299 Days VIII: The War (2 page)

Mendez had never landed on this particular helo pad. He was a good pilot, but every
landing on an unfamiliar surface required total concentration.

As soon as they touched down, the soldiers got out and were met by hospital medics
with a gurney. The soldiers removed Nedderman out of the pilot’s chair and made it
look like they were rendering first aid.

The hospital staff did not have any security. Why would they need it? This was a Loyalist
helicopter making an emergency landing at a Loyalist hospital. Camp Murray had radioed
in and told the hospital to expect several soldiers in the helicopter, so no one was
alarmed that eight extremely well-armed operators were now entering the hospital.

As soon as the operators were inside, the team leader found the stairs and went down
to the sixth floor, with his seven teammates right behind him. They quickly found
Room 612.

They walked down the hall and past the nurse’s station. No one even looked up. The
operators looked right at home there. St. Pete’s often had soldiers and contractors
milling around.

The team leader knocked on the door to Room 612 and said, “Trigger?”

“Seven, zero, two,” a male voice said from behind the door.

The team leader pointed to two operators and motioned that they stand guard at the
door. Another two took up a nonchalant position facing the elevator. The four remaining
operators went into the room.

When they walked in, they found Roy “Trigger” Chopping holding a pistol on a small,
well-dressed man with duct tape over his mouth.

“Mr. Attorney General,” Roy said to the well-dressed man, “your ride is here.”

The team leader motioned for the medic on his team to approach the Washington State
Attorney General. The little man in the suit was terrified, but couldn’t scream because
of the duct tape.

“Sir,” the team leader said to the Attorney. “Don’t make me do this,” as he made a
fist. The Attorney General tried to run away. The team leader grabbed him and punched
him in the face. The Attorney General dropped to the ground.

One of the operators took a big, body-length bag out of his backpack and another operator
helped him unfurl it. They gently put the Attorney General inside and hoisted him
up on their shoulders.

“Let’s boogie,” the team leader said and motioned for Roy to join them, which he did
and then they all left the room.

Before they left, an operator in the room knocked three times on the door to let the
two standing guard outside know that they were coming out.

The operators walked calmly out of the room with a heavy bag on the shoulders of two
of them. It didn’t look out of the ordinary. Soldiers carried heavy things all the
time, especially during wartime and in the state capitol hospital that catered to
the VIPs in state government.

Roy, a former NYPD detective who moved to Washington State for a job in the Attorney
General’s office as an investigator, felt a surprising calm wash over him. Not only
was he calm – he had done years of undercover work and been in some extremely dangerous
situations – but he was actually enjoying himself. He was so at ease that he even
winked at the pretty nurse at the nurse station as he walked by. Roy’s sense of calm
was contagious; the team leader started whistling a song like he didn’t have a care
in the world.

They took the stairs up to the roof, which was locked. That was the one thing they
hadn’t planned for. Someone should have noticed that when they came down the stairs
from the helo pad, but that detail had been missed.

“Shit,” the team leader said.

“I got it,” Roy said as he went back down the stairs and to the nurse’s station.

“Hey, beautiful,” he said in a New York accent, “My security detail needs to get back
in a helicopter that’s on the roof, burning a gallon of very expensive fuel every
few seconds it’s sitting there. The roof door is locked. Could you call someone? Quickly?”

The nurse, who got hit on all day long, but was charmed by this New Yorker with silver
hair, said halfway flirtatiously, “It depends. Who are you?”

Roy got out his Attorney General’s investigator badge and flashed it. The nurse smiled
and picked up the phone and gave him the thumbs up after thirty seconds.

“Thanks, beautiful,” he said as he ran toward the stairwell. He caught up with the
operators and they got into the helicopter. No one tried to stop them.

As they lifted off and got out of small-arms range from the hospital, the team leader
started to relax slightly. He handed Roy a headset and said on the intercom, “How
the hell did you do that?”

“The door?” Roy asked. “Cute nurse.”

“No,” the team leader said, “Get the Attorney General into a hospital room so we could
get him.”

Roy smiled and said, “Ah, well, that’s a story I can tell you over a beer sometime.”

(December 21)

It was late afternoon and Jim Q. was getting hungry. He was thinking about what was
for dinner that night when his radio crackled. “My shoe is green,” he heard his cousin
say in their language. It sounded so sweet to hear his language from a familiar voice.

Jim Q. had been instructed to test messages from HQ to ensure they were valid, even
though they were in a language only about three dozen people in the state understood.
He opened his code book and looked at the letters written in his native language,
which was in an obscure alphabet only those three dozen people in the state, and maybe
a Near Eastern linguist professor, would even recognize.

Jim Q. found the appropriate test phrase for an instruction coming from HQ “When do
the birds fly south?” he asked in his language, one he only spoke on this radio.

“My birthday is fourteen days after the Festival of the Harvest,” his cousin answered.
This was the proper response, meaning the person on the other end had the same code
book. Of course he did: no one else spoke this language and Jim Q. recognized his
cousin’s voice. But it was easy to take the extra precaution of code phrases. The
104 soldiers in the 17th Irregulars counted on secure communications.

“Go ahead,” Jim Q. said, meaning it was safe to start the message, now that the
sender had been authenticated.

“The ocean is purple,” his cousin said.

Jim Q. looked at his code book again. This meant “an all unit-commander meeting tonight
at midnight at Boston Harbor.”

“My kitten is green,” Jim Q. said, which meant, “Message received: there will be an
all unit-commander meeting tonight at Boston Harbor.”

