Remnant, Chapter 38

38

Friday,

November Twenty-fourth

0840 Hours

I’d had a couple of options on my morning chores.  I could sit in the command car, and absorb information as it came in; I could head out into Sterling just behind the advance units from Third Washington, who were conducting an inventory and assessment of the town; or I could help with the basic mission for us in Sterling, retrieval of Sixth Army.

I chose the last.

The portion of the battlefield we’d first clear reached from Factory Street south to County Road Twenty Six, an open field that had been some of the heaviest concentration of Sixth Army’s central line.  South of Twenty Six, the land had been subdivided into smaller parcels with small hobby farm sized lots.  The Sixth had some units scattered in that area as well, mostly west along the South Platte River.

We’d work from the wreckage of what looked like a sugar beet mill to the south--the mill had been burned, quite recently. A squad from the Second Battalion stood patiently, waiting for the Combat Engineers to clear the area for our team to start retrieval.  I hadn’t asked to join a squad, I looked over the ten squads tasked with the morning efforts and picked one. 

“Sir, something I can do you for?” A First Sergeant named Jones asked me.

“Come to lend you a hand, First Sergeant,” I said, pulling on medical-grade gloves before putting my outer gloves back on. “Everyone in the Brigade will be doing this. Figure I’d lead by example.”

He looked very surprised, then resumed his normal demeanor. “Very good, Colonel. Engineers should be ready for us in about ten minutes. You might want to look this over, though, sir,” he said, pointing to a concentration of his squad, looking at something on the ground.

“What is it?” I asked as we walked over, the men making room for us.

“One of the canisters that released the gas.  The Engineers figured that it’s a converted propane tank—big bastard, too.  Remote control and release valve is there on the side, Colonel.”

“How many have they found so far?”

“So far, one every two hundred yards or so. That translates into a shitload of them, sir. Engineers are checking for any that didn’t go off, in addition to booby traps and IED’s that the S.A. might’ve left us. No reports of any of that. One undetonated device, a couple miles north—that’s where the prisoners were captured, Colonel.”

“Pretty impressive use of tactics and unconventional weapons. I hope we have the chance to pay them back in kind.”

“I think everyone’s of the same mind, Colonel.”

Within a few more minutes, we were given the all-clear to begin retrieval operations in an area a couple hundred yards deep.

Sixth Army had been hit in the early morning hours, probably around three in the morning, from the reports I’d read.  Those that were roused by the sound of the venting nerve gas had a chance to get outside of their tents and shelters, in time to have the gas hit them and drop them where they stood.  Those that were not in earshot were killed where they slept, as the colorless gas saturated the atmosphere.

Initial analysis showed that the weapons were triggered not-quite simultaneously, working from west-to-east, with a light prevailing wind.  This directed the majority of the gas concentration from the release points—mostly along U.S. Highway Six—toward the South Platte. Sixth Army was between the highway and the river, where the brush and terrain prevented any escape.  A well-planned attack, calculated to kill everyone.

The first victims we found were outside of their tents, not dressed for the cold weather, obviously warned that something was going on.  I’d never seen a frozen body before, translucent skin, hands gripping an M-16 and a belt of spare mags.   All ranks. All races. Men and women, dead on the frozen field.

We worked quietly, a few men working together, to identify each soldier, remove him from the frozen ground and thin snow cover or frozen tent or sleeping bag, and other men retrieving personal effects.  The dead were placed in body bags, with much effort and using means that would offend an ‘average’ person, further indignities inflicted upon the dead.  The final rotation of the process included weapons and ammunition removal. Further clearing would remove tents and other equipment, destined to be reused by soldiers who wouldn’t know the history of the equipment in their hands or over their heads.

Three hours of this work left the squad drained emotionally and physically. We were all ready for a break when our relief team showed. The morning field squads would rotate through cleanup, then the mess cars, and then on to other work apart from body removal.  I had enough ‘command’ issues to deal with to occupy my time, if not relieve my mind from the mornings’ work.

I cleaned up, took lunch in the command car, as my eyes moved over the words and images on the screens in front of me.  By thirteen-hundred, it was time to get moving again. Outside of the command car, a steady stream of dead received last rites from the chaplains gathered from various units.   The first Lone Star soldiers were loading on boxcars, getting ready for departure.

