Invasion: China (Invasion America) (Volume 5) (9 page)

“I am aware of his questionable record,” Williamson said.

Stan opened his mouth to retort.

“Hold it, Colonel,” McGraw said in a stern voice. “General, if I could have your attention.”

Both Stan and Williamson faced big Tom.

“I respect your office and your record,” McGraw told Williamson. “What I don’t respect is your interference w
ith my coming offensive. Corporal Jake Higgins belongs to a Behemoth tank crew. Those tanks are the key to our coming success—if we’re going to have one. I don’t care if Jake Higgins raped your mother. He stays with his tank until the offensive is over.”

“He is officially a Militia member,” Williamson said
coldly. “You do not have the authority to stop me. If I call the President, he will order you to hand Jake Higgins into my custody.”

“Then make your
call,” McGraw said. “You can do it right here. But know this. By doing that, you will make a personal enemy out of me. Is that really what you want?”

Williamson laughed softly. “Please, General, don’t attempt
any melodramatics with me. I am a patriot.”

“So am I,” McGraw said hotly. “So is Stan Higgins, a Medal of Honor recipient.”

“I follow the law,” Williamson said.

“And aid and abet the enemy
through your actions,” McGraw said.

Williamson stiffened
as his neck flushed red.

“Now see here, old son,” McGraw said. “
Maybe I shouldn’t have said that. We’re both supposed to be on the same side. I know you believe you’re right, and I believe I’m right. Neither matters now. The coming offensive is all that counts. That means you shouldn’t interfere with my tank divisions. By taking Jake, you’ll hurt the morale of his entire regiment. I only have six of them—six to defeat the Chinese.”

Through his ridiculous lenses,
Williamson glowered at McGraw. “I will have the traitor one way or another. You know that, don’t you?”

“
I’m asking you to wait,” McGraw said. “Let the man fight for his country. At this stage in the war, isn’t that more important?”

“I will make that call to DC,” Williamson said.

“You’re a hard man, General, but a smart one, too,” McGraw said. “I run Southern Front. If you make that call, I’ll make one of my own. Who do you think the President will listen to right now, you or me?”

Militia General Williamson shot to his feet
so several of his bones popped with sound. He swiped the wallet off McGraw’s desk. Without a word, he slipped the wallet into his jacket and marched for the door.

“One way or another,” he muttered. Then he was out the door, leaving it ajar.

A moment later, the major looked in, with her plucked eyebrows raised. McGraw gestured, and she shut the door softly.

“Damn Militia bastards,” McGraw muttered.

Stan’s blood pressure still ran high. He didn’t know if the two generals had staged that or not. Why bother pretending such a thing for his benefit? It didn’t make sense. He was a colonel, not a general. Maybe McGraw was for real.

“Thanks,” Stan
said.

“I’d do it for any of my men.”

Stan didn’t want to say the words, but he did. “I owe you one.”

McGraw gave him a hearty smile, and he stood, coming around the desk. Holding out his hand, the general pumped
Stan’s arm and slapped him on the shoulder.

“It’s good to have you back, old son.”

Stan looked down. He didn’t know what to make of all this. Had McGraw truly been drunk the other night? He found it hard to believe.

“Stick around
for a while,” McGraw said. “I’ll buy you a beer later at the officers’ club.”

“I should be getting back to my regiment and seeing to those three tanks.”

McGraw nodded, and he slapped Stan on the shoulder once more. “Maybe you’re right. The offensive is coming soon, and I mean to win this one big. We’re going to drive the Chinese out of Oklahoma and through Texas into Mexico.”

“I hope you’re right, sir.”

“We’ll have to think of something for your boy.”

“Yes
, sir,” Stan said.

“Until then, make sure he sticks close to base. Who knows what these goons will try
next? Williamson is as tough as nails. He’s not going to back down long.”

Stan
silently agreed, and soon he found himself saying goodbye to the major. Did McGraw and Harold still have ideas of unseating the President? Stan hoped not. But even more importantly, what did General Williamson plan to do about Jake?

SIXTH BEHEMOTH REGIMENT ASSEMBLY AREA, OKLAHOMA

Corporal
Jake Higgins found the answer to his father’s question nine days before the start of Operation Reclamation.

It was early morning, with the monster tanks hidden under camouflage netting and surrounded by trees. Twenty inflatable fake Army trucks with huge inflatable stacks of boxes gave the impression this was a growing forward supply dump. It was part of McGraw’s deception techniques to fool Chinese surveillance drones. Neither side maintained recon satellites, as the other side beamed them down as fast as they reached operational orbit.
That meant each side used high-flying stealth drones. Various tents provided sleeping quarters for the crews. A larger tent served the function of mess hall.

Several late risers ate breakfast inside the tent, Jake Higgins among them.

As soldiers went about their duties, a large black four-door sedan roared over a hill to the north, kicking up dust from the dirt road. The big car had tinted windows, making it impossible for anyone to see who rode inside.

A dug-in sentry squad watched the vehicle, tracking it with a heavy machine gun. The
dirt road led to a shack and a crossbar. By the weight of the four-door, it looked as if it would have no problem smashing through the crossbar.

Brakes squealed nonetheless, and the car crunched across gravel as it came to a stop beside the guard shack.

A sergeant approached the vehicle. With a soft purr, the driver’s window descended, revealing a burly Detention Center MP. The driver’s ID in his hand showed he belonged to Homeland Security.

“This is Army territory,” the sergeant
told him.

