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39
A wall of armed, ghostly figures in blue-yellow fatigues, their faces alien and their eyes like round, black windows in their gas masks, stood on either side as the column of LXs roared straight toward the tunnel entrance into the underground garage complex.
Tory felt a mixture of hot anger and cold fear as the LXs rumbled around a corner, and down a ramp.
Devereaux pulled his cigar down and twirled it between his teeth. “Goddammit, why is there no smoking in government vehicles?”
“Sir,” Tory said, “are we getting into a trap here?” Her fear deepened as the empty concrete field of the vast underground garage came into view. The hotel was on emergency power, and the batteries threw islands of aseptic light amid an ocean of darkness. The parked cars had been removed. To the left along the wall was the Tower One elevator door.
Far off against the right wall, Tory saw a vast array of LXs painted in blue and yellow swirls. Armed men ran away toward the rebel LXs as Devereaux’s column screamed down into the garage and took positions. Fifty LXs, Tory figured—500 riflemen. They were well armed. Each LX had at least one top-turret heavy machine gun—but so did the rebels, no doubt.
Dead ahead was a solid concrete wall.
Devereaux told Tory and his NCO aide: “We’ll get Mattoon out.”
Charlie frowned. “How do we get out of here, Sir?” Tory saw what he meant as they rolled forward. Garage walls loomed to their left and ahead. On the right, on the other side of a no man’s land about 300 feet across of oil-spotted concrete under sickly yellow illumination, were rows of blue-and-yellow LXs, and beyond that acres of garage with stacked equipment. The ceiling was an impenetrable mass of steel and concrete twelve feet over their heads. Devereaux’s LXs filed in until the front vehicle nearly touched the wall ahead. Tory heard engines roar behind as the excess vehicles broke rank to form double and triple parallel rows. The soldiers jumped out and took positions behind their vehicles.
“They’re moving a couple of garbage trucks down the ramp behind us!” someone yelled over the mike. “They’re boxing us in!”
Devereaux nodded. “Let’s not waste any time.”
It was a standoff, Tory saw as she clambered out. Hundreds of yellow-and-blue uniformed men took position behind their vehicles. Despite the distance, Tory saw the hostility in their eyes.
Devereaux opened the hatch, jumped out, and relit his cigar. He stayed well in the cover of his LX. From another LX, several men ran at a crouch with weapons and mountaineer equipment. Their faces were painted black, and they wore beanie helmets and goggles over watch caps. “Those boys are some Montana reservists I borrowed, and smoke jumpers to boot,” Rocky said. “They go mountain climbing for fun in their time off.” They stared as the specialists hurried about their tasks. “I never underestimate my opponent,” Devereaux said, “but I know Montclair’s style of leadership. He couldn’t lead three piss ants to a urinal.”
Tory checked the .45 Ciampi had given her. She knew both sides had rifles whose rounds would go through armor, and whiz around like cleavers in a butcher shop slicing people up.
“We take for granted they screwed up the elevators,” Devereaux said, “so we won’t push buttons and wait for the elevator to arrive. We’ll make our own elevator and go up to the tenth floor. Hold your ears, guys!” He stepped aside and bent away. Tory did the same. She saw a commando tape something to the elevator door and withdraw. There was a bone-jarring explosion. Tory felt as though she’d been punched. Her head rattled and she was deaf. The elevator doors had been blown off. A grenade rolled in. Another tremendous explosion, and the elevator was rubble. Another grenade rolled in, dropped two floors, and blasted the elevator engine.
Two LXs now drove in close to shield the operation so the blue and yellow boys couldn’t see what was going on.
Charlie dropped out of a lower hatch on the safe side. “General, it’s General Montclair.” He handed a field phone to Devereaux, and Devereaux spoke his name, then listened. “Yeah, Montclair, what do you think you’re doing? This is all so pathetic. Give up now, and maybe they’ll let you off with life. You might even be paroled before you’re 90.” He listened. “No, that’s wrong. The military is not going over to your side. General Norcross is not on your side. You didn’t know this, pal, but he just had about twenty admirals, generals, and colonel types arrested all throughout the area. It’s over before it begins, pal. Norcross just announced this evening that he will take all measures necessary to put down your rebellion, so why don’t you just quit?” After a moment: “What’s that? Time for your radio speech? Sure, if ya gotta, ya gotta. Meanwhile, I’ll make you a deal. You don’t shoot at us, and we won’t shoot at you. How’s that?” Devereaux’s voice rose and he waved his cigar over his head. “I’ve got tanks, cannon, and jets ready to turn this place into rubble, and I frigging mean it. I am prepared to die here tonight, and I am prepared to kill all of you, and I will get all of us killed, and all of those goddam yuppie lawyers who came here as delegates to this stupid convention, but this will end here tonight on my terms. Do you understand that? No? Stick it up your—” He looked at the phone. “He hung up on me!”
