State of Rebellion

night vision goggles from the neck of the bound trooper and turned out the Coleman lantern, taking a position between the window and the bunk bed.

The cabin grew quiet, the hissing from the Coleman lantern dissipating until the only sound in the room was the shallow breathing of Special Agent Nicole Bentley. However labored, it was a comforting sound.

Watching out the window through the night vision goggles, Dan’s thoughts returned to his final moments with Susan as she had died in his arms on the ski slope. His love for Nicole had grown over the previous months, and he found himself in an identical position. Another woman he loved was in danger, and he was virtually helpless to get the medical attention she needed.

He checked his watch. Only three minutes had passed since he had ended his call with General Del Valle. No sign of activity was evident through the window, and he sat silently, contemplating the impending loss of another woman he loved-a woman who had just saved his life.

After several motionless moments, the greenish hue of ambient light captured through the lens of the night vision goggles played tricks with his mind, but the sudden appearance of two humanoid figures was unmistakable. Dan slid the old-fashioned window upward, the cool night air quickly replacing the warmth of the cabin. He watched as a third, then, to his surprise, a fourth figure made its way slowly down the hillside. He nearly dropped his rifle when the cell phone lying on the floor at his feet began to ring. He picked it up, the flashing blue tinted window identifying Shaw as the caller.

“Well, Commander Shaw. Welcome back. I’m sorry we can’t come out to meet you, but the Guard troops are busy setting up a perimeter around the cabin.”

No answer came immediately. “I don’t think so, Rawlings. If you and the lady want to live, come out with your hands up.”

“Sorry. We’re busy at the moment, playing gin rummy with the Command Sergeant Major and the battalion commander, and haven’t time to play war games. Please tell your troopers that we haven’t room for another hand in this game, so they should stop where they are and not come any closer. You carry on without us.” Dan pressed “end” and dropped the phone to the floor, resuming his observation of the moving silhouettes on the hillside, two of whom were closing slowly toward the cabin. Dan took careful aim and fired a single warning shot, watching as the two advancing figures quickly took cover behind available trees.

A quick fusillade of shots was loosed from the hillside, most hitting the outside walls of the cabin, and one breaking the glass of the upper window. Dan fired once with a more careful aim and caught a glimpse of a green human form rolling over in the brush. Glancing at his watch, he picked up the flare gun and a cartridge Nicole had placed inside her jacket, inserting the cartridge and aiming the flare gun out the window. He closed his eyes beneath the night vision goggles and fired the flare, the arc moving quickly into the night sky and bursting into a bright, slowly descending light.

A second round of shots impacted the cabin, and Dan returned fire, putting several three-round bursts into the area where he had seen the muzzle flashes. He heard the scream of someone hit by his fusillade, and the incoming rounds decreased. The silhouettes of two men moving back up the hillside convinced him that his defensive shots were giving Shaw second thoughts. In three minutes, Dan launched another flare and several moments later, heard the unmistakable sound of heavy-caliber automatic weapons coming over the cabin, followed shortly thereafter by the sound of helicopter blades. He picked up the cell phone and called General Del Valle’s number again. The general answered immediately.

“We’ve got your flare in sight, Captain. What’s the ground situation?”

“Sir, the LZ is hot, but I think the enemy is withdrawing. No shots for several minutes.”

“Understood.” Two helicopters flew directly over the cabin, and Dan could hear one hovering behind the building, a spotlight suddenly illuminating the open field to the rear of the cabin.

Ten minutes later, and long before daylight, an unconscious Nicole was carried onboard by two medics, who had stabilized her with an IV drip and pressure bandages. Within moments, the helicopter lifted off and was on its way to Woodland Memorial Hospital, twenty minutes away. Del Valle offered Dan the opportunity to accompany Nicole. His hesitation puzzled the general, but Dan explained the necessity of retrieving the computer disks, which had been the primary purpose for their evening’s excursion and for which, Dan knew, Nicole would have maintained priority.

The other two helicopters sat down in quick succession, and a well-armed squad of State Military Reserve troops occupied the cabin and surrounding hillside, joined at first light by the remainder of Company B, 324^th Mechanized Battalion-Colonel Jack Harman’s outfit. As dawn broke, no additional Shasta Brigade troopers were present in the area. On the surrounding hillside, they discovered one dead Shasta Brigade trooper and one wounded man, lying silently beneath a tree, who raised his hands as the SMR troops approached.

Slightly more than an hour later, Dan sat in a waiting area near the operating room at Sacramento General Hospital, where Nicole had been redirected. The decision to extend the flight the extra fifteen minutes to Sacramento was made during the flight on the advice of the surgeon who was available to perform immediate thoracic surgery. During the long wait, while Nicole was in surgery, Dan reflected on the violent events of the previous night.

When Nicole was hurled through the door into the Scout hut, his heart had come up into his throat. At that moment, he didn’t know if she had been abused by the guard or if she was injured. Sitting helplessly bound to the chair, he had been astonished by her strength and agility as she disabled one guard and then, in a thoroughly professional way, responded so decisively in firing her weapon and killing Dahlgren.

The ghastly wound she had sustained sickened him, and while waiting for the helicopters to arrive, he had watched her face, alarmed by how pale she was becoming. He had agonized over her, imagining the pain and trauma she was enduring. Throughout the agonizingly long minutes they had waited for General Del Valle, she was unable to speak, drifting in and out of consciousness.

Nicole was truly a remarkable woman. Over and over again, she continued to amaze him. He wondered if he could have performed as she had, and readily admitted to himself that she had excellent instincts in tough situations. As he sat on the pale green vinyl couch in the waiting area of Sacramento General Hospital, he shook his head and smiled at the thought. She’d proven that on at least two occasions.

The experience they had been through had not only intensified his admiration, but had also served to compound the tender feelings he had for her. In the quiet of the hospital corridor, Dan once again began to fear that he was in danger of losing the second woman he had ever loved. As he sat waiting for her to come out of surgery, he prayed that she would survive, that they might have a life together-that he might have the chance to tell her that he wanted them to have a life together.

It was six hours later and approaching noon before the surgeon walked the long corridor to tell Dan that Nicole was out of immediate danger, but that she would be unconscious for some time yet, and they would have to wait and see regarding the complications that frequently accompanied such wounds.

The computer disks had been retrieved and, following a telephone call to Colonel Connor, had been entrusted to General Del Valle. Now, sitting by Nicole’s bedside, Dan rested his head on the bed and was in a twilight sleep when a nurse came in to inform him of a phone call. He walked to the nurse’s station in the center of the corridor.

“This is Dan Rawlings.”

“Dan, it’s Pug Connor. How’s she doing?”

“Out of surgery, Colonel, but still unconscious. The doctor thinks she’s going to be all right, but it’s really too early to tell. The bullet punctured her lung.”

“Dan, I know it’s asking a lot, and that you’d like to stay with Nicole, but I’m obliged to ask you to leave her side. I’ve laid on a military fighter at McClellan, which will have you here in a little over three hours. General Del Valle has sent the data from the disks via modem, and preliminary review suggests a wide-ranging election conspiracy. We need to review that information before our appointment in the morning.”

“Appointment, Colonel?”

“That’s right, Dan. I’ve relayed the preliminary information to President Eastman and Vice President Prescott. The president would like to speak to both of us as soon as possible.”

“Colonel, what can I possibly add to your presentation?”

“The president is a forceful man, as I’ve discovered over the years. He likes to deal directly with those