Posted on 02/26/2002 12:59:26 PM PST by Travis McGee
Fifteen year old Danny Edmonds was at his desk hunched over his computer keyboard clicking and typing furiously when his father came into his bedroom.
"Danny, do you know what time it is?"
"Uh, hi Dad, let's see, zero one hundred hours."
"Affirmative. Time for lights out son."
"But Dad, it's Saturday night!"
"So what's the war tonight?"
"Stalingrad."
"Which side are you?"
"I'm Russian this time."
"So what time zone is Field Marshal Von Paulus in? Maybe it's not one am in his bunker."
"Actually, his bio claims he's an Army major at Fort Campbell, so it would be midnight his time. And I'm kicking his butt clear back to the Ukraine."
"One more hour then, until two am, that's it. Tell the Field Marshal that General Zhukov's father ordered him to go to bed by then."
"Oh Dad, give me a break, he doesn't know I'm a kid." Danny's voice cracked, half way between boyhood and manliness.
"So you're whipping an active duty Army major in tactics?"
"Strategy Dad, strategy. It's corps level warfare."
"Right. Pardon me. And you still want to enlist in the Marines in three years?"
"Two Dad, two years."
"You know I won't sign for you at seventeen. Three years and you'll be on your own, free to make your own mistakes."
"Dad, I'll still be an officer, but a mustang officer! The greatest Marine officers are mustangs, prior enlisted."
It was an ongoing contest of wills between them. Burgess Edmonds could get Danny an appointment to Annapolis or West Point with one or two phone calls, but at fifteen Danny was determined to enlist in the Marines "ASAP" and get into the action as a "mud Marine" in the war.
Danny's room told the story. Where other fifteen year old boys had posters on their walls of rock groups and basketball stars, Danny had seemingly every Marine recruiting poster ever made. He had a camouflage poncho liner for a bed spread, he wore Marine combat boots to school to toughen his feet, and sitting at his desk he was wearing bright red USMC sweats, with the gold "globe and anchor" on the front and the Marine mascot bulldog on the back.
Danny was only fifteen, and Burgess had no complaints about him, not really. Danny was carrying a 3.9 GPA at Saint Paul's while lettering in wrestling and lacrosse and would have his choice of colleges, his father just hoped that his son would come around and see the benefits of accepting an appointment to a service academy after high school instead of enlisting. Danny was afraid the war would be over before he could get into it if he waited four more years: Burgess Edmonds did not share that belief, or any eagerness for his only son to experience combat. Anyway, he knew better than to push the issue. Danny and 21 year old Valerie were his "second family", and this time he was not going to blow it like he had the first time around. Maybe he'd mellowed, or maybe he'd just learned not to push them too hard.
"Okay Danny, whenever and however you do get your commission, you'll be the greatest officer the Marines ever had. Two am, all right bud?"
"All right Dad."
Burgess Edmonds turned to the hallway before Danny could see the tears welling up in his eyes. Then he slipped down the hall to Valerie's room, Valerie who was spending the weekend down from college, his little girl Valerie who had so quickly become a grown woman. Her door was slightly open, so he looked in and watched her sleeping under her quilted comforter, her golden hair spilled across her face and pillow. Where had his little girl gone, the little girl he had tucked in among teddie bears what seemed like only last week?
He went back downstairs. His wife Glennis, his second wife, was already long asleep in their bedroom at the other end of the second floor hallway from the kids' rooms.
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George Hummel was in the shotgun seat of the lead vehicle in the "Special Training Unit" raiding convoy, a black Chevy Suburban SUV with black tinted windows. It was parked on the shoulder of a dead end county service road under a covering of oak trees a mile from the Edmonds' driveway. Next to him in the driver's seat was STU "Gold Team" leader Tim Jaeger, the ex SEAL officer. Behind them in the back of the truck six more STU team members were sitting on the carpeted cargo deck: the seats had been removed for the operation to give them more room and allow faster exiting. Nearly all of them had prior service overseas with military specops units: the stripped out Suburban was just a "low flying helo" taking them to their latest battle zone as far as they were concerned. They were all wearing black tactical gear, with black kevlar helmets, black balaclava face masks, black gloves, black boots, even black Heckler and Koch MP-5 submachineguns.