Men with fire axes and hooks pulled out pieces of the elevator carriage, while two men in fire retardant suits sprayed dry chemicals into the shaft. Soldiers laid planks over the gaping hole. The mountaineers stepped onto the planks with their M-16’s tied to their backpacks. They attached lineman pulleys to the thick elevator cable, and winched themselves upward. Electrical cables, attached to the climbers’ belts, trailed out of the shaft to the nearest LX, whose whining engine powered a generator.
Sharpshooters hunkered just outside the shaft and pointed rifles with telescopic sights and laser targeting aids upward. Tory heard tortured whining and grinding sounds. “Those are electrical drills,” Devereaux said. “Our guys are bolting all the doors shut on their way up so Montclair’s duds can’t mess with them from below. The snipers’ll take care of anyone who sticks his nose over the edge from the higher floors.” He spat a brown wad that made an LX tire gleam.
Even as he spoke, the snipers took careful aim with heavy rifles and picked off a few targets. Tory watched, queasily, as two or three lumps of blue and yellow matter sailed by toward the bottom of the shaft. Each body made a sound like cracking knuckles when it hit. “We got it under control, General,” said a sniper wreathed in gunsmoke.
After five minutes of tortured silence, Tory heard a shout. Men carried into the shaft a plywood platform secured by braided steel cables to a pulley device. They attached the pulley to the elevator cable and ran an electrical cord between the pulley and the LX generator. The empty platform rolled efficiently upward and out of sight. Tory marveled as the operation proceeded with flawless timing. Then she heard shouts, and the generator cut off.
ALLISON MIRANDA: The United States is currently undergoing the first military coup attempt in its history. Unknown Army elements have seized control of CON2. The Atlantic Hotel and Convention Center is an armed fortress tonight, with thousands of heavily armed commandos inside. They are reportedly holding all 1,000 delegates hostage in the main meeting hall, but they claim some will be released if they swear allegiance to a new Constitution with some Bible connection that is not clear yet.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Billy Norcross has pledged to support the Bradley administration totally and without regard for domestic politics.At the request of President Bradley, General Norcross has shifted his headquarters to the Situation Room at the White House. Norcross is said to have already ordered the arrests of dozens of dissident military officers who are reportedly unhappy both with the old Constitution and with any potential new Constitution that might arise out of CON2.
There are confirmed reports of fighting, with hundreds of casualties, maybe up to a thousand, and the number rapidly continues to grow, along New Hampshire Avenue between DuPont and Washington Circles, where National Guard and Reserve units are trying to hold the line against renegade units trying to reach the White House.
We ask you to bear with us as we continue sorting out the news. Stories are coming in, so many, from all sides, and the situation is so fluid right now, that we are doing our best to keep up.
There is a confirmed report now that early during this coup attempt, two Neptune SuperMarine amphibious attack helicopters with forty commandos being shot down on their way to the White House by Marine Corps forces loyal to the President, using car-mounted machine guns. Secret Service agents with shotguns also participated. Both helicopters crashed and burned on city streets. Observers said surviving commandos were stopped a block from the White House in bloody hand to hand fighting with lightly armed U.S. Marine embassy and White House personnel, some using knives and entrenching tools. All those commandos are said to have been killed or captured. Loyal casualties were heavy.
We cut now to the White House Press Room, where the President is speaking to the nation at this very moment.
BRADLEY: My friends, when I came here three years ago, I came as an old boy from Mississippi at the call of his party and his country. As you know, I quit the Middle Class Party earlier this year when I realized how radical and dangerous its direction had become. I tried to stop this CON2, but the mood of the country was not in my favor, and opportunists in MCP moved quickly ahead with their plans. Now we have a crisis on our hands, but do not worry. I will lead you out of this crisis and restore order. Democracy is in no danger tonight. Our goal must not be radicalism.—but healing, and that is what this Presidency is all about. The people who like to bash me have called me slow, indecisive, and lacking in principles. Everyone wants something done now, without thought or plan. I shall stay here with this government, in this ancient and glorious house of presidents, and defend the American system of government. We have to remember that democracy is a gift we are entrusted from generation to generation, but democracy, like virtue, has many enemies, and each generation must defend democracy in its own way and its own time, or it cannot not pass those freedoms on.
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