Chapter 10

Later Sunday morning

Within minutes of dressing for church, I felt a second danger, this one to the northwest. “Is this some sort of test because I waited so long to admit it?” I asked the ceiling rhetorically after a deep sigh.

“Something going on?” Don asked from nearby.

“Some sort of trouble to the northwest,” I sighed.

“Fort Polk?” Don asked. That had been my guess, too. I used the new handheld computer Don got for me and aimed it towards the trouble, taking a vector.

“Back in a few, or maybe I should just meet you at church,” I said. Don agreed with that. I took off on a grav sled and got a second vector. They intersected several klicks southeast of Fort Polk.

“Two trucks and a staff car. Twenty-four troops with a Captain in charge,” I whispered tersely to Don as I passed him, headed for my seat in church. “They’re going to be delayed because their electronics went out about thirty klicks from the base. One of them will have to walk until they find someone with a com unit so they can call the base for another ride,” I whispered with a chuckle.

“I’m going to com the attorneys and give them a heads up,” Don said as he got up and walked out. I moved over to sit with Sally.

“Everything okay?” she asked, concerned.

“For now it is. It’ll get ugly this afternoon. Don’s calling the attorneys from the Lucky Jim Trust,” I whispered back.

Despite the bullshit, and despite my annoyance with the constant interruptions in my personal life, I felt better after the service. Outside, I kissed each of my wives and significant others goodbye, walked to the secluded copse of trees close to church, and climbed aboard my cloaked grav sled.

After zipping home, I donned my battle gear. Then I went to check on the progress of the troops from Fort Polk. They had new vehicles and were now about twenty klicks closer to our house. I set the controls to pace the three-vehicle convoy and expanded my consciousness to eavesdrop.

The Captain was not in a good mood and was berating his driver. “No, I don’t think it was Nicaraguan troops. The President says there aren’t any troops headed this way. He wants us to find this ‘Gator’ person and throw him in the stockade to keep him from panicking the whole country. The FBI said he was with someone nicknamed ‘Cajun’. We had to access top secret files to find out who Cajun is and get an address,” he explained angrily.

The troops in the trucks weren’t in a good mood either. The Captain had blamed them for all three vehicles breaking down simultaneously and made them march south while the three drivers walked back to the base to get new vehicles.

I considered fucking with them and using the EMP on these vehicles too, but I didn’t. First, they were in a much more populated area and it would affect innocent civilians. Second, I didn’t want the captain in an even worse mood when he got to our house.

Instead, I commed Don and told him where they were and what I had overheard. I estimated that they’d arrive at the house between 1500 and 1600 hours. I also told Don where I planned to set up my camp.

It took about twenty-five minutes to collect the grav sleds with my gear and to reach my chosen campsite on the remnant of what used to be a barrier island called Isle Derniere.

Until 1856, the island had been a summer resort for the rich and famous of southern Louisiana, a place to escape the muggy, oppressive heat and enjoy the constant, cool sea breezes.

A hurricane passed over the island in 1856, submerging the entire island. It killed hundreds of people on the island and washed away all the vegetation and buildings on the island. The only thing reportedly standing afterwards was a children’s carousel. That remained because the anchor post was buried deep enough to keep it from washing away. Several people had survived the storm by hanging onto the carousel.

The hurricane split Isle Derniere into four separate islands. In the ensuing years, waves and storms had washed away two of the islands. The only visible evidence of those islands is two sand bars that only appear during extremely low tides.

Large parts of the other two islands met the same fate, but part of the islands still sits above water, even at high tide. One of the two is about sixty meters long by fifteen meters wide, much of it covered by calf-high grass.

The last island was smaller, only thirty meters long and twelve meters wide. Nearly a century ago, someone planted mangrove trees along the leeward shore of the two islands. The trees have somewhat stabilized the islands, even though most of the islands are still less than two meters above the high tide level. The small section of the island I plan to use is about a meter higher than the rest.

Reports from right after the hurricane indicated that nothing had remained of the buildings on the island, not even the foundations. I don’t know if they missed one or if the rock enclosure I use when I camp out here was buried by the storm. I’ve dug down in the sand inside the walls and found the remains of a cellar. There are no doors or windows, so access was probably through a missing wooden floor that rested atop the cellar walls.