“Colonel, we’re going to have visitors,” Captain Shand told me as I put my parka back on, getting ready for my next task.

“What’ve we got, Captain?”

“Under a thousand civilians, moving up from Denver and coming south out of the hinterlands, sir. About an hour and we’ll start seeing the first of them.”

“I hope they’re bringing their own supplies.”

“Yeah, I was thinking that myself, Colonel.”

“We have any idea where they’re going? Are they from Sterling?”

“Don’t know for sure, sir. Colorado Guard has cleared them, so I’d bet CNG knows what they’re carrying, sir.”

“With all this commo gear you can’t get an answer?”

“CNG’s equipment is pretty thrashed, sir. Calling it a patchwork would be generous. We actually got the relay direct from Austin.”

“Great. All right, are they at least coming in on a couple of roads? We can at least checkpoint them there,” I said.

“New Mexico’s already got that covered—and every other entry into the area, Colonel.”

“All right, we’ve got an hour. What’s the status of the recon through Sterling?”

“Thirty-six dead civilians so far. Pre-War population was around thirteen thousand.  There’s about two hundred residents still here, Colonel. Second and Third recon teams are moving toward the middle of town.  They should rendezvous at what’s left of the Logan County Courthouse within about twenty minutes, sir. I believe that Lieutenant Colonel Chappel should be here any minute for your trip into town.”

“Any report on the status of the CNG facilities here?”

“Not yet sir, not by Third Washington, anyway. We’ve seen some digital pics from the initial recon sweep, which aren’t good for anything.”

“Good chance we’re not here long enough to make use of them anyway. It’d be good to have an idea though for staging materials for the forward areas,” I said, as Lieutenant Colonel Trayvon Chappel came inside.

“Colonel Drummond, good to see you sir.”

“You as well, Colonel. I wish we were watching your Grambling Tigers playing Southern today, rather than this.”

“Yes, sir, that would be a pleasure. I understand you were in the field this morning with Sergeant Jones squad.”

“Yes, I was. I’ll do that when I can.  Good men he’s got there. I think they’re working on the last of resupply for the Lone Stars this afternoon. Pass on my compliments to them. They worked their asses off.”

“I’ll do that, sir.” 

“Captain, keep me apprised of the civilian approach. I’ll meet them out at the outer checkpoint when they come in. Gotta see this for myself.”

“Yes, sir. Your radio’s on the rack over there, with the headset there on the left.”

“Thanks,” I said as I grabbed the light radio unit, checked the frequencies of the day, and power.  The headset was matched to the unit, and wireless. Pretty slick. “OK, Colonel, let’s go to town.”

Outside, I noticed that the Lone Star command tent was now down and being packed, and General Garcia personally overseeing the loading of her men and women and all their gear, getting ready to get back in the fight.  The wind was blowing a little harder, and the overcast seemed to be lowering. My ribs hurt.

“Colonel, let’s go give our regards to our friend the General,” I said. “I’d like to shake her hand before she heads out.”

“Hear she’s a real firecracker, sir.”

“Fair assessment, I think,” I said as we approached General Garcia, and caught her eye.

“General Garcia, this is Lieutenant Colonel Chappel, commander, Second Brigade. Thought we’d pay our respects before you head east.”

“Thank you, Colonel, and Colonel Chappel, I believe that I saw you help beat my alma mater a few years back.”

“Been more than a few years ma’am, since I played,” he said with a grin.

“San Diego State. I think you stopped our team from scoring three times that day. My husband yelled until he was hoarse.”

“That was a good day, ma’am, thank you.”

“Looks like you’re getting close, General,” I said.  

“We are, Colonel. Third Washington is a compliment to your state.  I have a tough time believing these men haven’t worked together as a unit for months.”

“Most’ve seen action of a different kind, General. We’ve already had eleven months of survival of the fittest, with the occasional skirmish thrown in to keep everyone on their toes.”

“Understood. Thanks again to you and your men. I look forward to seeing you down the road.”

“Ma’am,” I said as I shook her hand. “It’s been an honor. And good hunting.”

“To the ends of the Earth, Colonel,” she said as Chappel and I saluted her smartly, and left her to her duty.

