The Calm...

(Source)

"Damn it!" One of the paramedics swore, he had checked Will's pulse, there wasn't one.

Frank sighed, then walked over and looked down at the body, Will Hopkins had been a good kid growing up, hard worker, smart. Smart enough to get a scholarship to go off to college, where, like many kids, he fell in with the wrong crowd. Drugs, alcohol, he was into anything and everything except studying.

After flunking out of college he tried to enlist in the Army, he popped positive on the drug test. It was a time of zero tolerance, so the Army turned him away. He came home, got into dealing drugs and had been in and out of trouble ever since.

"Hey Sheriff?"

Frank turned around, it was Becky Collins, a local kid, grew up not far from where he had been raised on the other side of the county. "Hi Becky, did you see what happened?"

"The soldiers started it. Will was being Will and..."

"He was loud, telling stories..."

"Yeah, he was being an asshole. He was blocking a big section of the bar and one of the soldiers wanted something, so he shoved Will out of the way. Honestly though, the soldier had tried to get him to move, I guess he just got frustrated."

"So after the soldier shoved Will, what happened?"

"Will threw a punch, which the soldier managed to dodge. Then Will smashed a bottle and went after the kid, one of the other soldiers pulled a knife out and stabbed Will in the side. No warning, he just stabbed him." Tears were running down Becky's face at this point.

Frank said, "You want a ride somewhere Becky?"

"That's okay Sheriff, my apartment is right behind the bar. I think I'll go home now."

As he finished writing the pertinent details down in his notebook, Deputy Holder rolled up in his county-issued SUV. Frank tucked his notebook away and walked over to his Deputy, fortunately Holder was one of the guys he had appointed, before the troubles.

"Tom, rotten evening to be out."

"Yup, I got the message just as I was getting home. Figured you might want some back-up, so here I am. What we got?"

"Homicide, sort of. That's Will Hopkins over there on the ground. Stabbed by a soldier after a brief altercation. Will bled out while the paramedics were working on him."

"Sort of a homicide Sheriff? What the heck is a 'sort of' homicide."

"Well, Will was being Will..."

"An asshole..."

"Yeah, that. Soldier wanted to get up to the bar, apparently he asked Will nice a couple of times to move, Will didn't move. So the soldier moved him. Will got pissed, took a swing, missed, then went all broken bottle on the guy. Before Will could do anything else, one of the other soldiers stabbed him."

"Uh Sheriff, I'm not the brightest bulb on the tree, but what soldiers?"

"Apparently they were manning a roadblock out towards Billy and Ida's place, they left a couple of scout cars out there, they actually stopped me as I was coming back from there. I'm guessing the men got bored so their lieutenant decided to take 'em into town for a bit. One thing led to another."

"You gonna file a report with the colonel?"

"Reckon I have to, shit's gonna hit the fan."

"Why don't you head in, I'll take over here. Body to the coroner's office?" Holder asked.

"Yeah, I'll stop by and notify Bob and Linda. Tell 'em their boy's dead."

Holder shook his head, in the morning, three dead soldiers, now one of their own was dead. It wouldn't be long before some of the hotheads decided to take action. He just wasn't sure whose hotheads, the locals or the peacekeepers. He was glad Frank was in charge, not a job he wanted anymore.

Billy had to watch the dirt track leading up to Jack Bishop's cabin, it was muddy in spots from the rain the day before. He still wasn't sure what to tell Jack, after all, it was from Jack that he'd gotten the old German MG 42 they'd used in the ambush. The gun was buried now, in an out of the way spot that only he knew of, just as well, they didn't have much in the way of ammunition for it anyway.

He now regretted listening to some of the others about stopping what they called the "marauders." After all, it was just some bored kids looking for excitement, and food, he remembered the rations he'd received in the Army, gourmet meals compared to the garbage the peacekeepers were issued. Somebody was "saving" money somewhere, no doubt pocketing funds allocated to feed those troops.

But something had to be done. He wished he could get enough people together and go to DC, that's where the real trouble was, he figured. But he wasn't ready to fight the rebuilt U.S. Army. Not the Army he'd been in, the new force were nothing more than glorified riot police. Which explained the peacekeeping force which the goddamned UN had imposed on the U.S., election irregularities my ass, Billy thought.

He slowed down as he came to the turn off for Jack's place, most folks wouldn't give it a second look, more like a trail than a road. A four wheel drive was absolutely essential to get up to Jack's, one with a lot of extra power, the "road" was that bad.

He damn near bounced his chin off the steering wheel as he pulled in, pothole the size of Lake Tahoe he thought to himself. Looking up ahead, he could see Jack's 4x4 parked outside the cabin. Unless he'd gone hunting, Jack was probably home, or at least nearby. As he rolled up and stopped, he could see Jack in the window. So the man was home!

