in the parking lot. Michael followed him, but kept going a few spaces away where his truck sat. He had opened the back door, and was climbing in when he found Terrell on his heels. Michael sat on the bed, while Terrell took the desk seat. He had donned rubber gloves. Michael handed down the package from an overhead compartment. Terrell produced yet another gadget from his pocket. Michael realized it looked rather like an electronic bug sweeper, but with a much shorter antenna.

After passing it around all sides of the package, Terrell said, "Tsk, tsk. Naughty boys. Something in here is not the kind of electronics I ordered." He opened the outer packing, checked each of the small boxes inside and then opened one. Removing the bubble-wrapped contents, he passed the device over the little empty box, hesitating at one spot. Then he set it down, took out a knife and sliced the cardboard. After he peeled the layers apart, a flat, plastic chip fell out. It was no thicker than a guitar pick, but had electronic tracings clearly visible on both faces. Terrell grinned and left the camper.

Michael followed wordlessly, watching.

Terrell produced a rather smaller glider from the back seat of his car. It was little more than a stick and some flat pieces for the flight surfaces. There was no paint, but on the nose was a lump of clay. Terrell pressed the electronic chip deep into the clay. Then he stood for a while, watching the flying models. The sun had come out strong about mid-morning, and it was a bit warmer. Grinning, Terrell began walking rather quickly out into the dunes with Michael struggling to keep up.

After about a quarter-mile, Terrell stopped on the crest of one dune, looking out across a rather wide flat spot, where there was a good bit of dark flat rock poking out of the sand. He measured it with his eyes. Turning to Michael, he said, "Updraft. It's just about the right size."

The breeze had slacked off at the ground level, but a few of the other models seemed to hit a drift if they went very high. Terrell walked just a few yards past the bottom of the dune, scanned the wide, rocky bowl, then drew back and launched the small glider with terrific force. It climbed straight up, then banked and did a few dips, coming to rest a few yards from Terrell. He ran to pick it up. As he walked back, he was pinching the blob of clay on the nose, and appeared to remove a little, applying it to one wing tip. Then he launched again. This time, the craft climbed in a rather flat circle pattern, just inside the ring of dunes around the rocky outcroppings. It continued to circle, climbing slowly. Terrell rejoined Michael, still atop the dune. As they watched, it eventually caught the breeze aloft, and drifted with each circle, still climbing. After some twenty minutes, it was too high and too far windward to see.

Terrell was still staring after it. "That chip was similar to the ones our government would like for all of us to wear under our skins. They sit quietly until hit by a transmission with the proper frequency and encoding. If that transmitter has a reader, too, at the right distance, it will get a response from the chip. Usually it's a long string of code, representing some sort of identification. That ID is matched to an existing database. However, this chip was more complicated. By waving the detector close to it, I got a very weak response, so no one else could pick it up. It would send a response signal matching the strength of the query. With a capacity to invest just a bit of extra power briefly to a long range query, it would at least report its position pretty well. Once a strong signal comes closer, it would also send more kinds of information, not just an ID string. Somebody will be disappointed when they find their chip somewhere far out in the desert, stuck on a glider you can buy all over the world. And without any fingerprints," he held up a gloved hand. "I was expecting this."

## Chapter 25

The aircraft would be delivered to an address in Stockton. The pickup date would allow Michael to get them on the way back from meeting Burk at the orchard. Michael was glad to have the camper, because he didn't feature spending money on a motel if Burk wasn't there. He wasn't. Michael decided to stay the night in the orchard.

The orchard was not deserted. There were a few pup tents clustered around a campfire. It was colder up this way, but someone used to it might do fine. Michael took a chance after his cold breakfast and approached the cluster of widely varying fabric accommodations. An older man sitting by the fire looked up, and smiled, "Nice rig."

"Thanks. I had it built to order in Mexico," Michael explained. "I'm looking for someone." He went on to describe Burk, and the man grinned.

"Yeah, know `im. Said to tell you he was staying with Mama for awhile." He looked up with a sort of question on his face.

"Ahhhh." Michael smiled, and stared into the fire a moment. Then, breathing in deeply, "Okay, thanks. I better move on, because I really need to talk to him."

"Got any spare coffee?" the old man asked, hopefully.

"Just a jar of instant."

"Better'n nuttin'."

Michael left the man a half empty jar of instant coffee and made his way toward the crossing where the cafe and tire shop stood, up in the national forest. No sooner had he left the valley floor, he was seeing snow. Patches at first, then large banks, and finally a good pack of it was visible on side roads as he climbed to higher elevations. He was still wondering what he'd say an hour later as he saw the place appear around a curve. Pulling into the cafe, he got out and hurried inside. At this higher elevation it was quite cold. There was a strong smell of wood-burning fireplaces on the wind.

As he stepped into the cafe, he was greeted by Mama. She apparently didn't recognize him. "What could I get you, honey?"

He smiled, "A cup of your fantastic coffee and your son."

Her cheery expression became rather serious. "My only son was killed in Iraq. However, I won't have trouble with the coffee."

"Wait," he said. "I didn't mean that like it sounded. The last time I was here my friend was with me. I don't know what name he uses here, but he told me to call him Burk. He's a full head taller than I, much younger, speaks with a soft, raspy voice..."

She was laughing. "Oh, /that/ son!" she interrupted him. "Now I remember you." Then cocking her head to one side she said, "I like the beard. Come on; he's in the back." She turned and stepped through the swinging half-door into the kitchen. There were two Hispanic women bustling around, and the place smelled delicious. Stepping through another doorway into a long stock room, she called out. "Take a break, Son! You have company."

She turned back into the kitchen, leaving Michael standing. He looked right, then left and spotted Burk, swinging a mop between the racks. The big fellow picked it up and set it into a wheeled mop bucket before looking up. Taking a step forward, his eyes rose to meet Michael's and he looked surprised. "Michael!" The big kid ran the few steps between them and grabbed Michael in a bear hug.

His grip was gentle, and Michael simply soaked up the moment of fellowship with the one who had become his best friend in the whole world. Mama returned with a tray holding not just coffee, but a thermal pot and plates of food. "Lunch time, boys," she announced, and led them out onto an insulated walkway between the cafe and a cabin out behind. The walkway was wide enough to accommodate a picnic table, and they were seated facing each other. Michael guessed the passage had once been open sided, perhaps with a roof. At some point later it was walled in with big windows, and a door added halfway up one side.

## Chapter 26

During the meal, Burk described his journey. Aside from cold, it was routine travel for him. He left the area immediately as promised, and asked the woman in the barn for directions to the best way out heading north. She sent him to a camp ten miles away. It was empty, but the path leading away to the north was obvious. It climbed a ridge, then down into a valley with railroad tracks. Stopping in some bushes half-way down, he waited. The wait was longer than he liked, and Burk kept looking around, listening for every sound.

The blind side of the curve had trees, and he hustled over to them as soon as he felt the familiar vibration. At first it seemed to be coming too fast, and he feared he'd have to walk a bit more. However, the train began to slow, and was quite a bit longer than he would have expected with two engines. Then he reminded himself the Midwest was much flatter, so it required fewer engines than the mountainous West Coast. He spotted his one best chance. Plunging out of the trees, he charged alongside the low-walled freight car. Tossing his pack over the side, he just managed to catch the step ladder, almost falling. The car was empty, and he didn't have much time, so laid against the forward wall with his head in the corner. He had long ago picked up a small, plastic hand mirror for the very purpose of peering around the corners of moving trains.

Seeing the signs of entering a town, he simply stayed down and waited. Eventually the train lurched subtly, picking up speed again. He ended up spending the whole day in that one spot, and was getting pretty cramped and cold by nightfall. It was tempting to get off and warm up somewhere, but he decided to take a chance and climb the box car behind him in the darkness. Having seen nothing likely in the cars which passed while he was waiting to jump on, his only hope was farther back. Moving carefully, he passed back to a flat car with a road grader. That was no better, because it had an open cab. Passing more road construction equipment, he stopped. It dawned on him most of it was painted a buff sand color. It was military equipment. Looking quickly to see if any of it had bumper numbers indicating it belonged to a military unit already, he couldn't find any. Still, it made him extra nervous to think there could be military guards on the load.