Two men from Chappel’s brigade joined us on the trip ‘into town’, one backseater armed with his M-16C, the second manning the top-mount machine gun, in the cold. I believe that he drew short straw.

From Factory Street, we headed west to Division Avenue, and headed north.  We passed several blocks of burned out business on our right, abandoned homes to the left.  A Catholic school seemed to have drawn particular attention, with numerous cars and trucks driven into the building and grounds, and burned.  There wasn’t a wall on that building that wasn’t pock-marked with bullet holes.

At Fourth Street, we turned right slightly, following the angled road, and saw the wrecked and smoldering Classical Revival building. I suppose it once had a domed roof, now collapsed, and the source of a fair amount of smoke.

“Damn. What’d these people do to deserve this?” I asked.

“Escaped inmates probably did this, sir,” Chappel replied. “We found a fair number of dead dressed in prison jumpsuits this morning.  Civilians didn’t go down without a fight.”

“What’s this town got left that’s not destroyed?” I asked.

“This area’s really the worst of it. Some of the business district is untouched.  There’s hardware store down by the highway that looks like they just locked it up and walked away. One broken window, no looting, I couldn’t figure that one out, sir.  Most of the residential areas seem OK, other than lack of power.”

“How about water?”

“It’s in the pipes, sir, but no power means no pressure. We were expecting Prime Power to assist us with tracking down problems like that. Things look repairable, we just don’t know where the feed to the city has been disrupted. Everything’s dead.”

We met up with the recon sweep units, who briefed me on the locations of civilians and their status, the overall condition of Sterling, and of course, the threat analysis as viewed from the ground. When we’d wrapped that up, I ordered additional troops to provide regular patrols throughout the town and to relocate a couple of the poorly located observation and security posts. I also ordered that our troops direct civilians to our location if they needed any supplies until outside connections could be re-established.

Checkpoint Able, off of Interstate Seventy Six, was composed of four Humvee’s, one Bradley, and twenty men from Charlie Company, Second Battalion and fifty men from New Mexico. Chappel and I arrived just after the first civilian vehicles had been seen by long distance spotters.

Within a few minutes, the rag-tag caravan from Denver was at the checkpoint. The vehicles—mostly SUV’s and three-quarter ton four-by-fours with canopies—were each searched, along with the civilians. The first truck flew the Colorado state flag, along with a home-made version of our ‘new’ national flag.

Chappel oversaw the search process, while I spent some time with the driver and passenger from the first truck.  He looked about sixty, barrel-chested, close-cropped hair.

“Good afternoon. You’ve got quite the caravan here, sir,” I asked. “I’m in command in Sterling.  I’d like to know your business in this area.”

“I’m Jess Armstrong, Colonel. Twenty years, Air Force. Can’t serve anymore due to a new heart valve, and I’m sixty-six,” he said.  “Colonel, most of us are from Denver. Some from Colorado Springs. We’ve come to help bring these soldiers home. They helped get us free of the S.A. in Denver. We owe them. We know some of them. I had a couple stay at my house.”

I hadn’t expected this, of course. We had a whole other plan in place, and I wasn’t sure how to integrate a civilian volunteer element into the equation.

“Mr. Armstrong, we are charged with this task. I realize you’ve traveled a fair distance, but this really isn’t an operation for civilians.”

“Colonel, I have five hundred and sixty people who’d respectfully disagree. We don’t need anything from you or your men. We do need to do this though, sir. Not want to….need to.”

I could understand his sentiment, and as the sweep team moved to the third vehicle in line, I realized that sooner or later we’d need to work with civilians, either here or somewhere down the line.

“Mr. Armstrong, I assume you retired out?”

“I did, Colonel. Chief Master Sergeant.”

“And they haven’t found a duty station for you?”

“Like I said, Colonel, I’m not in the prime of health these days.”

“Chief, I’m betting there’s still a wealth of knowledge up there,” I said, pointing at his head. “I also know I’m going to lose this situation, Chief. Teams still have to clear your vehicles and the civilians. I’ll figure out a staging area for you.  We’ll need you to have team leaders go over protocol, same as our men.”

“We can do that, Colonel. I appreciate it.”

“I’ll probably catch Hell, but in won’t be the first time.”

