1

  Ketchum sat in the sheriff’s command office, surrounded by Deltain, undersheriff Chelton, two majors, Davis, and the captain of patrol. Coleman was absent. Ketchum twitched uncomfortably in his chair as a major looked over the report containing his recommendations for the ceremony. The reception had been cold from the beginning, and Ketchum had expected that. None of the command staff wanted an overt display of force, but they would have to be idiots to ignore the necessity of defense at the ceremony.

  “I’m not sure about this,” the major said. “This seems like overkill.”

  “I’ve included our AARs,” said Ketchum. “I think you can see from that just how dangerous these animals are.”

  “I looked at them,” said the major. “But as I recall your team was given two weeks to eliminate this threat and you estimate in this last report that you’ve killed ‘possibly’ sixty percent.”

  “We worked within the time frame we were given. I’ll take responsibility for the failure but I really believe we should push dealing with that until after tomorrow night. This should be our primary concern.”

  “No, lieutenant,” said the other major. “It should have been your primary concern. I’m sorry if you didn’t see it that way, and I’m sorry if that ends up hurting you and your team, but it’s not tomorrow night’s primary concern, not for you or us. You and Alvarez can observe, your team can stand by at the Airbase, but SRT will be in the area, ready to respond, and we’ve already agreed that should be sufficient.”

  “And what if there’s an attack, and the time it takes for TARP to get airborne results in lost lives?” asked Ketchum.

  “As I said, that was your primary concern,” said the major. “And you failed to meet your goals within our parameters. I’m afraid what happens from here on out is your responsibility.”

  “No.”

  Both majors squinted at him, while Deltain raised his eyebrows.

  “What?” the major demanded.

  “No, sir.” Kecthum shook his head. He stood to leave. “I like to think I’m finally taking responsibility for some previous shortcomings in my career and my character, but I won’t be a scapegoat for anyone’s shortsightedness here. Gentlemen, whatever happens tomorrow night is on you.” He walked out before any of them could reply. The doors he passed through on his way out nearly dented the walls he slammed them into. He was livid, but vindicated. There would be no more blood for promotion in Ralph Ketchum’s life. He had no doubt shot his chances of captain to hell, but it didn’t matter. He only had but to hang on for five more years, and then came the pension. When this was all over they would have his badge, and they were welcome to it. Of course, he had to survive tonight for that to happen.

  The Arredondo County shooting range was a two-thousand yard long field surrounded on all sides by berms, and decorated with all variety of steel targets and barricades. A small, covered loading table sat to one side by the parking lot end, and a shed for the target and training supplies met one at the entrance. TARP currently had the range to themselves, and they were set up on their precision rifles, all of them reinforcing their sniping skills on every weapon, from their .308 bolt actions to the massive .50 caliber anti materiel guns.

  Wind whipped across the massive field, funneled in by the surrounding berms and baffling their shots. Ketchum stood by the loading table, waiting until all of them were assembled to speak. “You know, I talked to the county commission this morning,” he said. “I told them I wanted my team set up as snipers at the memorial, with at least two in the helicopter pulling overwatch.”

  “And? What did they say?” Bocker asked.

  “They refused. Said they didn’t want too conspicuous and aggressive protection or something to that effect.”

  “Well if you’re being conspicuous as a sniper you’re doing your job wrong,” said Fisher, the sarcasm palpable.

  “Guys, I tried. I tried to spin it as many ways as I could. I failed. I’m sorry. Maybe I handled it wrong, hell, maybe I handled things wrong five years ago, but whatever happens in five days, it’s not your fault. It’s out of our hands.”

  “Maybe we both handled it wrong the first time,” said Alvarez.

  “It was an unprecedented situation.” Fisher replied. “But if the commission wants to repeat history, they’re welcome to it.”

  “I don’t get it,” said Jebbins, shaking his head.

  “If I walked into a feed store, and bought three thousand pounds of fertilizer two weeks after Oklahoma City and the ATF didn’t ask me a single question, that’s the level of stupidity this would be tantamount to,” said Fisher. “And if a bunch of concerned mothers and old farts are more afraid of us than these four-legged killing machines, well, more power to ‘em. What do you think, Alvarez?”