Jim Q. wrote down the message about the meeting at midnight just to make sure he got
it right. Naturally, he wrote it in his language. Even if that message, the code book,
or the radio transmissions were intercepted, no one would have any idea what language
was involved, let alone what was being said.

Jim Q. and his fellow code talkers were essential. The Limas

were monitoring the radio frequencies and would love to know that all the Patriot
guerilla commanders would be in the same place at the same time.

“Horse seven out,” his cousin said, which was his call sign. They used English for
“out” because there wasn’t a word in their language for “end of radio transmission.”
Besides, let the Limas know that the speakers of this strange language used one English
word. It would just confuse them more.

“Bear two out,” Jim Q. said in their language, before going to find Ted.

When he caught up with him, he mentioned the meeting that night. Ted nodded slowly.
It must be the meeting about the offensive. Finally. Ted had been waiting for weeks
for the green light.

“My guys are ready,” Ted said out loud to himself. They were. Not ultra-ready, but
as ready as they could be. They were ready enough for the mission best suited for
the 17th Irregulars that he and Lt. Col. Hammond sketched out from the beginning:
rear-echelon occupiers of Olympia with a strong civil affairs emphasis. Ted just hoped
that this was the same mission they would receive. He was hoping his semi-rag tag
unit wouldn’t be tasked with taking a fortified Lima facility.

Ted got on the radio and called Grant. “Giraffe 7, Giraffe 7, Green 1.”

After a few seconds, Grant answered, “Green 1, Giraffe 7.”

“Supper at the ranch,” Ted said. He added, “Bring a toothbrush,” which essentially
meant that he’d better plan to spend the night.

“Roger that,” Grant said. Another evening and night away from the family, he thought.
Oh well. That was becoming more and more common for him. For the most part, his family
was understanding. He had to get the “rental team” up to speed to get some food and
gas coming to Pierce Point. It was a worthy cause, even if it was a lie. The actual
cause was even more worthy, but his family wouldn’t understand.

“Should I bring my cousins?” Grant asked. This was code for the Team.

“Negative,” Ted answered.

“Copy,” Grant said. “Giraffe 7 out.”

“Green 1 out,” Ted said.

It was about 4:30 p.m. Dinner was always at 5:30 p.m. It was earlier than most civilians
were used to, but the unit got up at 5:00 a.m.

Grant arrived at Marion Farm about a half hour later. He flashed the guards the unit’s
“1-7” sign and they let him in. The sign was just for fun. The guards recognized Grant.

Grant checked his watch. It was a little after five. That gave him some time to talk
to Ted and see what was going on. Grant could sense that something big was up. He,
too, had been waiting for the green light from HQ This must be it, Grant thought.

“Hey, what’s up?” Grant asked when he saw Ted.

“All unit-commander meeting tonight at HQ,” Ted said. “You know what that means.”

“Yep,” Grant said. His marriage was about to finally end, he thought. That’s what’s
up. Oh, and he might be killed. There was that, too.

Grant had dinner and talked to the troops all night. Around10:00 p.m., he took a caffeine
pill, anticipating a long night. A little while later, he and Ted got their kit and
rifles and headed out to the beach landing. There was the Chief ready to take them
to Boston Harbor.

They still hadn’t found Paul’s body and Mark was still insane. Every time Grant got
out on the water, he thought about Paul and how dangerous it was just to move around
now. Grant would inquire with HQ tonight about a Purple Heart for Paul. He died during
operations. No one was shooting at him, but he was out on the water doing something
dangerous for the unit. Grant would also inquire if there was some commendation for
a training injury for Tony Atkins, who was still recovering. A commanding officer
had the duty and responsibility to get his men recognized by higher ups when they
deserved it. Tony and Paul surely did.

The boat ride to Boston Harbor was uneventful. Grant remembered the last one back
in the summer, which had been his first trip to Boston Harbor. Everything seemed magic
on that trip. It was a brand new adventure, going to meet with a Special Forces commander
and finding out you are commanding a guerilla unit. That had been an amazing trip.

This trip was not like that. This was all business. Comparing the first trip to the
second, Grant realized how much he had changed in the past few months. He had gone
from thinking it was amazing that he was part of this guerilla adventure to thinking
he was going to see his boss and get a big work assignment.

Grant had become a soldier in the past few months, a professional soldier. Not in
the sense that he was particularly good at it, but that it was his job to be a soldier.
Now he thought of soldiering as his job rather than an adventure.

Security was particularly tight that night. The Chief had to make several radio checks
at various points with code phrases. The picket boats were farther out and more numerous
than the first time. There were soldiers on the bank along the entrance to the marina.
And the marina itself was bristling with soldiers, very well-armed soldiers. They
had medium, and even heavy machine guns and grenade launchers. Grant hadn’t seen that
the first time he was out at Boston Harbor. The Patriot forces were getting much better
armed as they captured Lima weapons.

When they pulled into the their slip at the marina, a sergeant—in an actual uniform
consisting of FUSA Army fatigues, but with a “Wash. State Guard” name tape—came up
to them and said, “Unit, please?”

“17th Irregulars,” Grant said.

The sergeant looked at his clipboard.

“And you are?” he asked.

“Lt. Matson and Sgt. Malloy,” Grant said as he realized that he was in civilian clothes
and had no insignia, except for his small homemade 17th Irregular unit patch, which
would be next to impossible to see in the dark with the poor lighting of the marina.

“Call signs, please,” the sergeant said.

“Giraffe 7 and Green 1,” Grant said. He was glad that they had so many security checks.
It took two seconds to give a call sign, but it was an easy way to uncover a Lima
spy who could get all of them killed. It was an excellent use of two seconds of time.