“Good officers know where they can bend the rules, sir.”

“Or ignore them outright. I’m new at the officer business, Chief, but I agree. Be back with you in a few minutes.”

“Thank you, sir.”

I walked back around the Humvee’s and told the command car to start planning on a logical staging area for our civilian grave detail.

“Best place, Colonel, is over at the junior college. Big parking lot, easy to secure, short walk to Command. We can probably swing some power generation over there, too,” Captain Gerry McGowan, our logistics guy, said.

“Sounds fine, Captain. Figure out a traffic cop for them, or five, and get them set up. It’s starting to snow down here, and we only have about two hours of daylight left and we’re pretty much out of the field for the day.”

“Done, sir.”

The snow was starting to pick up, along with the wind. We’d get some weather yet, it seemed.

Dusk brought more wind, turning the battlefield into drifts of light snow around the bodies, tents, and equipment.

The Combat Engineering teams made faster progress than the retrieval operation, and by the cessation of work for the day, half of the battlefield had been cleared for body removal. Most of the on-duty command staff was pre-occupied with a snowstorm of their own, real-time battle data coming in on a major firefight on the southern front of the S.A., in retreat from northern Oklahoma, moving towards Wichita.  Two of the Georgia Bulldog officers were listening in as well, commenting on tactics and pondering the enemy.

I’d listened in for a half-hour or so, finding much if it over my head, although the tactical side was intriguing.  I was also unaware that the S.A. had as much armor as was engaged along the line: If the satellite imagery was to be believed, the S.A. had more than three hundred tanks and hundreds of other vehicles moving north in a controlled pullback, against the five hundred M1A2 and A3 tanks of the Army. They apparently had more armor, further north and east.

While the tank battle was tipping in favor of the U.S., without air support in the form of the A-10 Warthog and depleted uranium shells, the fight was much more evenly matched than our previous fights in the Middle East.  We still had A-10’s of course, but there was no defense for them against dozens of SAM’s fired each time they approached. I wondered if the Air Force had other ideas, other ordnance that could be used without wiping out civilians behind the lines.

There was no ‘routine’ to the day; perhaps there wasn’t one in the position I was now in.  Most of Third Washington was pulled from the field and other units working toward moving east, to follow the Texans or to head straight east in their own engagement. Their respective commanders were anticipating a jump-off within the next twenty-four hours, after the expected orders were given from Austin.

I decided to go see how the civilians were settling in, as directed by some of Bryce Atwood’s Fifth Battalion. Fifth was currently tasked with night operations, with shifts coming on line overnight to keep the Brigade in operation while the rest of the men stood down.  The rotating schedule would have them on ‘day shift’ in a couple more days, for their time in the recovery operation. I was joined by Chet Travis, for the short trip over to Northeastern Junior College.  Chet wasn’t scheduled to be on duty for hours yet, but nonetheless was in the command car.

“Chet, you had a look around town yet?” I asked.

“Yes, sir. The college in particular. Quite a bit of it is pretty messed up. Left their big arena alone. Trashed the library and most of the offices. Didn’t burn them though.”

“You’ve had a chance to read through the initial recon reports,” I stated. “Do you think this is typical of what we’re going to see the S.A. leave behind?”

“Frankly, Colonel, no. There aren’t enough bodies left here to make it ‘typical’. What I’ve read about southern Colorado, and parts of Denver for that matter, they killed anyone in their way. Some for sport, it seemed,” he said as we approached the college campus, parking lot lit with some jury-rigging from our electrical engineers. Chet pulled the Humvee into the parking lot, and I pointed out Jess Armstrong’s truck and camper.

“Nice to see some lights,” I said. They said to me, ‘civilization.’

“Engineer group said they’ll be a week or so finding all the damage locally, sir. Problem is though, there isn’t power coming into town from the main grid. Nothing we can do about that, which really means that we shouldn’t even try to fix most of the local stuff. Might be different if the power was actually coming into the town.”

“I’d come to that conclusion myself. Not really in my nature to leave a job half-done though.”

“More support behind us to take care of that, Colonel.”

“Probably so, long time in coming, I’d bet.” 

Remnant, Chapter 37

37

Friday,

November Twenty-fourth

0250 Hours

“They’re in retreat, Colonel. S.A. troops are a hundred miles east of their last known and moving east,” the General said.

