Chapter 6: Here I am, called to serve

Here I am, called to serve

How did he get out at the main gate? His last memory was struggling for breath and the need to whisper. The deep reds morphing into purple and violet in the west promised a thunderstorm rolling in later tonight. Silas had slipped out to the main gate to speak with Paul. The man had some concerns about securing a place for his children. Paul had shared that his CAP score was a solid 5.3. Unable to accept his CAP status as a concubine, he wanted his wife and children taken off the planet. Silas had secured them a place with Pete Hinkle. Once this last group of orphans was transported to safety on the starship, Paul's family would leave with them. Since the start of this operation, Paul and his family had been residing at the retreat on the lake. Silas was here to let Paul know that tonight was the final pickup. Still secured by a neuralizer Paul would be given a method to contact a Pro-Confederacy home guard group in Colorado. They would be expecting his contact in about one month.

Silas approached Paul's position at the main gate three-quarters of a mile from both the county road and the campground. Time seemed to stand still, Silas discovered he could see individuals hiding in and around the main gate that moments before he would've sworn weren't there. Even as several figures rushed him, Silas noted minute details. Each of the twelve men had a distinct last name sewn into their breast pocket as embroidery. Tate, Espinoza, Garcia ... he read each one aloud as they stood frozen in their actions. Though fishing was his passion, Silas found himself describing each weapon the men carried. He even noticed what weapons he could see in holsters, sheaths and secured in their harnesses.

Several of the men struck at him, the blows caused no discomfort. His vision field suddenly changed to the courtyard. He remembered the pistol and the man's face as they worked in conjunction to wound him. There was no pain. Silas remembered looking up seeing Pete, he at told Pete something important, that caused Pete to relax. His next memory was of passing through a Quonset hut door into a white tiled bathroom. The campers' bathrooms were all taupe going to beige; this was not a bathroom; it was so bright that it hurt to look at it. Silas closed his eyes went to sleep.

Earth First Channel One received the live broadcast. Raw feed from several cameras showed on the various monitors. The patriot Rogue-2 had infiltrated another traitorous plot to supply the alien worshiping pedophiles with innocent children. The feed from Lake Ouachita was proving to be stable and recordable. Parts of the footage would need a bit of editing. Having your hero shoot an unarmed man in the leg, though appropriate, would cause bad press. Un-American forces would use this to libel and slander Earth First, detracting from the righteousness of the cause.

Every three or four seconds there would be some pixilation in the video feed. The audio remained stable though as the standoff slowly was turning in Rogue-2's favor. The confession that been extracted would force some of those weak minded fools in Congress to act accordingly. The power died plunging him into darkness. The sound of the door splintering caused the technician to spin towards it. Four blurry figures rushed into the room as the emergency lights began to glare. The only thing the confused technician could focus on was the stylized demon masks they wore. Everything else was a blur. A sudden flash rendered him unconscious. One figure took up station at the door they had entered through, while another one secured the technician by hogtying both wrists to both ankles behind his back with the zip ties. The remaining pair deftly pored over the equipment and the live feeds.

The strike team leader called in to report. "I have reason to suspect that a secondary team will need to be sent immediately to the Lake Ouachita Retreat. A live feed shows that Confederacy forces are under attack there." She did not wait for a reply from the mission leader. Reaching into her backpack, she grabbed a zippered satchel. Quickly she worked the fastener and then unfolded a transport pad. First, her teammate tossed the technician easily onto the locus and watched him disappear. Then together they began a visual and verbal recounting of the equipment and media in the room.

"Shadow One," the mission leader said to her through her implant. "The situation in Arkansas is under control. The live feed you are seeing is a construct by Earthat's AI." There was a pause, and then the mission leader continued. "Once the inventory is complete, set off an EMP to wipe anything you do not take."

"I understand."

Sister Mara waited patiently. Something had gone wrong with the group scheduled to come aboard after hers. Not much was said; her instincts told her something was not right. Their physical needs, food, water, clothing, and those of her infants were being met. Her specific need for information remained unfulfilled. Other than the damned AI, no one from the ship had bothered to speak to her. All that the AI would do was inform her that her inquiries were not going to be responded to. Sister Mara internally debated how satisfying it would be to caress the internal workings of the AI with a ball peen hammer.

Though she did not have direct physical access to all her former children, the AI provided access to the records via a terminal. The temporary foster parents in the other pods exceeded her expectations. Her former charges appeared for the present to be safe. Of all of the orphans transported to the ship only fifty-six of them scored high enough for consideration as sponsors. Surprisingly forty of those turned out to be female. Those new sponsors found themselves on the moon and in the process of induction into Confederacy forces. All in all Sister Mara felt satisfied that her children were now safe.

"Sister Mara," the AI called, "there have been interesting developments back on Earth. Would you care to view them?"

After eighteen hours of simple, 'it is in the replicator, ' or 'trash goes in the recycler' having a question asked sparked her interest. It so stunned Sister Mara that all she could answer was, "Yes."

"A video image of a news conference will be shown on the wall behind you."

Suddenly the image of Senator Leigh Parker appeared on the screen. "Jointly today with Representative Alvin Jackson the Defense of Childhood Act has been filed in both the House and the Senate." She held up a stack of papers with the title in large print and bolded. "We can no longer stand by and allow children to be abused and used by the Confederacy." What came next was a fifteen-minute rehash of sensationalized unsubstantiated rumors that Earth First advocates have been touting the last several years. One of those events had even been proven as the work of a pornographer from southern California.

After the Senators tirade, Global News Network switched back to their anchor, who then turned to his guests. "I have with me Professor Lillian Youngman, from the ACLU, and Mark Lewis, from the EFL." The camera panned quickly to an older black woman, her credentials under her name. Then at her side was a younger Hispanic man the words Earth First League, under his name. "The initial question I have is, can that this legislation if passed, altar the treaty with the Confederacy?"

Marco spoke first. "The two most recent nullifications of treaties occurred during the Carter administration." He slid a piece of paper forward toward the anchor. "As you see here David, President Carter stepped away from the mutual defense treaty with Taiwan to formalize relations with Red China. Also during his term a new treaty replaced the original Panama Canal Treaty." He pulled a second paper and lifted it to read. "In seventeen eighty-nine a joint resolution in Congress declared the United States quote 'freed and exonerated' from a mutual defense treaty with France." There was a pause-accompanied silence. "These precedents establish a procedure with which treaties can be nullified."