  Alvarez stared down at the ground. “I tried to shoulder the blame for sixty people’s deaths all these years. And if sixty people die next week, I’m not accepting that guilt. My heart’ll give out if I try to take any more. We can’t affect policy, it’s out of our hands, so don’t worry about it. Worry about what we can kill.”

  The TARP members arrived back in the office without words, they simply set their guns on the office table against the wall and went to the locker to get their cleaning kits. Michetti didn’t need to ask how they were feeling. She hadn’t heard the news yet, but she knew whatever word there was would be bad, and she knew Alvarez would tell her when he felt like it. Despite the distraction, she turned back to her computer, and tried to focus on her work.

  The men sat down, field stripped the guns, and started to clean. The smell of lubricant and gunpowder residue filled the room, and, in its own way, replaced the conversation, or joking insults and banter, that would ordinarily give life to the building. The monotony was broken after several minutes by the buzzing of Alvarez’ phone, which was vibrating violently, shaking the table slightly due to its position in a pocket that sat against one of the table’s metal legs. He cleaned the grease and black powder from his hands with a paper towel and retrieved the phone. To his surprise, he saw that it was Dyson. What did that mad scientist want with him? And especially this late? Alvarez was usually annoyed at best when anyone called. This annoyance caused him to answer as quickly as possible whenever he could, but now he opted to step outside first. A warm breeze hit him as soon as he stepped out the door, and he brought the cellphone close against his ear, and cupped his left hand around it after acknowledging the call. “Dyson,” he answered, with no obvious emotion. “What do you want?”

  “I’ve got something for you.”

  “Oh? What?”

  “Information.”

  “What kind of information?” Alvarez wanted to be right to the point, in case Dyson was going to try and play games, as he himself had done when calling the scientist. While it was a double standard, Alvarez didn’t have the energy to care.

  “Well, I read something in the news about what you’re doing, killing those dogs. I’m guessing that’s what you needed my satellite for.”

  Alvarez started to say something when Dyson resumed. “Anyway, I was reading about these things, and then about what happened in ‘07, and I think we killed one of these dogs.”

  Alvarez stood ramrod straight at that and began walking around the side of the building absentmindedly, staring out at the blooming evening sun without really seeing it. “Where?” he asked. “And when?”

  “Last year, in ah…it was October, this small, Podunk town in Michigan asked us for help. They had a handful of people go missing, and some of the locals reported that it was a canine. The sheriff said his people couldn’t touch it with their guns, but they had heard about us, about the defense company, and said they’d pay for us to come out and kill it. So, I took a couple of my guys out there, and first we tried some automated systems, but it dodged them.”

  “What do you mean, automated?”

  “I’ve got some autonomous, remote systems I’ve been working on. Sentry guns, if you will. Anyway, they tracked this dog, or wolf, whatever, and they shot at it, but it dodged them. I don’t know how. I don’t know much about animals, you know, that’s not my field, but this thing was smart. It was running around in the woods, avoiding everything we sent after it, so eventually, I took two of my people in with a minigun, and we tracked it down, and started to set up the gun, and it tried to attack us, that’s how it was acting, anyway; it ran up and tried to jump us, so we used the gun and killed it. It took a couple of grenades too; we used some fragmentation grenades. It was tough, but like I say, we killed it.”

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  “What happened to the body?” Alvarez was now thoroughly engrossed in this story.

  “There wasn’t much left. I got some hide, that was pretty much all that was intact. I didn’t think much of it at first. It’s not the first animal attack in history, after all. But after I read about you and that tactical group, I thought they might be related.”

  Alvarez considered what to say next. How much should he tell Dyson? “That…that may be related,” he said cautiously. “Thanks for that.”

  “Alvarez, what is going on out there, anyway? I get the feeling this is all something bigger than what that article said, and, to be honest, I don’t think you’re telling me everything. Maybe a lot less than everything.”

  “I wish I could tell you more,” replied Alvarez. “Just pay attention to the news. Some bad shit is about to go down. I don’t think I can stop it.”