“Do you have a high degree of confidence in this, General?”

“As good as it gets, Colonel Drummond. It does not appear that your position is being threatened.”

“Thank you, sir. Catch your spies yet, General?” I asked.

“Affirmative. Two survivors, six dead.”

“I’m sure the survivors are being treated with all appropriate care.”

“Indeed they are.  Colonel, good luck in your mission. We lost a lot of good soldiers up there.”

“Yes, sir. Tough few days ahead.”

“Take good care of our men, Colonel. Yancey out,” he said, and the transmission ended.

“All right, battalion officers. Sounds like we can lower our adrenaline a little. We’ll keep you in the loop if anything changes. Get your field communications gear on, and pass the word for command-level staff to be wearing theirs while on duty—should’ve done that this time.  Oh-five hundred and the Brigade’s up and moving for a long-ass day. Let’s be ready for it. Dismissed.”

The five ‘night-shift’ officers filed out and back to their respective units, scattered along two miles of railroad frontage, three of them providing additional supervision to Dog Six and their continued setup and staging.

I grabbed another cup of coffee and decided to continue my original plan, to go for a walk and check out our Brigade. I needed some fresh air.

Outside, I went for a walk through the staging area for Dog Six’s motor pool, Humvee’s and trucks unloaded and parked and waiting for the day.   Several guards noticed me and nodded my way as I passed through the area.  Further south, one of Dog Six’s machine shop cars was open for business with stacks of the Texas Guard’s rifles under the watchful eye of two guards. There were thousands of weapons.  The Texas Guard had almost five thousand men and women in the field.  I decided to visit the local gunsmiths in uniform and see how things were going.

“Good morning, gents. How’s business?” I asked, entering the nearly warm machine shop.

“Morning, sir, is still a matter of opinion,” said a first sergeant from one of the Georgia units, barely looking up, but finally noticing my insignia. “Sorry, Colonel. Thought you were…”

“No problem, first sergeant,” I said, noticing the workbenches and nodding at the other men working on the disassembly, cleaning, refit, and reassembly lines. They were working on a series of M249 SAW’s, the machine gun of choice since the old Browning Automatic Rifle was retired decades ago. I looked over some of the discarded parts, tossed unceremoniously in a series of plastic bins. “This typical wear? These are a mess.”

“No small wonder, sir.  This is what wear looked like in the ‘stan after a few months.  If we had enough new 249’s to issue to those Tex boys, we’d scrap the whole lot. Lotta field changes messed these up but good. Barrels switched, weapons pieced together.   A bunch of these’ve also seen max rates of fire for too long. A thousand rounds a minute. Overheated them. Can’t dissipate that kind of heat.”

“Are the -16’s in this bad of shape?”

“Looked over a couple dozen so far, and some of the M4’s. We’ve got our work cut out for us, no doubt about it.  Probably ten percent unusable as-is.  We can fix the rest and get them back to spec. Replace the others with new-issue.  Not going to mix up the unit with old style -16’s and the new Californias, Colonel….although our Bulldogs could surely make use those C models. Not enough to go around though.”

“I’m sure they’re coming your way, sergeant. I’ll get out of your hair. Thanks, all,” I said as I headed for the door, receiving a ‘sir!’ in unison.

Further south, Dog Six’s perimeter guard units were quietly watching south and east, over the darkened terrain where the last of Sixth Army lay.   I turned around and headed back to the command car. I knew that I’d need some rest for our first day in the field.

At oh five-thirty, the alarm on my watch roused me from an unpleasant dream, more so than my current reality. I pulled out my soft earplugs and emerged from the make-shift darkened cubicle into the fully staffed communications car, and smelled burning coffee.

“Somebody trying to convert coffee to carbon?”

“Sorry, sir. Been a little busy.”

“Reason for not waking me?”

“Yes, Colonel. You needed some sleep,” said my deputy C.O., Jim Schaefer. “My orders.”

“You’re almost as bad as my wife.”

“Wait a few days. This duty schedule will catch up with you—you’ll see it, sir.”

“You’re probably right, Jim. Status overnight?” I said as I turned off the coffeemaker, noting the many different types of information on each communication suite screen.