“Look at this,” the driver said, and he showed the guard a Presidential crest. “This gives us the authorization to go wherever we want. Right now, General Williamson told us to come here. Are you going to interfere
? If so, I’ll need your name and ID.”

The sergeant squinted at the Presidential crest. He bit his lower lip and finally shrugged. “I don’t know what you want here.”

“Where’s Jake Higgins?” the driver asked.

“
I don’t know. You’ll have to ask around.”

The driver sneered, and the window purr
ed as it shut.

The sergeant stepped back, signaled the private in charge of the crossbar and hurried to the shack
, reaching for the field phone there. Colonel Higgins was visiting Sixth Behemoth’s colonel. It seemed like Colonel Higgins would want to know about this.

Meanwhile, the black car accelerated to the biggest tent, the mess hall. Several tankers stopped to watch. Soon enough, the car parked beside the tent and all four doors opened. Five big Militia MPs got out. They wore brown uniforms and carried nine
-millimeter pistols in leather holsters, along with other police gear: mace, tasers, handcuffs and even batons.

The driver stopped a soldier, and muttered a question. The soldier pointed
at the tent. The five headed there, three of them drawing their batons.

The first Jake Higgins knew about this, the tent flap opened and five Detention MPs stepped within. They looked around, spotting him and heading his way.

Jake was an image of his dad, only a lot younger and with thicker, blonder hair. He had handsome features and weighed a solid one eighty. He watched the five military police march toward him. At the moment, he gripped a spoon and had a mouthful of Cheerios, with a half-finished bowl before him on a foldup table.

Although the five surprised him, Jake knew this day was coming
, at least this type of day, though not the exact sequence. He’d learned far too much about the world these last few years. What seemed like a lifetime ago, he’d attended college in California. He didn’t read history like his father, but he knew a few things about the old United States. Men of honor had built it, believing in freedom of expression and natural rights bequeathed by God, not by the state. He had protested against President Sims, went to a Detention Center because of it and learned prisoners did best there when they kept their mouth shut and did as they were told. His dad went to bat for him, and the Detention people finally allowed Jake to volunteer for a Militia battalion. He fought in Texas and watched just about everyone in his unit die. Along with seven other survivors, he escaped from the Amarillo Pocket where Chinese armor butchered American formations.

Alone, he reached Colorado
and turned himself in. There, Detention Center people accused him of desertion. By some hard talking, he managed to join a new Militia unit in Denver. There, he survived the terrible siege, only to soon find himself in a Militia penal battalion in New York. That had been bad.

“Jake Higgins?” the MP driver asked.

The other four fanned out. The ones with batons glared at him.

Jake swallowed his Cheerios and
set the spoon on the table. His dad had told him about General Williamson. Usually, Jake wore a gun, but not today. He’d gotten up late and hurried here before they closed down breakfast.

“We know you’re Jake Higgins,” the MP said.

“I’m not in a Detention Center cell just yet,” Jake said. “If you start swinging at me, others are going to jump in and help me kick the crap out of you.”

“Are you resisting arrest?” the MP asked.

Jake drew a lungful of air. A rule of life was never to let criminals take you to a secondary scene of a crime. Fight where the criminals first appeared in public to accost you. If you allowed the criminals to take you to a quiet spot and tie you up, they could do anything to you and you would be screwed. After his penal battalion days, Jake viewed Detention Center people as flat-out thugs.

If this is my last fight, let’s make it a good one.

Jake pushed away from the table so his chair went flying.

One of the MPs drew
a nine millimeter, aiming at his stomach.

“If you fire, you’re dead
,” a man said who stood behind the military police.

The five MPs glanced back
to see who’d spoken.

A hard-breathing colonel
stood inside the tent, with an assault rifle aimed at them. Behind Stan Higgins, hulking tankers filed into the tent. They looked determined.

“We’re here under Presidential authority,” the driver said. “You have no right to aim that weapon at us.”

“Your lawyer can explain that at my court martial,” Stan said. “You won’t be there, though, but in a pine box six feet underground.”

“Are you threatening us, Colonel?”
the MP asked.

Stan Higgins
pointed the assault rifle at the ground and let bullets rip near their feet. The sound was shockingly loud within the tent.

One MP dropped his baton and jumped back, although the others held their spots.
They were tough men.

“I’m not going to tell you to leave again,” Stan
told them.

“
I don’t think so,” the driver said. “We’re under—”

Stan’s features hardened, and he aimed the assault rifle at the driver
’s face.

“Dad, wait
!” Jake shouted. He went wide around the MPs, and he took an assault rifle from one of the tankers. Cocking it, he aimed the weapon at the five. “I don’t want you to do down, sir. If anyone’s going to kill them, it will be me.”

The driver paled as he stared at
the gun barrel pointing at him and then peered into Jake’s eyes.

“You and me,” the driver said.
He paused, and it seemed as if he used his tongue to swab the inside of his mouth—maybe it lacked enough moisture. Finally, he added, “Someday, we’re going to go around and around.”

“Sure, big talk,” Jake said. “All you mean is that your buddies will hold me down while you kick me in the face. I know. I’ve been there with your brothers.
” His trigger finger began to squeeze. “So you know what—”

“Jake!” his dad said
. Old man Higgins pulled his son’s arm down. “Let them go.”

It took
Jake several seconds, but at last, he nodded.

The five Detention Center MPs left the tent
and headed for their car. They climbed into the black vehicle, started it up and headed for the dirt road.

Father and son watched them
leave.

“They’re never going to stop,” Jake said. “You know that, right?”