  The other end was silent for several long seconds. The wind kicked up again, and Alvarez continued to stare at the prairie, wishing he could be just fly away forever and leave this cursed land. What had happened here to anger God or spirits so fervently? he wondered. How many more would die before it was all resolved?

  “That sucks.” Dyson finally said. “I’m sorry. If I can send anything else-“

  “No. I wish, but they shut me out. The county doesn’t want us anymore.”

  “I’m sorry, Alvarez. Really. Really sorry.”

  “Thanks.” Alvarez actually meant it. Had he and Dyson just had a friendly conversation? It was odd times, he reflected.

  “Be careful,” said Dyson. “And good luck.”

  “Thanks again.” Alvarez hung up and started back to the entrance, when he saw Michetti standing by the door. “So what’s the news?” she asked.

  “Bad.”

  “I knew it would be bad,” she said. “How bad?”

  “The county isn’t playing ball with us. I’ll be out there and so will Ketchum, but undercover. Everyone else is hanging back here. They’ll be in the heavy gear, and have the helicopter, but…” he shrugged. “SRT will be on standby at headquarters, no increased patrol presence. It’s a piss poor response, plain and simple.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry. Yeah, that’s great. Sorry is a great excuse when sixty five people are dead. I heard how sorry the commission was about a hundred times when all that happened, but a dementia patient has a longer memory than those clowns.” He paced back and forth in front of the door for several seconds, faster with each circuit. Suddenly, he kicked the clearing barrel. It shook, but was too heavy to fall. “Fucking hell!” he shouted. “How many bodies will it take to get their heads out of the sand?” He screamed at the sky, as if expecting the answer from God. But he was done with being angry at God, and done with taking guilt and frustration out on himself, or innocent parties. He turned back to Michetti, who knew better than to say anything. “I’m sorry too,” he said, walking up to her. “I can’t be mad at you. It’s not your fault.”

  She embraced him, and he pulled her head against his. “It’s OK,” she told him, only as an attempt at calming the man down. It was clearly not OK at all, and she was beginning to shake from the fear at what was coming. “I want to help,” she said simply.

  “You need to leave,” he replied. “Go to Dallas, to the CBP office. Wait there.”

  “No.” She pushed away and looked him in the eyes. “I need to do something. There aren’t enough people taking this seriously as it is.”

  “You’re not sworn,” he pointed out, which was true, of course. She was an FBI employee, but not an officer or special agent, and not permitted to use a firearm in her job as a result.

  “That doesn’t sound like something you would let get in the way. Not when it’s as as important as this is.”

  “You don’t have any training,” he protested. “These things are going to be cutting through people who actually know their way around a gun, I can’t let you just go out and get killed like that.”

  “Well there has to be something I can do!” she snapped.

  Alvarez sighed, took several steps back, and stroked the almost invisible stubble on his jaw. After a moment of thought he responded. “I’ll talk to Fisher. See about getting you in the helicopter.”

  “I guess that’s something,” she agreed.

  “The helo’s going to be really important in this,” said Alvarez. Besides performing as an observer, he had no idea how she could be an asset, but she was right, they needed everyone who actually cared that they could get. He walked back inside, holding the door open while she followed.

  “What was that noise, Alvarez?” Fisher asked. “Did you two have rough sex out there or something?”

  The group laughed at that, as Alvarez smiled thinly through an increasing amount of pain in his foot. In spite of it, he didn’t think he had done any real damage, and he welcomed the humor in any case.

  “Ray just doesn’t deal well with stupidity.” Michetti offered.

  “Huh? Oh, the county dumbasses,” said Fisher. “Listen, like we said, any blood is on their hands now. Let’s get these guns cleaned and go home. Tomorrow, we’re starting early. I want everything brought out, I want the helo ready; we need to be prepared to lift off in under five minutes.”

  Everyone nodded. Alvarez sat back down and began cleaning his own firearms. Michetti took his Glock and started on it.

  There were momentary groans and stretches among the men. They had maintained their hour of work out a day religiously, and that combined with a full day on the range made for odd aches and tight muscles.