“S.A.’s pulling back east, as well as moving major forces back up the Mississippi Valley.”

“Hmm. How far east of us?”

“Leading edge is U.S. Eighty-Three, damned near a straight line through Nebraska and Kansas, but they’re keeping well clear of the Oklahoma line. Seems like they’re consolidating along an evac route on Interstate Seventy.”

“Reason?” I asked.

“Air Force socked ‘em with a few high yield cruise missiles up in North Platte, seemed to take out command and control for this northern group. They’re running like hot butter on a skillet, sir,” Specialist Ayers said.

“Seems a little dramatic for a little punch in the nose,” I said. “How’s their communications? They still maintaining silence?”

“Not as of an hour ago, sir. They were yelling ‘incoming’ as the second and third wave dropped on their ears.”

“Got a BDA yet?” I said, referring to a battle damage assessment, which drew some looks. I apparently wasn’t supposed know that kind of thing.

“Uh, yes, sir, Colonel. We’re not privy to the ordnance package that the -52 was using, but radar uplinks showed twenty cruise missiles in flight. Single delivery aircraft did that. I’ll pull up the satellite images and put them on Suite Four.  The rest of the suites are monitoring their retreats and trying to assess their numbers and capabilities.”

“Monitor two shows the greatest concentration of KIA’s. The wider views show vehicle and equipment kills across a pretty wide area,” Schaefer said. “Fair percentage of their personnel transports are scrap.”

“Hmm.” Jim said, looking at the carnage on the monitor, a ghostly greyscale image. “You sure cruise missiles did this?” Schaefer asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“This kind of damage reminds me of cluster bomb impacts,” he said. “There’s an odd ‘shotgun’ look of the impact damage, and the debris scatter. Air Force must have something new.”

“Could’ve been worse. Could’ve been a hyperbaric weapon,” I said. 

“Civilians still present in the area, sir. Probably drove the weapons package.”

“The S.A. left them alive?” I asked.

“Yes, sir, although a significant number evac’d before the S.A. pulled in.  They’re now filtering back into North Platte. Vehicle signatures, trailers, horses. Following pretty much every road into the area…from the north, that is.”

“What’s Austin saying about moving that way?”

“Airborne units will deploy up there first, probably on the ground within the next couple of hours. They’re deploying from Helena and Cheyenne. Troop estimates, five thousand men.”

That surprised me. ‘Fair number of men,’ I thought. “Enemy headcount?”

“To the nearest thousand, Colonel, sixty-one five.”

 “O.K.” I said, while thinking, ‘Damn that’s a lot of enemy.’   “Third Washington ready for the day?”

“Reveille at oh-five hundred. Mess is running full steam with our visitors and light support for Third—our guys are mostly on MRE’s today.  Elements of each Battalion will rotate into and out of the field for the day, with obvious support personnel remaining with the trains.  First and Fifth Battalions will be first in the field, followed by Third and Fourth. Second will be handling loading of the remains collected by the field crews. Each battalion will have combat engineers ahead of them to make sure there aren’t any surprises, sir. All per the schedule.”

“How’re the other units? They getting everything they need?”

“Could always use more room, sir. About half of the Texas unit spent the night in temp shelters outside, their choice. Got the heaters running in there, and they’re passable. Third Cardinals are mostly down in Dog Six. New Mexico’s going to rotate in when Texas vacates.”

“Our guys keeping up with the load?”

“Laundry guys aren’t, sir. Mess hall’s been running non-stop, but the lines are pretty short.”

“How’re the guys in the armory doing? They had one helluva backlog last night.”

“Not bad. Nowhere near close to being done though. Those Georgia boys are pretty damned good, sir.”

“How long until re-supply is needed?”

“Three days at this rate. We’ve already told Cheyenne to step on it, sir.” Our re-supply train was already on the siding in Cheyenne, packed with non-perishable food, ammunition, uniforms, medical gear, and fuel.  We were expecting to need a re-supply every two weeks….we weren’t planning on supplying this level of fighting men, or the levels of depletion we were faced with.

“All right. Battalion commanders can handle the morning deploy. Let’s get senior staff assembled as we can for a look ahead at oh seven hundred.”

“Yes, sir. Not a problem,” Schaefer said.