Scrambling back to his first place in the low-sided open car, he tried to keep an eye out for the next highway crossing. It wouldn't be good to stay on this thing when it was unloading, or even idling, inside a military installation. To his delight, he noticed they were slowing as the tracks crossed over what appeared to be an Interstate highway. Risking being seen, he leaned out, clinging to the ladder. First tossing his pack, he then jumped onto the grassy slope rolling down to the highway. He managed to stop about half-way down. Clambering back up to get his pack, he then crawled under the bridge. To his amusement, there were a couple of hobos there already. He shared his food stash, and passed the night warmly in a well-used pocket filled with harvested dry grass.

Dawn showed him just a mile from a truck stop. His associates were headed south, but assured him he could probably catch a truck needing a lumper up at the plaza. About half-way there, he stopped and extracted one of the bills from his stash, then finished the hike. He was reminded how it's always coldest just before dawn. From the dumpster out back, he fished out a cardboard box. Using his multi-tool, he cut out one large square side. With a piece of chalk he always carried, he made a sign: LUMPER WESTBOUND. He folded it in half and went inside for a hot breakfast. Eating and paying for a meal would help convince the truckers he was no riff-raff looking for trouble.

As it turned out, he had just gotten a good start on pancakes, eggs and sausage, when a trucker walked over to his booth. "Lemme see that sign, boy." It was the faux tough talk truckers liked to use, softened by a smile. "Westbound, eh? Where you goin' out there?"

"Gonna go see my mama. She's in Californy," Burk mimicked the trucker's speech pattern somewhat. It was a reflex to cue off another's accent to reduce tension.

"Well, I got a split load of truck tires for Denver and Salt Lake." Burk's heart was warmed, and he remembered to thank God silently. "Think you can get 'em off pretty quick?"

"You won't even get a good nap before I'm done," Burk grinned with self confidence.

"I don't doubt it, big as you are. I can just about afford to feed you and haul you, but I don't have much cash. Hope you weren't looking to get rich. I'm just gettin' too old to toss them big tires anymore."

Burk had hardly slowed, eating the big bites typical of him. "All I really need is a ride. I'm glad to help you in the bargain." He reached out his hand.

The driver shook on it, then told him which truck was his. He went back over to stand by a table with similar-looking men. Burk finished his meal, drained the coffee cup, and made a quick trip to the bathroom. By the time he reached the truck, the driver was already inside, revving the engine. Burk climbed in the passenger side expertly and they were off.

There was the usual road chatter punctuated by long periods of silence or singing with the radio. The tires were no big problem for Burk. As it turned out, the man was dispatched from Salt Lake City to Reno for his next load. The driving and off-loading had taken three days, in part because of bad weather, and delays in getting the receivers to take the loads so close to Christmas. They had chatted about all sorts of things, and the man thanked Burk warmly when they parted company in Reno.

From there, it was two day's hiking, including a short cut through the woods and one long ride with a ranger who knew him, and Burk was "home" at the cafe. He sent word via the hobo grapevine to direct anyone asking for him to Mama's.

## Chapter 27

The plates had been pushed aside empty, and they were working on the coffee urn. The walkway wasn't heated, but plenty warm for their fellowship.

"I'm really glad now you made me keep that pistol," Burk said.

"Really? Why?"

"When I got here, it was pretty late. Mama was just closing up. She let me in the back door here" – he pointed to the door in the side of the walkway – "and I was sitting right at this table. When the ranger dropped me off, he had pulled around the side road and into the drive. With the trees and all, anyone not standing in the back wouldn't know he had let me out. I had seen a pickup at the tire shop, but didn't think anything of it. Turns out, they was waiting for Mama's help to leave. The ladies went out the front door, then she locked it as always, and turned off the lighted sign and the front lights. She counts her till from the light of the kitchen."

From a slumped-back position against the wall, Burk sat up straight. He continued, demonstrating with his hands, "They pulled up sideways, real close to the door. One jumped out and slammed a big truck tire spoon into the gap between the door and frame, and then another jumped out behind him with a short sledge hammer. He started beating the bar down, and it broke the lock right off. They rushed in with their tools as weapons, and Mama screamed. So I came running to the front, pulling the gun out of my pocket as I went. I crashed through the little swinging door, and they jumped back. I pointed the gun at the nearest one, and both ran right back out the door." He demonstrated with both hands, and was actually holding the pistol.

"Good man!" Michael applauded briefly.

Burk put the pistol back in his pocket. "Michael, I'm not leaving Mama alone any more. I don't have any problem with what we did, but I'm staying here. Mama's husband ran off six years ago, and she's too old to get another one from around these parts. She has no plans to leave, either. She's always kept a standing offer to feed and house me in exchange for doing the heavy lifting." He paused, looking out a window. "The world is getting pretty mean these days."

Michael set his cup down, and poured a fresh half-cup. "Aside from the progression of the police state, I suspect some of it comes from our adventure. Did you know we killed the entire SWAT Team?" Burk shook his head, his face saddened. "No? I know we had no expectation of being that successful – we weren't even sure any of the booby traps would work. But that's not the thing which matters most. That professor was a family member of the Shadow Government."

Burk raised one eyebrow, and turned back from staring out the window. "So they will be very actively looking for us because of him," a statement, not a question.

Michael took another sip, and then poured some coffee in Burk's empty cup. "I don't blame you for staying here to help Mama. This may be the best place you could live for the foreseeable future. Nor do I blame you for begging off future missions. I'm having doubts myself about the whole thing. I'm seeing where quite a few folks are copying our work to some degree, but without the precision, the care to avoid hitting the wrong people. More gunfights with police, attacks on cruisers and police facilities, and a few political assassination plots caught just in time. I feel certain it's something we started, or at least contributed to."

"It's going to get uglier either way," Burk murmured. Looking up suddenly, "I'm betting places like this will go unnoticed until the very last. If the dam breaks because we pricked a hole in it, then it was bound to happen sooner or later. Of course, now I wish I hadn't gone with you. I don't like having that much blood on my hands. I'm not a warrior; I can't pretend I'm Ehud. This place is where God wants me."

Michael stood up. "Well, I need get back down to Stockton before too late." He hesitated. "There might be another incident, soon. I'm planning to help another man with something more ambitious. Not more people getting killed, but a big black eye on the Shadow Government. I'm not sure yet what, but whether this works out or not, there won't be any more for me. I'm pretty sure I know where I belong, too."

Burk showed a vivid interest. "Where?"

"Ciudad Juarez, at a Baptist mission."

Burk laughed large, throwing his head back. "I like it! I like it!"

They embraced one last time, then Michael opened the door of the walkway. He turned, "Give my regards to Mama."

## Chapter 28

Michael paid in cash at the hobby warehouse; it was Terrell's cash, of course. The boxes filled his camper, and there was one in the seat beside him. The warehouse employees were turning the lights off before the roll-up door had closed. As he hit Interstate 5, he had no doubt Terrell had already secured the temporary storage unit. Terrell was meticulous, and seemed to be ready for everything, including another tank of gas. Michael decided to wait until he was back in town to refuel.

Arriving at a large storage rental facility, he wondered if he could get in this late. The storage unit was indeed ready, and the night man didn't seem the least bit perturbed to let him in. That's when he realized there were a half-dozen cars and trucks moving household goods into two units, right next to the one he was supposed to use. He went around to approach from the other end. There was a bit of tension as he had to wait a before one car was moved out of his way. The driver didn't seem happy about it. Michael decided the man's happiness wasn't his problem, and drove into his unit. After a moment thinking, he simply closed the door behind him and locked it. There was ample room to stack the boxes on one wall. By the time he was finished, it was 2 AM, and the neighbors were still moving stuff around with occasional cursing. That was fine with him. He climbed into the camper and went to bed, fully dressed.

He was awakened by the sound of the door sliding up. Prepared for a chewing out by the attendant, he was surprised to see Terrell. He glanced at his watch – 8 AM. "Shouldn't you be at work right now?" he asked the editor.

