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Vargas’ RTO switched his channels and chaos filled his earphones. It sounded like the Battalion net but several people were chattering, stepping on each other without discipline so he couldn’t make it out. The best he could tell they were in the midst of some kind of firefight. He snapped, “Furth, leave me on that channel and tell the convoy to halt, close-in deployment, no dismount, stay sharp. Tell the other RTOs to monitor the other company pushes, Guard freq, the Navy, everyone you can think of. Use runners to coordinate if you have to. I want everyone’s ears on signals and I want to know what’s going on, now.”
The convoy quickly halted and soon Vargas had his answers. He looked at his section leaders gathered around, then focused on the young, confident-looking civilian he’d been charged with escorting. He summarized what they had found out. “Sir, Battalion just got hit. Tanks and armored fighting vehicles, maybe a thousand infantry, they can’t tell. They’re getting overrun. It would take at least eight hours, six at best, to get back and help them. There’s no point in that. We have to go on with our mission. If they can fight them off, or some of them can withdraw, the best thing we can do for them is to get Richmond on our side.”
He didn’t ask the civilian’s opinion, but waited for it anyway. Men like this one always had to put their two cents in. What was worse, rumors said he held an Army Reserve Major’s commission and was the son of a well-known general. People like that always meddled.
Vargas waited for the stupid to flow.
Instead, the man just nodded. “Thank you, Major. I agree. Carry on.”
“My pleasure, sir.” Will wonders never cease? Don’t let on, Denny. Yes sir, three bags full, sir. Vargas turned aside. “Furth, try to get through to the Navy. Maybe they can send Battalion some air support. They might have lost their long-range transmitter. And keep the RTOs listening on their alternate channels. The rest of you, give everyone ten minutes to stretch and whiz, standard security.”
Back up on top of the tall armored truck, Vargas scanned the surroundings while sucking down a precious red-box Marlboro. He should have thought to try to loot a few cartons along the way, but he hadn’t wanted to waste time. Now he wished they had been delayed six hours, so they could have rushed back to help, play the Cavalry arriving in the nick of time.
That would have been glorious, and maybe the Envoy could have died bravely and heroically. Too bad.
The convoy chugged southward not yet halfway to their destination. Vargas had hoped to make the journey in one day, but at this rate it might be sundown before they reached the outskirts of Richmond – and that was without Murphy’s intervention. No one had challenged them yet. No one had as much as taken a potshot at them, but he expected something eventually. Perhaps it would come at Ashland, the first decent-sized town on the route. Perhaps at Hanover Airport.
They passed the dozenth brown sign directing travelers to yet another Civil War battlefield. Once again he thought of the irony. They were walking – all right, driving – in the bloody footsteps of Lee’s and Grant’s armies.
***
Inside the command vehicle, the Special Envoy sat, his back braced against the padded wall of the troop space, thinking. He ran his hand over his smooth face, through his thick hair. I could pass for twenty-five now. Absolutely amazing. And what do I get for it? Promotion – if you can call it that – from commanding armies to being carted around like a piece of meat without even an aide. And masquerading as my own dead son, to boot.
He snorted to himself. Now I don’t even have the gravitas of my years. And what if Governor Allaine doesn’t believe me when I tell him who I am? Would I believe me? Everything depends on the residual loyalty of a man who was a Unionist party member. Hopefully a reluctant one. Will he remember and rejoin the real, constitutional United States of America? Will he cling to the now-defunct United Governments, may it rot in hell? Or will he simply think himself a bigger and more successful warlord, King of Richmond with some neo-feudal vision of Virginia? I have to get him cooperating, vaccinating his people.
Travis Tyler, General, United States Army (Retired), mused and dozed to the jouncing and rocking of the MRAP. Infantrymen learn to sleep anywhere. He found he hadn’t forgotten how.