“Ayers, what’s the civilian chatter today?”

“Sir?” he asked, a little surprised.

“Mister Ayers, don’t tell me you haven’t been keeping an ear and eye on the civilian side,” I said with a little smile.

“Yes, sir. Didn’t think it would matter all that much to be honest,” he said. “Specialist Briggs has most of that, sir.”

“Briggs. Give me the skinny.”

“Some shortwave, bunch of traffic across the all amateur civilian bands, mostly family members looking for each other from behind the lines, no civilian AM or FM radio broadcasts within three hundred miles. I got the impression that the S.A. had been hunting down people that were broadcasting…what I picked up were short bursts of talk, some primitive codes, some foreign languages, but the S.A. didn’t pursue them this time, it seemed. Outside the zone, more chatter on the S.A. attacks around the country. Nothing we don’t already know, sir.”

“Any word on our arrival?” I asked.

“No sir. I doubt anyone in the local area has broadcast anything.”

“Very well. Thanks, Briggs. Now who’s handling weather?”

“That’s me sir, Private David Kittrick,” the young man said. I looked at him in some surprise. He looked as if he’d been playing video games, rather than a multi-million dollar communications suite.

“Private, good to meet you. What’s incoming?” I asked as he pulled up the weather imagery for North America.

“Weather front…the bulk of it, sir, is passing south and west of us. We’ll get arctic air within eight hours, holding for at least thirty six hours. We’ll probably get some snow, but from the east, not the southwest. We’ll be in single digits every night, maybe up to the high teens if we’re lucky. Second front is heading east and north of us, we’re between systems, sandwiched. That eastern system is the one that could give us some snow.”

“How about further East? What’s coming in on the S.A.?”

“That second system, just crossing into North Dakota, will hit them in the next twelve hours. The cold of that system, when it hits this warm front coming up from the south, could really bury them, sir.”

“Bottles them in, with luck.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Thanks. Back at it,” I said. “I’ll head down to the mess for breakfast, and back here before oh seven hundred. Jim, where are we meeting? Our conference car is now a dorm, right?”

“We’ll be in one of the big tents, Colonel. Setting it up as we speak.”

“You are nothing if not a mind reader, Colonel Schaefer.”

“Just forward thinking, sir.”

“Good. Figure out a way to bottle that and you’ll be a millionaire.”

Outside, the eastern sky was growing lighter, with sunrise in an hour or so. I headed ‘down’ the train to the southwest toward the mess car, passing many men along the way, and a few women, who were the targets of some attention. I met General Garcia on the way, she’d already taken breakfast.

“Good morning, General. Did you get some rest?”

“Yes, and thank you, Colonel. Thank you for the hospitality. I’ll be out of your quarters shortly.”

“Not a problem, General. I’m heading down to the mess for a bite.  Lieutenant Colonel Schaefer can give you a full update on the S.A.’s current position.”

“Coming at us or running away?”

“The latter. Air Force whacked them up in North Platte not quite two hours ago. They’re running hard, east.”

“Back to the chase.”

“Yes, ma’am. Looks like.”

“Thanks, Colonel. I’ll see you after breakfast,” she said as we exchanged salutes in the near-dark. “I’ll be over in Lone Star command, that a’way,” she said, directing me toward a tent south of our command car.

“Ma’am.” 

I took my place in line, heading into one of the mess cars, again receiving some looks from the men on my presence in the chow line. 

“We must be screwed if the officers are eating this stuff,” I heard from behind me.

“To the contrary, soldier. I figure if we eat this stuff, nothing’s gonna kill us. It’s done wonders for y’all,” I said, getting some laughs. The breakfast was actually pretty good, with scrambled eggs, bacon, bread and canned fruit. As I ate, I chatted with several of the Guardsmen from Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Only about thirty percent of them were Guardsmen a year ago. All had lost family and friends in the flu and in the invasion from Mexico. Virtually all had been in battle in both Mexico and against the S.A.

Our senior staff meeting was brief, all of twenty minutes. My staff got the point that I liked short meetings, and we all had a mountain of work to do.  With our crowded quarters, we had to rotate staff through, releasing some to get back to work a little ahead of the others. The big surprise was coming from the west, not the east. Civilians by the hundreds were coming east, according to intel provided by the Colorado National Guard. The CNG was trying to pick up the pieces after the occupation of the heart of the state, first by what seemed to be the legitimate United States government, then, what became the S.A. 