Water didn’t enter the cellar, something I didn’t understand at first. I realized that the lack of water was due to two things. First, the floor of the cellar is still half a meter above the high tide mark. The second was that the builder coated the outside of the walls with a thick coat of tar, much like pioneers tarred the outside of their covered wagons so they would float across rivers.

Originally, a thick coat of guano covered the walls and the sand inside the walls each time I visited. Two years ago, I rigged small horizontal windmills on each of the four walls. They look like long-armed anemometers that spin lazily all day and night, as long as the wind blows even a little. The one-meter-long arms have small cups attached on the ends to catch the wind, making the windmills spin horizontally like helicopter rotors, although much slower. With enough of them spaced atop the walls, it keeps the birds off the walls and away from the sand inside the walls.

Once I was sure the windmills worked, I brought a small pump to the island and power washed the bird crap off the walls, inside and out. I laid a plastic tarp inside the walls to collect the nasty water and pumped it out. Since the interior is eight meters square, I still have a good-sized area to set up my camp, even with the windmills spinning along the edges. I renewed the tar that the power washer had blasted off the outside of the walls. The new coat of tar even keeps the annoying crabs away now.

After I set up my camp, I flew out to locate the mini submarines. They were about a hundred klicks offshore, headed north in a wedge formation. They were just over seventy klicks due east of me.

When I got back to my campsite, I thought about bringing the girls out here, but decided against it. Each time I camped here, I’d dig out a bit more of the sand inside the walls. My goal was to dig down and remove all the sand from inside the walls. That way, the walls would provide more protection from the wind when it was strong enough to start blowing sand around. I wasn’t surprised when my shovel hit a piece of wood. I’d hit driftwood twice before. I assumed that a hurricane or some other storm that had filled the basement with sand had added the driftwood too.

What was surprising was that the rotted wood was still attached to something. Even though the piece broke apart easily, I kept digging to find the rest of what it had been attached to. As I dug deeper with my collapsible camping shovel, it looked as if it had once been part of some sort of workbench and not deposited by a storm.

Four, fifteen-centimeter-long bolts were anchored firmly in clay bricks that were part of the wall. In fact, the wall behind the remains of the workbench was all red clay bricks. The rest of the walls were rock. Looking at it, I could see another difference. There was a finger’s width of mortar between the rocks and the bricks. The gap was a straight line of mortar. Yet, there were sand grains wedged between the mortar and the edge of the bricks.

Curious, I let my consciousness expand and looked at the wall, and then beyond the wall. Behind the brick facade was a bricked in opening three bricks wide, seven bricks high, and a meter deep. Inside the opening were three wooden chests. I gasped when I looked beyond the wood and saw the aura of gold. One chest was filled with small gold bars and gold coins and two were filled with jewelry. I’d almost expected to find Spanish gold and silver coins once I saw the wooden chests, but saw no silver coins or ingots anywhere in the boxes.

As excited as I was about the find, it was nearing 1500 hours, and I needed to get back to the house before the army troops arrived. After donning my combat armor again, I headed for home, linked electronically with two other sleds so they would follow me and I could command them if necessary.

I found the three military vehicles about half an hour away from the house, followed by six State Police cruisers, so I returned to the house and warned them. I also told Don and Sally about the cache of treasure that I had found on the island. I was surprised to find Don in his old military uniform. The only difference was that the battle armor he wore was three generations newer than what they had available back them. Hell, it was still three generations newer than what all but the current elite forces were wearing.

“See, it’s not all bad,” Don commented about the cache I found. Then he told me that attorneys from the Lucky J Trust had flown into the local airport and he’d picked them up. They were in the dining room in case they were needed. In addition, Colonel Berkins of the State Police was on his way with fifty officers and had officers from Houma already following the army convoy. Don figured that Colonel Berkins would be here in about twenty minutes, too. They were driving much faster than the army since they were coming from a further distance.

“I feel like Wyatt Earp waiting for the shootout at the OK Corral to start,” I said as I paced nervously.

“They didn’t wait for it to happen, it happened spontaneously,” Sally corrected me. At least she got me to laugh. She always knew how to make me laugh, one of the many things I loved about her.