"I was on standby at the office last night for a couple of pending stories, which I was told had to be ready for this morning. The events concerned didn't take place, and I'm officially having breakfast." The man never looked tired. Terrell began opening a box. He pulled out a rather simple, yet graceful pair of wings. He held them a few inches apart, indicating the wing-span was well beyond the reach of his arms. The way he held them indicated they weighed almost nothing. He put them down and pulled out a fuselage, in two halves. He held the halves together, and smiled at the apparent capacity. "I'll test the load capacity Saturday."

Michael had been watching, slumped against the back wall of his camper. "I don't suppose you brought that breakfast with you, by the way?"

"Sorry." Terrell dismissed the question, but then turned. "You broke yet?"

"Getting close. You've made me afraid to touch an ATM."

"With good reason." He placed the parts back into the open box, without bothering to repack neatly or close the box. "Two guys showed up that night you left the office and flashed badges. Since people working for 'The Families' can be just about anything they have to be, I didn't bother checking what sort of badges." He crossed his left arm over his stomach, gripped the right elbow, and held his chin loosely in the right hand. "They were thorough. After thanking me for the folder of your notes, they disappeared into your office. An hour later, they came back out and demanded more. I invited them to search the entire building, if they wished, and held up that fat ring of keys I have to keep. Must have been convincing; they went away." His right hand swung out, palm up to emphasize the point.

"Obviously that was not all," Michael said.

"Obviously. They had taken your laptop and the hard drive from the desktop system. The next morning, they woke me up at home. In essence, they told me I couldn't discuss this with anyone. Then they mentioned some items from my Marine service to emphasize they knew I knew what could happen. Then they told me to notify them the instant I hear of, or from, you again."

"And you rigged a recording to call me as soon as my phone registered in the cell network," Michael stated, not quite a question.

"More or less. Don't ask how. Best I can tell, they are still watching me at least part of the time, relying on mostly passive methods – phones, Internet, probably some spotters here and there. They own the system, so they don't need to resort to melodramatic tailing methods."

"Ah, that chip you found," Michael pushed away from his truck. With his arms crossed in front of him, he walked over to stand near the stack of boxes.

Terrell dropped his hands to his sides, putting them in his pants pockets, and turned slowly to keep his face towards Michael. "I got a chance to field test that hand scanner on your car. It told me there were two chips. I extrapolated from there your apartment was similarly bugged, and of course your accounts are tagged – they're bankers." Reaching into a jacket pocket, he produced a blue colored plastic card. "Wal-Mart gift card. I got it before all this started, and kept it for emergencies. This qualifies as an emergency. It should hold you until I'm ready for the next step."

Michael, still facing the wall, reached out and took the card. He studied it a moment, looking up in time to see Terrell's back, hastily walking to his car outside.

## Chapter 29

Without any better plan, Michael left his truck in the storage facility. He sometimes slipped in and out when traffic was heavy, or asked to ride out the gate with folks leaving. If the attendants knew he was sleeping inside, they said nothing about it. Wal-Mart was just a mile away, so it wasn't too bad. The card was plenty to live on, and he took advantage of the time and strong signal for his laptop. On the Flagstand site, he and Terrell stayed in touch the four days until Saturday.

For the time being, Terrell was discussing targeting an NSA listening post, and favored the one in Yakima, Washington. He had gone to desert training there with a Marine artillery unit early in his career, and knew the terrain quite well. There were several places to enter the perimeter of the Yakima Training Area with a vehicle, and at least two good places left a short drive to an excellent launch area on the ridge just north of the NSA site.

Terrell had reasoned there were three classes of target desirable for the purpose. That purpose was to extend what Michael and Burk had done, but with a direct attack on the government, not just one of its nefarious activities. So hitting the NSA listening post, the first class of target, while not a crippling blow, was rather low risk and would serve the purpose. The second, killing one or more critical figures in the government, especially people responsible for the unprecedented level of tyranny, was more risky, and also wouldn't stop the process. However, it would bring a new level of fear to the tyrannous elite. Both of these kinds of attack would spawn more of the copycat stuff in evidence following the adventure with the SWAT Team.

However, the third and ideal attack would be the riskiest of all: Killing more of the Shadow Government and family. Terrell had made it clear just whom he knew them to be. There were a select few steering the whole thing. In one exchange online, Michael had a lot of questions about this, so they used an encrypted chat board.

M: I keep hearing this is all some kind of Zionist conspiracy.

T: That's one of several covers for the real conspiracy. This, for example, is what keeps the mainstream evangelical and fundamentalist Christians on board. It's so effective, a great many of the Shadow folks affect a Jewish identity. A tiny few of those making all the noise about Jews are actually trying to keep that lie alive; the rest are just useful idiots.

M: I'm confused about the neo-cons. Are they part of the Zionist-Dispensationalist axis?

T: Most of the neo-cons are Christian or Jewish, by religious affiliation, but I can't see any real religious practice in the central figures. Keep in mind, it's just politics with another face. The vast majority of the partisans are dupes, and don't really see the big picture. Neo-cons and Zionists are pretty much the same bunch, but the difference is which audience they pander to at the time. Precious few are permitted to see how strong their ties are to some of our liberals, atheists and certain cooperative Muslim governments.

M: Yet so much of it seems based in Israel, and I keep seeing the Rothschilds name, or their associates.

T: Israel is most certainly NOT our friend. BTW, it was the Rothschilds agents who first pushed through the forfeiture laws in the so-called Drug War. They wasted no time in getting their first bag, a guy named Scott here in CA. They wanted to confiscate his immense property, so trumped up some false charges about marijuana, got a bogus warrant, and conducted an armed raid. They provoked him to show himself armed, then blew him away. No one was prosecuted because the Shadow crew made sure to hush it up. They have continued using that MO since then to deal with problem people or simply seize property.

M: So what's the big picture? What can you tell me?

T: Distraction. If a significant number of sheeple can be riled up about Israel on either side of the question, it makes Israel valuable. When people lose interest, Israel will probably be thrown under the bus. Same goes for just about every major political debate: abortion, gay marriage, welfare, etc.

M: I guess the Latino migration driving wages down, the wasted resources on pointless foreign wars and taxation, the wholesale conscription-through-poverty and mutilation or death of an entire generation, the harsh crack-down on liberties... it all aims to keep us busy while bringing us down so we can't resist.

T: That's about it. There's nothing to say the Zionists have to succeed, but they probably will up to a point. Yet the core issue is robbing the whole world, keeping everyone away from the real issues so they can enslave us all slowly – that is, those of us allowed to live. We won't stop them. It's like you said: We just want to raise the price.

Michael was beginning to have doubts.

## Chapter 30

The test flight went well. The cheap gliders could carry the five kilograms just fine, even without steering ailerons on the wings. Also, with the Arduino modules modified to compute flight in 3D, the craft could be programmed to climb to a specific altitude, then dive into any chosen location in the entire world, if the wind would carry them, and as long as the battery held a charge. Terrell explained, "Most every modern structure of any significance, including the NSA listening posts, can be pinned down precisely by coordinates, thanks to Google Earth."

The idea of destroying a bunch of equipment wasn't too bad. Michael was just a bit worried about getting explosives powerful enough to be useful without raising attention. Could even a former Marine pull that off? It was one thing getting pre-made weapons from an arms dealer, but Terrell was talking something more powerful, which could be fitted to the curves of the aircraft bodies.

Terrell asked Michael to spend one more week hiding in the storage center while he arranged for the explosives. Then he said something which made Michael very nervous.

"Once I take delivery, you can be sure we'll have to move very fast. There's no way to get this stuff without drawing attention. The supply chain is too compromised with double agents. The trick is to pick it up immediately, and act instantly, before any response can be mobilized. You won't be with me for the final event. I'm pretty sure I can get out of most jams, but I can't take responsibility for you. Just be ready for anything, and don't ask too many questions." Then he said something which showed a side Michael had never seen before. "Please, trust me."