  “Fuck it,” Jebbins finally exclaimed. “Fuck all this.”

  Fisher glanced over. “Huh? Fuck what, Jeb?”

  “We worked our asses off, and this shit with the council is going to get us killed?” demanded Jebbins.

  “Woah,” said Fisher. “I don’t want anyone thinking like that. We don’t train to die, no matter what some wrinkled old farts want out of us. If shit hits the fan tomorrow we’re going in to win. I expect every mag to be dumped if it comes down to it.”

  The heads around the table nodded.

  Fisher reassembled his Glock, function checked it, reloaded, and broke down the cleaning supplies. He stood, feeling his knees creak like old boards as he rose. “It’s been long enough. Let’s come in late tomorrow. Twelve hundred. All our ‘go to war’ gear, except you guys of course,” he nodded to Alvarez and Michetti. “Whatever special shit you’ve got, Alvarez, might want to have it in your truck. I want everything ready to go as soon as we come in. At the first sign of trouble, we’re moving. Do what you’re trained to do and let me worry about higher.”

  The rest, with the exception of Alvarez and Michetti, reassembled their own weapons and stood to leave.

  “Come on, Alvarez,” said Fisher, stopping as the rest walked out. “Don’t stay up all night. You won’t be any good if you run yourself into the ground.”

  We’re just staying long enough to finish with our weapons,” Alvarez assured him. “We need everything in as good a shape as we can get it for tomorrow.”

  Fisher nodded. “All right. You love birds don’t stay up too late.” He walked out the door, and the two listened as the vehicles pulled out of the lot.

  “It’s not too late to leave,” said Alvarez. “I’d still feel better if you did.”

  “Well I’d feel better if we both weren’t here,” she said. “But I also think it’s too late to worry about that. You have your job, and I’m going to stay and help.” She function checked the Glock and handed it to him. He stood, and walked over to her. She stood to meet him, took his hands in hers, and pulled him into an embrace. “I love you, Ray,” she said.

  Around the three counties, quiet preparations were being made at the end of the day. Despite the Commission’s stolid affirmations that nothing out of the ordinary should be expected, and despite his own extreme skepticism that another attack could be coming, Clearborn was ensuring that his SRT was ready.

  Their heavy armor was set out, the APC was fueled, and its minigun fully loaded with six thousand rounds of 7.62 NATO tracers. Rifles, shotguns, and a variety of grenades were being checked out by the team as he watched, standing in the corner of the ACSD weapons locker, his green combat uniform streaked with sweat and dirt from their drills, lost in thought at the potential for a situation he did not want to think about. He was too tired to think about it, and too paranoid at the idea of new terrors. He was also too old for all of that. Retirement was staring him down like a howitzer barrel these days, and he doubted he retained the psychological ability to handle more dead children, for he was old enough to see those eighteen-year-olds as just that.

  Grady needed to promote, he thought. He needed Grady to take the lieutenant’s test and relieve him of this weight. It would not hurt if Fisher did the same. Fisher was an armed hippie who needed to accept that he was both old and no longer in the army. Let him get his bars, go back to patrol, command a night watch, and stop sucking money away from the tactical teams, thought Clearborn.

  And beyond his personal and budgetary reservations about TARP, integration was an issue he had neglected to bring up. He regretted that now, he realized. He regretted it more deeply than he could ever admit to his charges. It formed an icy pit in his stomach, flushing the lingering heat from the range day and the broiling shoot house. They had barely trained on assaults with the aerial team, mainly owing to his own efforts. Now they might very well pay a steep price for that mistake.

  He hated it all now. He hated the soul numbing fatigue of dealing with this place and its morbid undercurrents. It had drained him of livelihood as readily as it had his neighbors. He was tied down though. His family, and his position, and his pride in both would not relent. He had to see his career through. It wouldn’t matter, at any rate, he thought. They would have the damned anniversary, and he would go back to his office like always the day after tomorrow. God help them if it didn’t work out that way. Of course, that was an empty, idle plea. God did not offer help in Arredondo County.