“Do us all a favor and keep it from becoming a shootout,” Don almost begged. “Unless they force the issue and someone is in danger,” he amended.

“I have two of the grav sleds loaded with nothing but 10 mm tranquilizer rounds. I also have a 10 mm assault rifle loaded with tranquilizer rounds and I have three more magazines of tranquilizer rounds for the assault rifle,” I assured him.

“Let’s see what the attorneys can accomplish first,” Don suggested. I agreed. We heard the wail of dozens of sirens approaching long before we heard the engines of the army trucks approaching. Curious, yet cautious, I snuck out the back and headed for my grav sled where I cloaked before going to see what the commotion was. Don and the attorneys went outside using the front door.

When I got out front, I saw more than twenty State Police cars, with a disorienting display of red, yellow, and blue lights flashing. They had the T-intersection of Blanc Bayou Road West and Neland Road blocked with the front row of cars turned across the road. A second row was behind those, parked with the nose of the cars against the side doors of the front row.

Don was talking with Colonel Berkins of the Louisiana State Police. Two attorneys, one a smartly dressed man and an equally well-dressed woman were talking with them, as were the one male and three female attorneys from the Lucky Jim Trust. Don wasn’t exactly smiling, but he looked pleased and gave me a hand signal to come over but to remain cloaked.

I heard the last moments of their discussion before the angry army captain stomped towards them. “I demand that you move your vehicles immediately. You are interfering with a military matter,” he shouted.

“We’re here because we are aware of your destination. Before we allow you to proceed, we insist on knowing exactly what your mission is. If it involves taking any residents of Blanc Bayou into custody, we won’t allow you to proceed because you lack the authority to act as law enforcement officers and take civilians into custody inside the borders of the United States,” Colonel Berkins replied flatly.

“My authority comes directly from the President,” the captain said arrogantly.

“Then you and the President are both idiots. He doesn’t have that authority,” the elegantly dressed woman replied.

“And what makes you such an expert?” the Army captain asked sarcastically.

She handed him her business card. I moved to where I could read it. It said, “UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT Honorable Victoria A. Westley, Chief Judge.”

“Anyone could print up a card like that,” the captain scoffed.

“Then I suggest that you check with the idiot you say gave you the authority you claim to have and see if he recognizes the name,” she replied. “If you continue, you and your men will be subject to arrest, prosecution, and imprisonment,” she warned.

“Like these men could stop us?” he asked condescendingly. “I can have a thousand troops here,” he bragged.

“They’ll never make it,” Don chuckled. The captain glared at him. “They’ll experience the same sort of mechanical problems that you did at first.”

“Is that a threat?” the captain asked.

“No, more of a warning. I know the person you’re after and you’ll have a harder time catching him than you are having against the Chinese. In fact, one of the most recent tactics currently recommended to use against the Chinese was his idea. If you have any contacts at the Pentagon still willing to talk to you, ask them if you should worry about going up against someone that a retired Marine Raider with the handle ‘Cajun’ considers much better now than he was when he was in the service,” Don suggested.

I saw the captain flinch when he heard the name Cajun. “If he’s so good, why didn’t he make a name for himself in the service?” the captain retorted.

Now Don was laughing. “How ... how many sixteen-year-olds are in the service?” Don laughed, joined by Colonel Berkins and the attorneys from the Lucky Jim Trust. The other looked surprised.

“Sixteen?” the Chief Judge asked.

“He just turned sixteen,” Don replied.

“Sixteen?” The captain snorted derisively. “Hell, he’s probably shit his pants and taken off running,” he sneered.

Don replied unfazed. “He’s probably within thirty meters of you right this second, and the only pants shitting happening today will be you,” he goaded.

“Thirty meters, huh?” the captain asked as he looked around, expecting me to be under cover. There were a lot of possibilities.

“If he’s so close, tell him to turn himself in before anyone gets hurt,” the captain ordered, pulling his sidearm and aiming it at Don. Don didn’t react because the captain was close enough that Don could disarm him before he could ever pull the trigger.