They stayed up very late prepping the aircraft for quick final assembly. All the electronics were installed, batteries tested and installed, and some fitting of parts. Then it was all packed back into the boxes. Terrell then had Michael lay down in the floor of the back seat of his car so he could take Michael to his house. It was a much better ride than some of his rail adventures, but still not the best. Terrell pulled inside the garage, turned and whispered to stay put just a little longer.

Coming back, he announced he found no bugs, and let Michael out. The ostensible purpose was to take a regular bath instead of the washpan bathing Michael had been doing in the storage unit. Terrell showed Michael what sort of home a knowledgeable paranoid kept. The entire place had a fine mesh Faraday Cage built into the wallpaper, and linked to a similar mesh in the shutters, doors, etc. Closed up tight against a good storm, the house was also protected from EMP weapons and some forms of snooping. Terrell mentioned it had been shielded this way since September. He showed Michael his only computer, a laptop running OpenBSD – famous for being un-crackable. He invited Michael to explore the system a bit while offline. The file structure was similar to his own Linux laptop, so he knew his way around. Michael wondered if Terrell's urging to look it over fully was some kind of effort to show there was nothing to hide. Indeed, the whole house was rather sparse, clearly without a woman's touch for many years.

In the wee hours of Sunday morning, the visit was terminated, and Michael was brought back by the same method as he left. So began another week in the storage facility. The boredom was broken only by extended time on the Net. There were tons of real flaky conspiracy bozos. Most of them had a few real facts, but they mixed it with all manner of paranoid junk. With the high variation in literacy, it was all the more difficult to sift out the garbage from the facts. One thing seemed rather clear from the mass of jabbering: There was a high likelihood the government would either manufacture another false flag incident like 9-11 – only worse – or would provoke military action from someone like North Korea, or any number of other foreign policy whipping boys.

Since it was known some portion of the troops would most likely side with the population against the government elite, they had to be kept out of the US, and possibly whittled down by casualties in a senseless quagmire. Once the bulk of troops were absorbed in tasks or disabilities, there would be only police forces. Joining an already huge collection of armed federal officers – even the EPA had guns – the state and local agencies would be forcibly federalized. The police certification process in every state was loaded with subtle mind-conditioning, and by now most state and local policemen were ineluctably ready to crush any and all citizen resistance to even the most oppressive government demands. Those officers not quite fully adapted to the task were tagged as such. The plans called for compromising them by various leverages, to include threats to family and property, bogus charges filed away for possible future use, and limitations in duty assignment to prevent them getting in the way when the big even went down.

When that day came, the police would round up all those who dared resist, lock them away in camps staffed by the few trusted units of the military, resulting in a nightmare world Stalin would have admired. Seeing this soothed his conscience for one last try at resistance.

## Chapter 31

Michael was jolted awake Thursday morning by an urgent knocking on the side of his camper. Peeking out, he saw it was just about dawn through the open garage door. Terrell was feverishly loading the boxes into the back of a rental truck. He was wearing a brownish version of military woodland camouflage pants, and a plain brown hunting jacket. The back of the truck was a low-slung moving van box, about 12 feet long. Michael hurried to get dressed and join the fun. Terrell shooed him away. "Get your truck ready to roll. It's going to be towed behind the moving rig."

Sure enough, there was a dolly hitched to the back of the mover. By the time Michael was ready to start the little pickup, Terrell had already pulled forward a bit and was impatiently waiting to guide him up on the dolly. First, he demanded Michael don a pair of snug fitting jersey gloves, with a warning not to remove them for any reason until he was driving his pickup again. It took only a couple of minutes to lock down the front of the pickup and hustle to the cab of the moving van. Terrell directed Michael to drive while he jumped in the passenger seat, and then produced a map. As soon as they stopped for the first traffic light outside the storage facility, Terrell unbuckled his seat belt and crawled through the opening between the cab and the van box. Michael kept driving, trying to glance back when he could through the rear view mirror to see what was going on.

"Take it nice and easy for awhile!" Terrell ordered. The glances Michael managed showed Terrell opening a wooden case, lined with lots of padding. Inside were clear plastic bags filled with what appeared red-orange putty. Orange? He dared not ask out loud if this was Semtex, but decided it was. No wonder Terrell made it sound so risky!

They managed to escape most of the morning drive-time traffic as they headed out toward Barstow. The map showed them taking I-15 to Las Vegas, with a spot circled somewhere on the north side of the Mojave. Once they settled into the steady rural highway traffic, Michael was able to get a better look into the back of the van. There were two large wooden cases of the orange putty. As Terrell carefully packed some into each model, connected some wires, and closed the fuselages, he stacked them back in the boxes. All that was left was to mount the wings and launch them. Michael also spotted a large military style backpack and frame in one corner.

As Terrell was finishing one model, Michael asked, "Why Vegas? I thought the target was in Washington."

Terrell's natural voice was a booming baritone. While he could easily tone it down without transition all the way to a whisper, this was not the moment for that. Speaking easily, yet blasting clearly and sharply over the road noise, "Change of plans. The Bilderbergers will be in Vegas."

Michael's soft tenor required yelling almost. "I thought they were meeting up north this summer."

"This is a preliminary, something never published. In fact, it's so hush-hush, they pay a deposit and reserve a chunk of several major hotels around the world for the same time frame. Then, at the last minute they show up at one or the other. They can afford to take the loss, easily." He named one of the tall, towering hotels in Vegas as the place they actually showed up last night, mostly members of the Ghost Families.

Evil people, indeed, he thought. Still, Michael was feeling that sense of conviction this was not right. He wondered if there was any way he could back out, but decided it was too late, unless God intervened directly. That might mean the plan failing altogether, so Michael prayed silently to know how to pray.

Terrell eventually finished, lining the boxes neatly across the tail of the truck. He shoved the wooden crates to the front, making sure the plastic bags were all stuffed back in them. The bags still had some orange residue in them. Clambering back through and into the passenger seat, Michael wondered how such a tall man, not exactly skinny, could move so gracefully in these tight quarters. Terrell pulled a handful of granola bars from somewhere, and two bottles of water. Michael realized he was starving. They ate in silence for a few minutes before Terrell pointed to an exit, saying, "Take that."

They headed north on a paved road, but soon left it for a winding gravel affair. After a few branches, it was one step above bare rocky desert ground, yet still rather smooth. Finally, they turned up into a draw, in which was nestled a very interesting house. It was three stories of native stone, built right into the back corner the draw. Add crenellated balustrades and it could easily become a castle. Terrell had Michael stop the truck outside a gate an eighth of a mile back from the house. As he jumped out, he told Michael to use the open space in front of him to turn the truck and towed pickup around.

Through the turn-around, Michael watched as Terrell stepped up to the gate and put his hand on something on the other side. Then he climbed over the thing, which was sturdier than it appeared. In a steady jog, he approached the house on one side where there was a pair of garage doors. At this distance, Michael couldn't see much, but he thought a human head poked out of one window near the garage doors. The exchange was brief. Terrell walked over to one of the doors, raised it and stepped inside. A minute later, the nose of a large pickup emerged, followed by a double horse trailer. As the truck rolled up to the gate, it opened automatically. At about the same time, the garage door was closing itself. Motioning to Michael to follow, he lead the way back out. They stopped just before the road climbed over a ridge.

He waved with his hand for Michael to pull up even on the passenger side. Before Michael could get out, Terrell had the back door slid up, and began moving the boxes to the horse trailer. This was one of those fancy trailers completely closed in, but with panels that could be folded down in warmer weather. Michael began helping move the boxes. The crates stayed in the van. When finished, he looked up at Terrell with an obvious question on his face.

"Vegas is just a ruse. It'll scare 'em to death, give 'em a taste of their own medicine. Listen carefully." He pulled a fat envelope from a pocket inside his jacket, and handed it to Michael. As he spoke, he retained his grip on it. "Follow me out to the paved road. I'll turn right, you turn left and get back to the Interstate. Drive into Vegas. Just this side of the Strip, you'll see an old, run-down gas station. There'll be a bunch of snowbird rigs out back in a huge parking area this time of year. Pull out to the far side, lock up the van, uncouple your pickup and drive away. I don't care where you go, just go. I recommend you never visit California again. In fact, leave the US." He let go of the envelope. Grabbing the backpack from the van, he slammed the roll top door down. "Thanks for your help." Tossing the pack into the cab of the truck, he climbed in and began driving away.