Three more black Chevy Suburbans were lined up behind them. Tonight the STU Gold Team was the lead element and was taking down the house, the Blue Team was providing the snipers, the recon team, and the perimeter security. STU team on-site commander Bob Beaufort in the trailing Suburban was not masked or helmeted and was remaining at the bottom of the driveway, he would "badge" any local law enforcement which might arrive unexpectedly with his fake FBI credentials. Nothing on the STU team tonight would connect them with the BATF. This was the first time in his long career that Beaufort had carried FBI creds, the irony was delicious after years of being the subject of FBI jokes and put downs.
They all sat silent as death, watching the subdued lighting of the various screens in the front between the leaders, straining to hear their radio earphones which were turned down to a barely audible hiss. The snipers and the recon team had gone out hours before the raiding party had arrived at the forward staging area, dropped off by the STU's phoney "VEPCO" Virginia electric power van, which was now hidden nearby serving as a commo relay and electronic support unit. The "VEPCO" van was already monitoring the house's telephones and electrical usage, and would cut the phones and the ADT alarm system off just before the raid. Unknown to the Edmonds, two of their cell phones were now remotely turned on, providing the STU with audio listening devices paid for and placed in position by the Edmonds themselves.
The two man sniper teams and the recon team carried advanced 3rd generation night vision rifle scopes, thermal imagers, electronic "big ears", and "field detectors". If the Edmonds had infrared or microwave or other alarm systems on their property, then recon team "Romeo" would find and neutralize them before the raiding convoy arrived. The sniper teams with their night scopes and thermal imagers were in position to cover the flanks of the Edmonds 100 acre property, as well as the rear of the house towards the bluffs and the river.
The radio crackled in Hummel's ear, all thirty STU team men heard the report at the same time. "Gold leader, Romeo, all clear, condition zebra zebra, hush puppy."
Zebra zebra was a STU brevity code slang for "z's", meaning a sleeping house. The BATF and other federal law enforcement special response teams preferred to raid in the early hours when people were most deeply asleep. This was safest for everyone, providing the maximum shock for their "speed, surprise, and violence of action". This caused people to quit before they even had the first idea of resisting.
"Hush puppy" meant that the recon team had taken care of the Edmonds' dogs with sound suppressed weapons....
Gold Team leader Jaeger then checked his sniper teams, code named "Daniel Boone" and "Davy Crockett".
"Delta Bravo, Gold leader, sitrep."
"Gold leader, Delta Bravo ready."
"Gold leader, Delta Charlie ready."
"Gold Two ready?"
"Ready" came from the Suburban behind Hummel and Jaeger. Blue Leader and Blue Two reported in immediately after that.
Gold Leader Tim Jaeger flipped his helmet mounted night vision goggles down over his eyes. All four vehicles' engines were turned on. Jaeger hit the gas and all four blacked out vehicles ran up the service road to the county road in tight formation, fast but silent with their oversized custom mufflers. They'd all studied aerial photos of the Edmonds estate taken earlier that day from the newly acquired STU helicopter, they knew exactly where the snipers and the recon team were, they knew exactly where to park and jump out, they knew the locations of the doors and windows and who was assigned to each.
It was 2:45 am, and the STU team was conducting its first "real world" operation. They were primed, cocked, and coursing with adrenaline and testosterone. Payback for the Baltimore Massacre, and the Reston Virginia ambush of the FBI team, and the assassination of Senator Rodman and Sanderson was starting in one minute. They had all been briefed that Burgess Edmonds was the leader and financial kingpin of a shadowy right wing terrorist organization loosely hidden behind the cover of a rural hunting club in southeastern Virginia, an organization responsible for the past weeks' acts of domestic terrorism. And they all believed it: all except for Hummel in the lead Suburban, and Wally Malone, the founder of the Special Training Unit of the BATF, who was up overhead in the helicopter.
For a great excerpt from what is going to be a fantastic book!
600 new firearms laws enforcement special agents is not enough.
Why?
What these extra BATF agents are doing is compiling a virtual national gun registration list from numerous data bases, including paper files, and helping local PDs to go back in history sifting out ancient misdemeanors etc. These are man hours intensive, but safe and easy cases to make.
Why are they so hell bent on disarming as many of us as possible? I wonder....
I don't know anything about writing, but my Dad read Louis L'Amour and told me that L'Amour must have kept a bottle of 'typwriter lube' real handy -- Dad said that in one story a stampeding herd of cattle started up the hill and by the time the got to the top, they had turned into a herd of horses!
Can't read L'Amour for some reason, or Clancy for that matter -- No problem reading yours, though...
You know what a .45 is, I don't need to put John Browning's biography into the plot.
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