Billy got out of his Jeep and waited, stretching to get the tension out of his body, the drive up wasn't something for a timid man, it took a lot of concentration and sheer muscle power to keep a vehicle on that road. He heard the door close and looked towards the cabin, Jack had two cups of coffee in hand.

"How goes it, Billy? I haven't seen you in a while, last month right?"

"Yup, down in town, you were buying dry goods as I recall."

"Yeah, can't really supply my own flour up here. Meat's no problem, but a man's gotta have bread from time to time, least I do." Jack handed one of the cups over to Billy, who immediately took a sip, he had noticed that it was a lot cooler up here than it was down in the valley.

"So Billy, what's this I hear about foreign soldiers getting killed? I also heard that a local kid got himself killed in Brooktown by a soldier." Jack was watching Billy intently as he asked about the ambush.

"Yeah, the ambush, that was us, that old '42 came in real handy, until it jammed."

"Heh, I warned you about that old ammo."

"Okay, where can I get a stock of 7.92 mm for that gun?" Billy was just kidding of course, there was a severe "ammo shortage" according to the news.

"I gotta bunch of brass, if you want to come up and reload 'em yourself. Me, I'll stick with what I got, 5.56 was good enough for Daddy, it's good enough for me. Let's go inside, it's fixing to rain."

"Now what's this about a local kid getting killed?"

"Sounded to me like a bar fight, Will Hopkins started it, Will died."

"That boy was headed for a bad end." Billy said, shaking his head.

"Yup. But we need to talk about what's next, come on inside."

Billy followed Jack into the cabin, he knew that things were about to turn bad, real bad.

The lieutenant and his men had returned to the roadblock not long after the incident in Brooktown. He knew that he would have much to answer for once the incident was reported to command. He wasn't really worried, his men had been provoked, they were also very aware of the deaths of three men in another company, gunned down on a country road by terrorists. Of course, why they were in a bar some five miles from the road block might raise a few eyebrows. But he wasn't the first officer to cut his men a little slack, he probably wouldn't be the last either.

Still, he had a certain amount of trepidation as he saw the colonel's personal vehicle approaching. He heard someone approach his right side, before he could turn he heard his sergeant speak, "Don't worry Sir, I'll vouch for your actions."

The lieutenant remembered his father's words, "Take care of your sergeants, son, and they will take care of you."

The colonel's vehicle rolled to a stop and the man himself stepped out, followed by his personal security detail. Those men took up positions around their colonel, watching outwards for any threat, real or imagined.

"Lieutenant, good morning. How was your night?"

Snapping to rigid attention the lieutenant reported, "Sir, only one vehicle approached the roadblock during the night, it was the chief of the local constabulary. I took a squad into town, well, the nearest village actually, so that some of the men might have a chance to get out of the cold and perhaps sample the local beer."

The colonel walked up to the lieutenant, he got very close to the lieutenant and said, "And...?"

"We got into a fight with one of the locals, he tried to attack Private DeVries with a broken bottle, Corporal Jensen stabbed the man, he died."

"Corporal Jensen is dead?" The colonel asked facetiously, knowing that in his nervousness the lieutenant had misspoken.

"No Sir, the local man died, Corporal Jensen stabbed him."

"And where is the corporal now?"

"He is under arrest, I have him in the APC¹."

"Under arrest? Surely he was just trying to assist Private DeVries."

"But he stabbed the man from behind, I felt that Private DeVries could have adequately defended himself without Jensen's assistance. So I arrested him, if you feel that was too much, I can release him."

"No, no, you did the right thing Lieutenant. We must take these things seriously, do your men know of yesterday's ambush?"

"Yes Sir, they know that we lost three men to the terrorists."

"Very well. Tell your men to mount up and return to the compound, we'll let the political officer sort out Corporal Jensen's situation. I want you to ride with me, your Sergeant should be able to get the men back to barracks." The colonel glanced at the sergeant who snapped to attention and nodded brusquely.

"Carry on then Sergeant. Shall we Lieutenant?" the colonel said as he gestured to his own vehicle. "I want to get back before it rains again. By the way, he's called a Sheriff."

"Sir, who is?"

"The chief of the local constabulary you referred to, he's the Sheriff, the head law enforcement officer in this area."

"Oh, I see..."

After the colonel's vehicle left, the APC carrying the under arrest Corporal Jensen and the two scout cars followed. The sergeant's driver asked him over the intercom, "Do you think Jensen is in serious trouble?"

"I don't know Kotze, I really don't. I do think that the Americans are getting frisky, how the colonel will deal with that remains to be seen. For now, we follow orders, we do our jobs."

"I want to go home Sergeant, I want to go home."

"So do I lad, so do I."

¹ Armored Personnel Carrier