Michael hustled to get in the cab of the van, trying to keep up. He was pretty sure he'd get lost in the twisting roads out here. As they parted on the paved route, Michael stared after the accelerating rig with a blank look on his face. Just like that, he's going off to do it alone, keeping Michael out of it. Apparently there was some small risk in driving the van to Vegas, but he decided he could just about handle that.

## Chapter 32

Finding things as Terrell had described them, Michael un-strapped the little pickup from the dolly and drove away. With no better idea what to do, he had left the keys in the ignition of the van. Then he remembered he was still wearing the dark brown jersey gloves, and took them off. Fingerprints, he said to himself. The aircraft and boxes apparently were going to be destroyed. The van would have only Terrell's fingerprints, and the empty explosives containers. With the tank still full after that errand for Terrell two weeks ago, he decided not to stop until he reached Kingman, heading south.

The envelope had two grand in twenties. In Kingman, he stopped at Wal-Mart. Among other things, he grabbed a couple of sandwiches from the deli, and miscellaneous groceries. Between what he could get there and at the Home Depot, he replaced his carpentry kit. He also purchased a wide collection of items which made the work easier, but were hard to get in Mexico. There was also a collection of work clothes and decent shoes in sizes he guessed at for a certain slender young man. And for the young widow, he picked up a simple but lovely dress.

It would be dark before he reached the border at Nogales, so he decided to risk one more night in the US, staying at Patagonia Lake Park. He was irritated to find they had no regular camping spaces, but for a fee would let him park among the self-contained vehicles. In his gear was a tiny chem-stool, so he was fine with that. Most frustrating was his inability to fall asleep quickly. Finally, he pulled out his laptop, and to his surprise found a moderate wireless signal. It took about three minutes to crack the WEP key, and he read a few sites. He decided to check the Flagstand site, and was surprised to find a message waiting.

Check your weapons.

The only weapons Michael knew about were in the secret stash over his head. As soon as the panel was moved, a sheet of paper fell out. He recognized the typeface as coming from the old typewriters still used for some things at the publishing company.

You already knew the plastique would be followed. That every rental truck in the US now has locator chips only guaranteed it, so I made it a point to pick it up in the moving van. With the Ghost Clan already keeping tabs on me, I knew they'd guess I was aiming for their confab in Vegas. A little panic is good for them. Unless you were foolish enough to stop too soon, by the time you see this, the police will be swarming that van.

The horse-mover belongs to an old Marine buddy. He promised to claim it stolen, which would allow me to ditch it when the job is done. We'll see if I can still do winter wilderness survival. I have my Merchant Marine license, though with a different name on it, so I'll try to sign on for a voyage to some place in the Pacific.

You might even hear from me again.

Michael slept poorly, and woke at first light. Wasting no time, he crossed the border as early as they would allow, and didn't relax until he saw the highway signs for _Numero Dos_ heading east.

## Chapter 33

Just a few more months, and the old guard chief could retire and forget all about it.

He was trapped. By the time he understood the government bureaucracy's concept of security was all theater, he had too much experience and training invested to afford another line of work. Sure, they called it "controlled access." It always amounted to giving a real hassle to those with an honest need for access, and precious little control over those who were intent on breaching the perimeter without authorization.

He was bored out here in the middle of nowhere, on the night shift at the gate to a low population facility. Tonight the guard force outnumbered the population of the base. The domes on the buildings stood silently mocking him, since there was yet more and more effective security around them and the processing center standing nearby. That was a totally different agency, merely a partner to the one which actually owned the ground and his job.

But he knew that boredom was a particular kind, almost like a sixth sense. The first time he felt it was the night when he was at the Military Police station in Europe. The rolling gate was closed and nothing was visible on the camera displays. His mind had been wandering in that peculiar, odd sense of boredom. He looked up just as a shadowy figure darted away from the fence line at the far back corner of that compound hidden in some tiny village.

He almost didn't move, then realize it might have been a test. So he stood and walked to the door of the station building and physically looked down toward the motor pool where the camera had caught the fleeting hint of movement. In the bright flood lights shining down on the vehicles, he saw brilliant paint smears on the largest vehicles. Garish bright colors against the gray-green government paint job offered anti-military slogans in English and the local tongue.

He almost lost his rank over that one.

It was also when he actually took an interest in the glaring disconnect between official procedure and actual security. Hoards of senior officers made all the decisions and wrote all the manuals, but not a one had ever done any security on the ground. While his efforts did gain him some feeble positive notice, he realized too late it was only a trap. At least, so it seemed. They took his written recommendations and acted like it was such a wonderful thing, and promised in all sincerity to examine and ask more questions later.

Once or twice, they actually did send someone who barely outranked him and they discussed things. Again, there was a warm and positive interaction. It was mentioned in his promotion packets. And not a darn thing changed, not simply because bureaucracy was slow, but because the people who actually decided these things simply tossed it all in the trash.

By the time he figured that out, he was locked into the system. Sure, he could just quit, but he was by then too old to learn a new career, and really wasn't interested in anything else. So he stayed, promoted and transferred with bureaucratic regularity and efficiency, until he found himself here, guarding the outer perimeter of one of the highest security installations in the US. He was totally unneeded except in the bureaucratic imagination of some policy dweeb at the Pentagon.

And it was that weird sense of boredom, which his mind recognized as a warning there was almost surely something brewing out there, outside the fence and buffer zone of bright stadium lights shining on the ground. He didn't trust the cameras. As the senior man on shift, he stepped out into the night air and scanned the darkness beyond the nearest edge of the lighted area.

That's when he heard the first explosion. Running around the edge of the building, he spotted the flames coming from one of the domes. He froze. There was nothing he could do, except yell for someone to notify the other end of that closed phone system, and watch so he could file an accurate report. Also, he was waiting in case anything exploded or fell into the area outside the inner perimeter.

He watched with every fiber of his consciousness, but a part of his brain just could not believe it as explosion after explosion shook first one, then another dome, and then the processing building. Nothing he could hear or see indicated the source. This was not military ordinance, but something much more effective, with some odd-colored flame signature. He counted a dozen. He was nearly deaf, ears ringing by the time the explosions stopped, so he didn't hear the yelling. Not that it mattered, because there was still nothing he could actually do except note every detail visually as he stared at the smoking ruins of two communications domes.

Not that it would necessarily protect his retirement from the impotent rage of bureaucrats, but at least his conscience was clear. Whatever it was causing the explosions, he knew with all the certitude of the earth and sky themselves there was nothing he could have done to prevent it.

## Chapter 34

The homecoming in Juarez was spectacular. No, there was no cheering, no singing or dancing. But there was a minor feast, hastily arranged, since Michael arrived late in the afternoon. His friend, Hermanito, was there, and was even more speechless than usual when Michael gave him the bags of gifts. The young man put on the shoes immediately, and it appeared they were a reasonable fit. Everyone helped him celebrate, and commented Hermanito had been working quite hard while Michael was gone.

He didn't wait for Juanita to finish in the kitchen. He called her to the doorway, then handed her the dress, neatly folded. She blushed, and looked at him with a depth in which he was completely lost for just a moment. Then she turned and went back into the kitchen. Had he been wrong? No, for the next day she wore the new dress, and came to show him before starting her day in the mission's kitchen. His heart was gone, never to return. A proper courtship would take awhile, but he had time – all the time in the world. She wore the dress proudly that day, and told quite a few people where she got it, he was sure. All day long he dealt with smug looks and broad hints about a future marriage. The mission pastor reminded him marrying a citizen made permanent residency much easier.

It was warm that night, and a breeze blew through the open window of his camper. The door was latched open, too. He reminded himself to see if Ernesto could add screens to the camper windows before it got too warm. Maybe an awning, too, strapped to one side. On the glowing laptop screen in front of him, he read numerous different sites. While none of the wire services carried it, he found reports on a couple of radical Green forums celebrating the fireworks outside Yakima, to the east. There were postings asking if any of the activist cells had done it. In spite of the high security, one activist had managed to climb a hill and use binoculars to see at least two dishes were completely gone, and smoke still rising from the main building.

