“Same shoulder?”
“It’s not bad. Barely grazed,” said Alex.
“How’s Ryan?”
Alex’s son had his head turned to the wall.
“He got hit in the leg, but he should be fine. He’ll be out of it for a while. Morphine.”
Chloe pulled at his arm, keeping him from entering the room.
“What’s wrong?” whispered Ed, turning to Alex and shrugging his shoulder.
“You should spend some time with your daughter. We had it rough getting back. She did good,” said Alex.
“No, I didn’t,” she muttered. “I almost got all of us killed.”
Alex shook his head and mouthed, “No.”
Ed hovered in the doorway, feeling conflicted and guilty about leaving them alone in the makeshift surgery room. He owed Alex everything for this. He had so much to say, but his daughter clearly needed him more.
“I don’t know what to—”
“We’ve been in this together from the start. This is just what we do. Go,” said Alex, suppressing a grin.
“Still, I—”
“Ed, don’t make me chase you out of here.”
“All right,” Ed mumbled, “but I owe you one.”
“Negative. You keep forgetting the church.”
“I haven’t forgotten. Bringing Chloe back—I can’t even.” He shook his head, fighting back tears.
“I know the feeling,” said Alex, reaching out to touch Ryan’s arm.
Chapter 20
EVENT +59:33
Harvard Yard
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Alex entered the command tent and immediately sensed that something was off. The staff sat tensed at their stations, silent. The battalion TOC (Tactical Operations Center) was never quiet. Ever. He took a few steps in and spotted Lieutenant Colonel Grady talking to the UAV section.
Not good.
UAV operations had been grounded for more than two hours, and the storm showed no signs of abating. He removed his boonie cap and twisted the water onto the floor. Grady saw him and patted the UAV pilot on the back before moving to greet him.
“This isn’t a good time, Alex. Sorry,” he said, pointing toward the hatch.
“You’re putting a Raven up? In this?”
“It’s just a precaution. I can’t afford any more surprises like the car bomb. Sorry, but I can’t have nonessential personnel in the TOC right now.”
“This is the first chance I’ve had to get away from the aid station. My son’s fine, by the way,” said Alex.
“I’m glad they got him stitched up, Alex. He sounds like a fine young man. Staff Sergeant Williams told me about the bridge. Sorry I haven’t been able to swing by, but things are a little tense right now. Insurgency chatter stopped three minutes ago. All channels,” said Grady, with a severe look.
“I need to talk to you about the so-called insurgency. It might have some bearing.”
“All right.”
“You’re not dealing with a rogue gang of criminals. This is something much bigger. My son says they refer to themselves as the Liberty Boys.”
“He heard them say this?” said Grady, betraying a hint of recognition.
“From his apartment window.” Alex nodded. “A group of heavily armed men and women drove a pickup truck down their street, assuring everyone that the streets are safe. From what Ryan described, criminal elements ran wild for about twelve hours. There was a ton of shooting the first night, and this Liberty Boys group appeared the next day. They were asking for volunteers to help them secure Boston.”
“That could have been the same criminal group trying to draw out troublemakers,” said Grady.
“You don’t sound very convinced. What I saw was far too centralized for spur of the moment, post-disaster opportunists. They had an effective, grassroots communications network. We were ratted out by a family just south of the turnpike. I didn’t give you a heads-up on the radio because we were running for our lives.”
“You got lucky. Staff Sergeant Williams almost lit you guys up. Flares reach a height of three hundred thirty meters. Over a thousand feet, in case you were curious,” said Grady.
“I remembered the forty second part. The name Liberty Boys has an interesting historical context.”
Grady held a hand up to stop him from continuing. “Why don’t we step outside for a second,” he said. “Let me know as soon as the Raven is airborne!”
“Yes, sir,” replied the UAV operator.
They walked far enough away from the sentry to avoid being overheard. The rain collapsed the brim of Alex’s cap against his forehead before they stopped. Grady, however, appeared unfazed by the deluge against his ballistic helmet.
“I have a few hundred digital pages of information compiled by the Department of Homeland Security on the Liberty Boys—or the Mechanics. Top secret, limited distribution. Myself and the battalion intel officer. There’s a reason for that.”
“A reserve military unit drawing unit members from the greater Boston area? I can’t imagine what the problem might be,” said Alex.
“We left three marines at Fort Devens, including my XO. My first task was to privately open a sealed file stored in my secure Cat Five capsule. The file contained explicit orders for the immediate incarceration of three marines that had been in the unit for more than a decade. Homeland identified them as ‘immediate, high-mission risks. Known affiliation to subversive anti-government militia groups.’”
“And you don’t think Homeland found all of them,” said Alex.
“That’s why we’re talking out here.”
“Don’t you find this a little disturbing? Homeland investigating your marines? Category Five Event Response with no information flowing from higher headquarters? Boston is falling apart because the two groups with half a chance to keep it together are working against each other. Maybe that’s by design. By the way, I saw a few XM-9s out there,” said Alex. “What exactly happened to the National Guard unit out of Brockton?”
“We don’t know. They just stopped communicating with us,” said Grady.
“I think they had a problem. An internal problem—and I think you know more about the situation than you’re willing to admit.”
“How many XM-9s did you see?” asked Grady.
“Does it matter?” Alex countered, studying Grady’s poker face.
The XM-9 was a new combat carbine used exclusively by the United States Army and National Guard units. Civilian variants of the Heckler and Koch line of XM rifles had been specifically banned from importation into the U.S. by the 2016 Combat Weapons Reduction Bill.
“You need to reach out to militia leadership across the river before this situation spirals further out of control. I’ve studied groups like this in Maine and New Hampshire. Talked to their leadership. They’re highly suspicious of the government, but they’re reasonable. Most of them share the same mission as your battalion: to help the people in a crisis. I assume that’s still the crux of your mission?”
“The Liberty Boys are making that mission extremely difficult,” stated Grady.
“That’s because you’re working against each other. If the current organization has roots to the original Mechanics, you’re talking about a league of New Englanders that has spent the better part of the past two hundred fifty years planning to fight a guerilla war against a possible government takeover. I’m surprised that I didn’t come across this group in my research.”
“They don’t officially exist. You won’t find a single modern reference to them on any website. They don’t produce literature or host bean suppers like nearly every other militia group out there. They don’t muster in the streets to fill sandbags when the rivers overflow or serve hot meals after a nor’easter. Instead, they donate sizable sums of money through untraceable proxies to support relief efforts. They have considerable resources at their disposal. We’re talking generational wealth.”