Colonel Berkins, however, drew his sidearm and pointed it at the captain. “Captain, you may consider yourself under arrest for threatening a civilian with bodily harm,” he said. When the Colonel pulled his sidearm, his men all drew or leveled their own weapons. That caused the army troops to level their weapons.

“This is getting out of control,” I thought to myself so I commed the Colonel.

“Colonel, this is Gator. I appreciate the support, but please ask your men to stand down before one of them gets hurt. Don and I can handle this,” I promised. “Once you do, please patch your com through to your radio so I can speak with the idiot ... I mean the captain.”

“Stand down,” the colonel shouted to his men.

“First smart thing you’ve done,” the Army captain snorted. The colonel just grinned smugly and patched his com through like I asked.

“That’s more than I can say for you, captain, or should I say private. After this clusterfuck, you’ll be lucky to hang onto any rank at all. I asked the colonel to stand down because I can deal with you and your men by myself. Like the colonel said, consider yourself under arrest, except I’m making a citizen’s arrest. Let me give you an example of how much trouble you’re in. Watch the ground a couple of centimeters in front of your right foot,” I instructed.

Once he finally looked towards his foot, I squeezed off a carefully aimed shot that hit two cm from his boot. Then I skedaddled since I had fired from directly above him.

“Shit!” the captain exclaimed as he jerked his foot back and then looked around, waving his sidearm back and forth in the air expecting to catch a glimpse of me. His men were doing the same thing, although they had no idea why.

“Tell your men to stand down immediately,” I ordered. “I have every one of them targeted and if they refuse to stand down, within thirty seconds, you and every one of your men will be put down,” I warned.

“You’re bluffing,” he shouted angrily. “You can’t possibly hit everyone that quickly.”

“You have ten seconds,” I warned, “nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one,” I counted down as his men scrambled to find me or take cover, even though there was no cover that could protect them from the sleds. Cloaked, the sleds could operate from directly above the men, from ground level, and everywhere in between.

Within five seconds of what would have been my count of zero, the captain and his men were all down.

“Jesus!” the Colonel hissed. The lady judge slapped her hand over her mouth in horror.

“They’re all fine,” I assured everyone. “They’ll wake up in four to five hours. The bigger they are and the faster their metabolism is, the quicker they’ll wake up,” I advised.

Landing next to the group near Don, I uncloaked, making most of them jump. “Are you sure they’ll all be okay?” the lady judge asked.

“Positive,” I replied. The grav sleds were programmed to shoot at arms, shoulders, and legs. I didn’t want any of the darts to impact the neck, face, head, or around the heart,” I explained.

“You can do that?” she asked, surprised.

“With the two latest versions of the grav sled, yes,” I replied.

“You took quite a risk making that shot so close to the captain’s foot,” the well-dressed man next to the lady judge commented.

“Nah, that shot was a gimme,” I replied. “I was only thirty meters above him and used the advanced targeting system to aim my assault rifle. I hit the exact oil spot I aimed for ... although Hal will give me hell for messing up the surface of the Highway,” I chuckled. “He’ll probably make me repair it.”

“Damn straight,” Don chuckled.

“He can do that?” one of the trust attorneys asked.

“Not really, but Hal’s a one-man show if it has anything to do with the streets. He runs the street sweeper, grades the gravel roads when they need it, fills in holes, patches the highway when it needs it, replaces street signs, and changes light bulbs in the streetlights and stoplights. You name it, he does it,” I explained.

“If the repair requires more than one man to accomplish it, Hal has a list of people he can com who routinely volunteer to help him, usually some of the men in town.”

“There are several women and quite a few older boys on the list, too,” Don interjected. “Jim started volunteering to help when he was only nine, much younger than Hal was comfortable with. Jim worked half a day a week doing menial and simple tasks that Hal felt he could accomplish and that still helped Hal get caught up with the backlog of work he had.

“He gave Jim small jobs to do and kept an eye on him. After six months, he started giving Jim the jobs he’d give to a teenager. By the time Jim was eleven, the only thing he couldn’t do was drive. Hal even had him cutting rebar with a torch for a section of the highway they had to repair. When I got back from China and married Jim’s mom, Hal told me that Jim knew more about the upkeep of the roads and did a better job of it than any man in town except him.