There were several mainstream media write-ups on a bomb scare in Las Vegas. The word "terrorist" featured prominently, and some public figures made a lot of noise. The "bomb-making materials" got mention in a few places. Vegas took a major income hit from emergency evacuations, and he could just picture the panicky feds running all over town.

Meanwhile, there was a news item about a raid on a child pornographer's house. There was a photo of FBI agents carrying a desktop computer and boxes of video tapes out of a suburban home. It was Terrell's house – the house which was sparsely furnished, had no desktop computers, and no video equipment. There had been no videos or photos hidden on Terrell's laptop, which was probably with him, anyway. Michael wondered how many other kiddie porn arrests, and other attention-grabbing allegations, were based on planted evidence, when the real reason for the arrest was totally otherwise. It occurred to him some of them were pure vendetta, with no crime committed at all.

Nothing changed. Tyrants continued in tyranny until they died. Michael had decided their end was none of his concern. As long as God had a mission for him here on this hill west of Juarez, it was just as well all that stuff stayed north of the border.

# Part Three Epilogue

## Chapter 35

For the fifth time in the last hour, his eyes strayed once again to the package. Thick brown paper wrapped around a hard object, it was roughly the size of a small cigar box. The pretty stamps were from some Asian country, and the US Customs declaration said "Personal effects." There was no return address. It had come to the mother church across the border in El Paso, in care of his name. He picked it up the day after Valentine's.

He couldn't focus on the computer game on his laptop. It wasn't Juanita's purposeful movements in the kitchen distracting him, either. Nor could he blame it on the twin infant boys, for they were sleeping quietly after their lunch. He stretched his legs, rather stiff in the room which he purposely kept cool. Placing the computer in suspend mode, he closed the lid. Very deliberately he slid it back toward the wall on his very clean desk. With a will, he turned to look at the package. Reaching over slowly, he pulled it toward himself.

He never got packages addressed to him individually, and got no mail at all delivered via the mother church. They had no record of him there, his name not written anywhere on a single scrap of paper. This was by his request. The package was obviously from Terrell, and he was pretty sure the customs declaration was absolutely truthful.

They had discussed the dilemma of a change in conscience. If either of them later regretted the whole thing, neither could talk about the other. Of course, they both knew that meant no one could discuss their mission unless the other was dead. Michael wondered if Terrell had carried the same seeds of doubt that haunted his own mind the past two years. Both were sure they had to do something, even if it meant getting caught – even if getting caught meant one day turning themselves into the authorities. Yet both were sure none of that mattered, because they couldn't stop themselves, couldn't abandon the mission. That Michael had only a peripheral part in it didn't change his culpability. So sending the package to Michael at the church in El Paso was Terrell's permission for Michael to confess the whole thing. The package would surely alert them to look for Michael in Ciudad Juarez.

And the US could have as easily gotten to him on either side of the border, once they knew where he was.

That was part of the reason for his delay in opening the package. He was a little surprised he hadn't heard anything by now. Might as well see what Terrell wanted him to have. After cutting the tape seal, he unwrapped the brown paper slowly. Inside was a wooden box, finely crafted with Native American carvings on the top face. It was a very tight fit and only slowly the two halves separated. In the bottom half, a folded letter lay on top – a single sheet.

"Typical," Michael thought to himself. Opening it, there were two sections, obviously typed at different times, on different typewriters. The paper was perfectly clean, and not the standard US letter sized. It was longer and narrower.

Michael

I didn't tell you about my heart condition. It was the result of some fever I got during a visit to the Middle East, and was why I didn't stay in the Marines longer. I was never able to get the evidence it was the result of some intentional bio-warfare agent, one of ours which got in the wrong hands.

. . .

It seems rather anti-climatic to end my life this way on board a cargo vessel. I'll be gone before we make the next port. Enjoy the exotic stamps. I was pretty sure I wouldn't even make the hike to port in Seattle, but felt fine. It was the combination of long dreary hours loading and unloading this scow for two years in tropical heat, and bad food, that seems to have finished me.

I'm glad for the quiet days, for once not looking over my shoulder, not having to think of every angle, every detail. God is Semper Fidelis.

Terrell

Underneath was an old pocket Bible, well worn, tattered, and marked up by all manner of writing implements. A stack of large bills fell out from between the pages, scattered throughout the Bible. It was several thousand dollars. One of them had a small sticky note, and the words "mission support" scribbled on it. On one end of the box was a lump wrapped in athletic tape. Unraveling it, Michael stared at what he felt sure were Terrell's original issued dog tags from Parris Island.

## Chapter 36

They had come back during Fall Break. That visit from the college students marked the end of Michael's second year with the mission. In those two years, the church house had been finished, expanded, and several small homes now clustered around it like bodyguards. During the five days with two dozen young adults, they would pour a foundation already dug in preparation, raise a frame, finish the roof, set windows and doors, and start on the exterior siding of yet another house.

This time, Hermanito did all the hustling, and Michael translated and directed work from the ground. The volunteer driver for the student bus was an ancient retired preacher who provided good company for Michael. It was altogether refreshing, for the man was surely one of the great unknown Bible scholars, spending his entire life serving in obscurity in small churches across the South. When he could no longer keep the pace of even those small churches, he retired to his home in West Texas, living in the shadow of the small Bible college where he had received his ministerial training. It was this college which sponsored these mission trips each fall to Ciudad Juarez.

The old preacher was called Bro. Lowe by everyone. This was his first mission trip, he explained. It was a way to stay busy after his wife died that past summer. Warm friends from the first minute, Michael had invited him to stay at his house. His spiritual hunger must have been painfully obvious, because Bro. Lowe kept their conversation mostly on biblical topics. The mission pastor hovered around, too. With his poor English, he didn't bother to ask many questions, but listened intently to whatever Michael and Bro. Lowe discussed.

The three were sitting in the shade of the church's east side porch, sipping iced lime tea. As usual this time of year in Juarez, it was still rather warm, and the building was a merciful block between them and the dry desert air blowing across the high ground there on the west side of town.

Bro. Lowe took a sip, held it in his mouth a moment, and then swallowed. Still holding the glass near his lips, with his eyes watching a floating lime seed, he asked, "I keep wondering how you pay your way out here, Michael." He looked up with a sly smile. "Is that a rude question?"

"Nah." Michael set his glass on the rickety cafe table in front of them, folded his hands and tilted his head back against the wall. "I brought a laptop with me and have been doing odd webmaster work now and then. There's a cantina near the bridge with clear line of sight to some commercial building on the US side. It puts out a strong wireless signal. I do most of the work here, then go down there to copy files and such."

"Could I ask about your customers?"

"I had some clients back in California, who led me to some others, and of course there are odd jobs on the Web from time to time. Once in awhile I do some translation work, and I've had one ghost-writing assignment." Michael picked up his glass, took a sip, then looked directly at the old preacher with a half-smile.

"The other thing puzzles me is how you keep the drug gangs from shooting this place up. With all the violence along the border, even out here there must be some trouble now and then."

Clasping his hands in his lap again, Michael looked down at them and was quiet for a moment. "One of my clients is connected to a drug gang," he said slowly, choosing his words carefully.

"Smart move," the old preacher said quietly.

They were silent for a few minutes. A dust devil spun out from between two of the little houses, and then darted between two more. The old preacher stared after the whirling dust, and asked: "What prevents you turning them all in to various governments at war with them?"

Michael looked down at his feet, crossed at the ankles and stretched out in front of him. "It won't make any difference, except a change of personnel. Then, either government agents would take me into protective custody, never to be seen again, or the gangs would get me first and kill me."

He asked mildly, "You afraid to die, Michael?"

Michael looked up, "Of course not. But I'm pretty sure God isn't finished with me yet, so I can't do something which interferes with my own mission."

The old man interlaced his fingers and rested his wrists on the edge of the table. "Exactly. Yet I could take you to a church full of well-off middle class families who would condemn you so loudly you'd go deaf. They couldn't bear the idea someone claiming Christ would fail to condemn something they find so unspeakably evil, and fail to do all they could to destroy it. They couldn't imagine you having a mission from God which didn't include that sort of zealous battle against drug abuse at all costs."