The Colorado Guard, before the War, had maintained a company-strength unit in Sterling, part of the One Hundred Forty-Seventh Brigade Support Battalion.  The battalion was based in Boulder, and from what we were able to glean from the advance units, the local installation was largely intact.  A recon team would assess the condition of the facilities and any other structures that might be used to house the current military needs.  We expected to meet with someone from the Joint Force Headquarters, as they advanced east from their base in Centennial.   One of the many intelligence briefs that I’d read recapped the re-assignment of many of the Colorado units to the Mexican War, and then quiet reassignment and evacuation out of the state as the intentions of the ‘Federal’ government became clear to the military leadership. There was little left for the S.A. to gather from the military as far as supplies and equipment went…at least as far as the intel knew.

At oh seven-thirty, anyone not working on an essential function was ordered to stand at the perimeter of the Sixth Army battlefield, as all the chaplains led a brief prayer service.  Along with my senior staff and five battalion commanders, I stood at attention as the twenty-seven star Guidon flag was raised, then lowered to half-staff, on what was left of a utility pole, stripped of wire. From somewhere east of us, we heard Amazing Grace, on bagpipes.  Our senior chaplain, Captain Adam Fillmore, had organized this, along with men from each brigade and from the other state units.

I dismissed the senior staff to their duties, quickly changed into ‘work’ wear in my quarters, and headed over to General Garcia’s command tent.

“Ten-hut!” a lieutenant said as I entered.  I’d never get used to that.

“As you were,” I said.  “General Garcia available?”

“One moment, sir,” the lieutenant said.

It was more than a moment, but I was OK with that. The Lone Star command staff was pretty busy. It was good to see a well-organized, smooth running operation. That perception always hid the complete chaos lurking just under the surface. I noticed that everyone in the command tent had an M-16 or M-4 within arms’ reach.

“Colonel, you may come in now,” the lieutenant said.  She was a stocky young woman, maybe twenty-three or so. I could tell by the look in her eyes that she’d be tough in a fight.

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” I said as I entered the second bay of the tent.

“Colonel, thanks for coming by. I’m going to cut to the chase if you don’t mind. I want to get my unit reprovisioned and back in the fight. Honest estimate. How long until your crews are done with our gear?”

“Just got out of our staff meeting, General. Weapons refit will be done by twelve-hundred hours. Your crews are working as hard as ours are, across the board. Provisioning for the individual soldiers is taking probably more time than it should.  We’ll be done with Lone Star by fourteen-hundred. Late in the day to be making an advance, my opinion, especially with weather moving in.”

“Don’t really care about the weather, Colonel. I do care about picking up some mileage for our Texans, and getting us up to North Platte. Which is why I need a couple of your locomotives….and slug of those boxcars coming in.”

This surprised me, it was probably obvious. “We had intended those to be used for transporting the Sixth, ma’am,” I said. The transport trains would be around a hundred cars apiece. In theory, we could load the remains of the Sixth Army in two trainloads…in theory.

“Understood.  But I know that you have more cars than you’re going to need before your resupply unit gets here, and I’ve already arranged to have more cars sent up ahead of the supply train from Denver. I don’t believe this will change your operational plan or schedule at all. Two trips up to North Platte and back and the personnel are done. A hundred and forty miles.”

I thought for a moment. “OK, General, then we’ll spin up the schedule. Some of the refit work can be done in transit, we can make up some time on the provisioning side. The crews have been re-supplying each soldier’s packs assembly-line style….we can just toss the bulk supplies in and have your troops do it themselves. Probably pick up a couple hours.”

“No argument. I appreciate that, Colonel Drummond.”

“I’m beyond arguing. The sooner the last S.A. sonofabitch is under the sod, the sooner we can all go home.”

“Agreed. Thanks for your cooperation, Colonel.”

“No problem, General,” I said as I stood to leave.

“And Colonel? Thanks for the use of the iPod. It’s been a long time since I had a chance to listen to a little Stevie Ray Vaughn.”

“Pride of Texas, that one,” I said. “Magic with a Stratocaster.”