Michael thought for a moment. "I can't say who or what they worship, but I know what my God demands of me on that issue, at least, and none of them are Him." His mouth formed a half-smile.

Pastor Lowe almost mirrored his expression. "So what's the difference between a criminal gang and a criminal government?"

This is too easy, Michael thought. "Most gangs I know don't claim legitimate right to rule."

The old pastor wrapped one hand around his glass. "Tell that to the folks living in Sinaloa, or under any of a dozen revolutionary governments fighting the official governments." He took a drink from this glass. The Mexican pastor nodded his head sagely, looking down at the ground.

After some silence, Michael said, "One man's legitimacy is another man's lie."

Pastor Lowe went on, "Not a single government on this earth, official or de facto, has God's approval and support the way He once backed ancient Israel. He got out of that business at the Cross. What was left of Israel no longer had a legitimate government by the time Jesus was born. That's the point behind His treatment of that woman in John 8, caught in adultery. The Jewish leaders were long past the place where they had standing to expect God to support the death penalty at their hands. That's why He allowed some pagan empire to take the authority from them. They were so far off track; they couldn't even identify the path."

He paused a moment. "It would take weeks to explain it in all the details, but it has to do with the ancient Hebrew mystical outlook long forgotten a couple of centuries before Christ, and how all God's Laws are based on the utter necessity of living in a tribal social setting, with a tribal government. The only people who can legitimately govern you in this world must be kin by blood or covenant. They are also the only people who can judicially take life under His Laws. So on that day, Jesus alone stood with such authority, not a single one of those Sanhedrin. He alone stood squarely in the authority of the Law, and declared it was not God's interest any longer to take human life that way. That's because He came to close up God's business of backing human governments once and for all."

It was time to get back to work. They began walking back to the work site.

They finished the day's labor and the college students were all collapsed into their cots. They were too physically exhausted to sleep right away, and their giddy chatter back and forth echoed quietly in the night, fading slowly with longer and longer pauses.

The wind was still up, though cooler, and the men had gathered with folding chairs behind Michael's camper. Now having a house, Michael had parked his old pickup and camper beside it, tightly squeezed in the space between his and the next house. He had been storing all the equipment and tools in it, and Hermanito would lock himself inside to guard everything overnight. They had all ended up here and simply sat down before trying to sleep themselves.

Bro. Lowe asked, "Given our discussion this afternoon, what would you make of the popular quotation about being under grace, not under Law?"

Michael offered, "Getting involved in human politics, whether in support or resistance to any agency, interferes with God's spiritual governing of His Body."

Pastor Lowe nodded with a grin, "Exactly. You don't have to obey anyone's orders to violate your own calling and moral judgment, but for the most part we do what we can to avoid entangling ourselves."

They all shifted a bit in their chairs, no one ready to end the discussion yet. Lowe went on, "Once you put your hand to that worldly business, it owns you. The Laws of God are all about the human level of things, while grace is the unspeakable truth about divine things. You violate the provisions of grace – you violate the Cross – when you try to bring His Laws to bear on humans who aren't family. Your mandate only covers those who place themselves under your authority. Otherwise, you become a debtor to the Laws and you have to first make amends before you can restore grace to your life. But you see, you can't properly read the Laws of God without a Hebrew mind. Those amends have to be made on the level of Jesus' teaching, not from any other cultural background of understanding the Bible."

Michael frowned, "How much education does it take to cultivate an ancient Hebrew mind these days?"

Pastor Lowe smiled knowingly. "That business of the Cross assumes you start where you are, and commit yourself to moving in that direction. Some will obviously pick up on it really well, and others may never get very far during their entire lives. It's answering the call, doing what you know and can understand. Once you start obeying, God provides a path of improvement. You have to commit to it sight unseen, knowing you'll make mistakes and not hear correctly the voice of His Spirit. But mistakes or not, if you don't start down that path, you cannot possibly serve Him much, nor reap the rewards of that service. You'll never really find peace with Him."

Michael knew where his own bumbling path to peace went next.

In his dreams that night, he stood in a shower that spewed sewage on him. The curtain became a solid wall, and he couldn't get out. The faucet knobs came off in his hands.

## Chapter 37

For most of the past two years, Burk kept his promise to stay with Mama at the little restaurant. One day she fell in the kitchen. There was nothing to trip over; she just fell. One hip was broken, it appeared. When the ambulance arrived, she was barely conscious. They said something about a stroke and took her away.

When Burk discovered no one would or could tell him what happened to her for the next week, he realized his home was gone. He had packed his stuff and was planning to slip out after closing time, locking everything behind him. The cooks had helped him keep the place going, but folks quit eating there so much. They stopped by only to ask for news about Mama. So he told the women he had no legal right to keep the place open, and they agreed there was nothing they could do.

That evening, some fellow dressed all too nicely came in the door. Burk instinctively stayed out of sight in the kitchen. The man showed the girls a piece of paper, saying something about a court order. They exchanged glances as he spoke to them a bit longer. He walked over to the cash register, opened it, and gave them each what was probably their last pay. After a bit of poking around under the counter, the man headed back into the kitchen. Burk's instincts had driven him out into the covered walkway out back. Through the cracked open door, he watched the man, surmising he was a lawyer.

The cooks asked the stranger one last question, and Burk listened closely. From the fragments of conversation, he made out this man was closing the place and locking it up. He heard the phrase "terminal care" and his heart fell. Without further ado, he fetched his bag and left, hiking out through the woods. A half-mile up the hill, there was a smokehouse he knew he could enter without arousing anyone's interest. It would do for the night.

Burk was a hobo once again.

Michael found out when a message on one of the activist bulletin boards caught his eye. He had been checking every few days just for that reason. They had traded a few brief greetings to each other there now and then. This time Burk said simply,

Mama gone. Hobo says "later".

In due time, they had longer exchanges, though Burk had a slightly tougher time getting Net access at libraries. He was quite content to return to his previous existence. Further, he persisted in showing no remorse about the SWAT team. At the same time, he told Michael to find his own peace. By that, he meant it wouldn't matter if Michael told anyone, or turned himself in to the authorities. Burk was no worse off either way, as he saw it, since Michael didn't know where to find him. And Burk wasn't telling. Aside from comparing notes on the Shadow Government figures and the worsening oppression, they were just friends passing the time.

That's where things stood when the Fall Break had rolled around and Michael met Bro. Lowe.

## Chapter 38

So it came around to the next Christmas, then the New Year, and Michael was still waiting. He knew he could not rest until he at least explored turning himself in for the two attacks. Burk had released him from any obligation to silence, but Terrell was still out in the Pacific somewhere, as far as Michael knew at that point. Thus, the arrival of the package in mid-February was sad, but perfect timing. Michael had not been particularly tormented once he decided he had to come clean. It was just a matter of when.

As he held the two boys before bedtime that night, one on each knee, he wondered how big a load they'd be in his lap the next time he saw them. That was assuming he was not executed, as so many captured resistors were these days. Execution also didn't take nearly as long as it once did. It crossed his mind if he was quick enough to slip inside the FBI office building, he wouldn't have to worry about a manufactured gun-fight cum execution, another popular means of handling resistance these days. Still, he had no way of knowing what to expect, and wanted to play it as safely as possible for his family.

He didn't want Juanita or the boys anywhere near the border when he went back. It was too late to prevent bereaving her yet again, at least in some sense. She could take it, he was sure, but that didn't prevent him becoming a nervous wreck trying to tell her. Oddly, she was more worried about his emotional state than the content of the long story, the crimes to which he admitted. Noting he had repented, it was clear her faith was stronger than his, in that sense. Her deep eyes said more than words, telling of love, trust, and calm.

She must have a good grasp on what Job felt. She had been raised in a town named Miguel Ahumada, a good ways south. She became a favorite of one of the school teachers. It was to this woman she turned when Juanita's parents divorced, her father left home, and mother sank into alcoholic despair. She was just 10 then, and the teacher was her lifeline, essentially raising her. No surprise, then, Juanita married the teacher's son, just a couple of years older. Upon promise of a job with Juanita's uncle in Juarez, they had moved north to the ratty huts clustered on the east slope of the ridge where the little mission church was being built.

Sure enough, there was work at a warehouse down near the river bank. It meant riding a bus, then walking a few blocks to the warehouse gate. Typically, he would arrive just before dawn, with his co-workers. He usually approached from the south side of the road, where trucks often lined up on the shoulder across from the gate.

That morning, a driver for the local drug cartel was out quite early. His SUV was one of the best kept of the fleet used for running drugs. It had rather wide tires suitable for the sandy soil, 4-wheel drive and a high suspension. From his last delivery payoff, the driver had taken the SUV to the shop for a special bumper, made to order. It had a sloped plate on the bottom, and a brush guard mounted at an angle on top. The idea was to allow him to push vegetation down quickly as he drove over it. He was on his way out west to test drive it in the desert.

Spying the trucks in perfect alignment across from the warehouse, the driver decided to challenge his skills by swerving close to the trucks at high speed. With his lights off, just inches from the trucks, there was no way Juanita's husband could have known. Apparently the bumper and brush guard were well designed, for they dropped the young man in mid-stride as he emerged from between two trucks. One second he was stepping out through the gap, the next he was flat on the pavement, already dead. The driver of the SUV never noticed, apparently.

Juanita turned again to her mother-in-law, the woman who had practically raised her. They remained close some five years after they were both bereaved. It was Juanita's custom to travel for a visit in mid-February every year. Marrying Michael didn't change this, except now she stood to face being widowed yet again, in effect if not in fact. To play it safe, he told her to hold onto the money from Terrell's package. If he didn't come back, she'd need it.

After seeing off his wife and sons, Michael steeled himself. The worst part was the complete lack of information on his case. That is, news reports were naturally bogus. After the first couple of weeks back in Juarez two years ago, he had pretty much quit checking mainstream and underground news sites for updates. The original story was about terrorism, and the professor was listed as an accidental death. The destruction of the listening site was covered by the Green forums, but only what one might observe physically from afar. The bomb scare in Vegas was quickly hushed.

He had already decided the best, most direct path, was through the FBI office in El Paso. Leaving his truck at the mission, he rode the bus downtown. He decided a hike in the cool mid-morning air would help him clarify his thoughts. He carried only his passport and old driver's license, plus a few pages of notes with the basic facts and dates. Most of it did not appear anywhere in the news reports, as far as he knew. Crossing the bridge was routine, and he caught a bus to within a block of the FBI office. The place was bustling.

Once inside, he announced at the front desk he was turning himself in, but the man seemed unimpressed. "What for?"

"I suppose the charges would be terrorism, vandalism, and several murders," Michael said with a straight face.

"We've got drug gangs doing that every day. Have a seat over there, and I'll see if we have an agent available." Just like that. No handcuffs, no whisking away to interrogation, nothing. Just wait your turn.

After quite some time, the man at the desk managed to waylay a passing agent, identified by the badge hooked to his belt. Walking over to Michael, he asked again why Michael was turning himself in, and seemed, if anything, less interested than the first man. Producing the pages of notes, Michael watched the agent flip through them. He told Michael to wait there, then walked away and disappeared around a corner.

Michael realized he was hungry and decided it was part of the suffering he deserved for his crimes. He watched the constant passing of people, yawning. Slumping down into the hard chair, he was surprised when, what seemed just moments later, the agent was handing the sheets back to him. Michael realized he had dozed off.

"Thanks for your time sir, but we happen to have solved all those right after they happened. The SWAT team suffered some casualties taking down an Islamic terror cell, but most of them survived. We have no record of any professor killed or even injured at that college a year either direction. There is no record of a bomb scare in Las Vegas hotels during that year. As for the NSA station, we understand there was some sort of equipment malfunction, but they don't release much information even to us. Those cases are closed, and we aren't amused by your fictional version. Now, if you don't mind, I have some real work to do."

Michael rose in a daze, and then stood slack-jawed as the agent hurried away down yet another hallway. He was still there in that pose a few minutes later when someone behind said loudly, "Excuse me, Sir!"

Turning suddenly to see a cart loaded with boxes, Micheal sputtered an apology as he stumbled back against the wall. After watching the cart pass, he stood a few seconds longer and then practically ran out the front door.

Back on the busy street, he stood at the corner for a few minutes, wondering if he was dreaming, and that his body was still asleep in the waiting area, about to be arrested. Managing to find a cafe, he wandered in and sat down. Ordering absently, he stared into space awhile, then looked around again, still confused. He eventually ate mechanically. Coming back to himself, his eyes lighted on a row of public computer terminals at one of end of the cafe.

## Chapter 39

Logging onto the activist bulletin board, he was about to post a query, when he saw a message from Burk. It said,

Back yet?

Michael sat for a long moment, and then typed a response:

What do you know that I don't?

He doubted Burk was online at the time. Checking a couple other sites, he came back to the first just in case. Burk must have been at a library somewhere that very moment.

Nothing. You've forgotten the principles of propaganda. A timely and useful lie is far more important than solving a crime.

Then he remembered that one conversation about propaganda. Not the words, but he recalled the content and its impact on him. Cynical as any reporter should be, Michael was unprepared to hear that al-Qaeda was fake. When Burk showed him the evidence, carefully concealed in plain sight, he was stunned. From there, Burk worked through an explanation of the Neo-cons, and the vision of Leo Strauss. Strauss cynically taught it was vitally important to build a mythical American civil religion, so the masses would really believe the US had some divine destiny. Even when a side-by-side comparison of facts indicated the US had done more harm than some of her "enemies," Americans were still somehow better than them, and they hated the US unjustly.

It took some time back in those early years, but the Neo-cons had convinced Conservative Evangelical preachers to damn communism, and when the Soviet Union fell apart, to damn Islam. It was the very same radical Islam the CIA had created by torturing a few conservative Muslim philosophers in countries where there was some resistance to our Westernizing cultural evangelism. When some of the radicals proved only good at preaching and teaching, but unable to do much damage, it became necessary for CIA field agents to create the likes of al-Qaeda. America needed a big bogey to keep her focused, and her leaders funded all the terror attacks necessary to create the climate of fear.

Thus, the SWAT raid was more useful for anti-Muslim propaganda than as a criminal case to catch a couple of guys who could never pull it off again in a million years – if they could drive Michael insane in the process, so much the better. Covering up the damage to the NSA station was more about testing infiltration of the radical Greens. He still wasn't sure about the professor and the effect of their pointed warning against overuse of SWAT teams. He asked Burk,

Why did they coverup the professor?

A few minutes later, the response came:

Dunno. Maybe too busy with the Amero and NAU.

Okay, that's plausible. They've been too tied up getting the North American Union going and crashing the dollar to force everyone over to the Amero, a new currency like the Euro, which was also about to collapse. There really was an awful lot of activity in those areas lately.

Just to settle some nagging doubts this was really Burk, he asked a question about Burk's favorite drink:

What do you pay for a beer these days?

Burk never drank beer, or course. The response came back,

Wine coolers are twice what they were two years ago.

Burk liked wine coolers, and understood the question. That was about all he could do to make sure it was Burk. Not that it really mattered. Michael had come to a new resolve:

Time for hobo hiding. God bless, and see you in Heaven.

He didn't wait for a response. Moving over to the pay phones, he dialed the Baptist church. When the secretary picked up the phone, he asked for the Men's Minister, who had been the ramrod on most of the building at the mission in Juarez.

"Bro. Tom, this is Michael. Yeah, I'm on this side today. You seem to know an awful lot about mission building projects. Seems to me the Juarez hill mission is about to become self-sustaining. I was wondering if you knew anything about similar projects farther south... How far? How about South America? Yeah, I know, but I have a recent donation that should cover start up costs. Where? Paraguay..."

His home was everywhere on earth, because it was nowhere on this earth.

###

Contact the author:

Email – mailto:tmoc-team@gmx.com

Blog – Do What's Right

Site – Kiln of the Soul

