Directive 51 (47 page)

“You’re asking us to throw away the best story we’ve had yet, Ms. O’Grainne,” Rusty said. “Not to mention that Mr. Nguyen-Peters is absolutely right. If they actually say they’re arresting us on the Acting President’s orders—with Betsi inside here taking notes, so we’ll have their exact words—then we can get that asshole out and a real president in. So what the hell.”

“Uh, what the boss said,” Chris said, grinning.

“All right, then, go on out, and move away from the door quick in case I need to come through fast.”

Rusty went through first, then Chris, and they moved down the front porch to the left, clearing a path for Heather immediately. She rested the door on her hand, ready to fling it open.

“Can we help you?” Rusty asked.

One of the young women stepped forward, nervously brushed her hair away from her face, and began to read from a card. “By order of the Acting President of the United States, this company is to cease publication immediately and all staff present on the premises are to come with us. You are also to turn over all materials, supplies, and equipment to us; you may petition to have them returned when the present emergency—”

“On what charges?” Rusty asked. “And do you have a warrant?”

“We don’t need a warrant, we’re not cops, we’re here from the President,” the taller and more muscular of the two young men said. “And it’s a National Security Emergency. And you’re under arrest.”

“Read your Constitution. You don’t come onto this porch without a warrant, and if you’re going to arrest me, you have to tell me what the charges against me are—”

“Fucking Republican, it’s not
your
fucking Constitution,” the man said, and drew his gun.

Heather burst through the door, crouching into firing position and shouting, “Freeze, Federal police!” in one swift motion.

The young man may have just started and accidentally pulled the trigger; he may have intended to shoot Rusty Parlotta all along; for whatever reason, his gun barked, and Heather shot his head—
practically textbook combat handgun,
she thought, as she bellowed, “Throw down your weapons! I am a Federal agent, and you are all under arrest
now.
Throw down your weapons!”

Stunned, bewildered, the two young women and the surviving young man dropped their guns; Heather ran forward, bellowing, “Lie down, lie down on your faces, hands behind your backs,” and was putting the ties on the second one as she recited, “You have the right to remain silent . . .”

It was only as she tied the third one that she realized someone else had been shouting, and she turned to see Chris bending over Rusty, cradling her in his arms in a sort of
Pieta
as he tried to hold her so that she could breathe. Beside Chris, ineffectually, a man tried to stop the still-flowing, bubbling chest wound. Heather rushed to join them, but even as she did, the blood flow from the gushing wound diminished, and the dim recognition left Rusty Parlotta’s eyes; they kept trying to revive her while a runner fetched a doctor, but they all knew she was dead long before it was official.

Election day wasn’t anything anyone had expected: It was surprisingly smooth and dull.

In the burned-out areas of Boston, soldiers walked down the street with notebooks and megaphones, asking people to come out and vote. Many of the people who came out were disappointed to find out that it wasn’t about food, or about rides out of the area, or heated shelters. But once they understood what it was about, they almost all wanted to vote. Since the printed ballots had been mostly destroyed, the soldiers hand-copied the correct spellings of the names and parties from the blackboard at headquarters, then each carried a clipboard with that sheet on it, so that voters would have something to copy correct spellings from.

An hour behind Boston, in Pale Bluff, they all voted right on the dot of six in the morning, in the interest of giving Freddie Pranger the maximum daylight for the trip to Springfield. An old mimeograph had been found, along with a still-sealed package of mimeo sheets. A long-retired schoolteacher had figured out how to make it all work, using a turpentine/ethanol mix for fluid. They had printed up a set of ballots, and everyone promised not to peek; in the same community hall where they had all listened to a radio pulled from a sealed box and switched on just before the debate, 681 adult inhabitants and 104 adult refugees cast their ballots, sitting next to each other, filling them out all at once, careful to keep their eyes on their own ballots.

The township clerk shuffled them in a big cardboard box and started counting. An hour later, a landslide for Will Norcross was announced, and the results for local elections were written up on a whiteboard and recopied onto a sheet of lined notebook paper. While they waited, they’d all had a pancake breakfast.

Then Freddie Pranger, who had been in the Special Forces and was still a good shot, packed the results total in a small bag. He figured he’d make Springfield in three days, and depending on what he found, might be back in a week. He also carried a letter from the mayor of Pale Bluff offering to secure the roads and operate a postal service within ten miles of the town; that offer had been ratified by unanimous voice vote just before Freddie left.

They stood in the street, waving good-bye to Freddie; then people returned to their homes and jobs, with plenty to do, and nothing more about elections for the next two years.

An hour behind Pale Bluff, election day in Antonito was sort of a half-holiday by common consent, with everyone taking either the morning or the afternoon off to vote, and incidentally just to enjoy having time to themselves, or to chat with the neighbors.

Voting was by secret ballot at the town council secretary’s office. She had a big sign out front:

The older lady behind the desk, whose nameplate said she was SUZEE B., wore a gray beehive and glasses that made her look like she had escaped from
The Far Side
. She looked gray and sick, and the empty ashtray beside her probably explained it. The tobacco supply had run out, and many of the local folks were going through withdrawal.

“Here to vote?”

“Uh, yes, and we had a question—”

“Just ask when it comes up. Let’s start with your names.”

When it got down to address, Beth and Jason couldn’t very well use the commune’s old address, not knowing whether any of their old neighbors might someday come this way. Jason said, “Um, we’re refugees and the last we saw of our home—it’s not going to be there if we ever go back.”

Suzee B. looked up, nodding in sympathy, her mouth skewed a little to one side. “That sucks, don’t it?”

“Yeah,” Beth said, and her voice was choking with tears. Jason never knew when that would happen to her; most of the time she insisted on pretending nothing much had happened, but every now and then, some little kindness or attention from anyone—Jason or a stranger, it didn’t seem to matter—would completely undo her.

The lady looked at Beth, glanced at Jason, and said, “Bad getting here?”

“Bad starting out.” That was as honest as seemed safe. “Uh, what we wanted to ask was, we just rented a garage from Dave Wilson, over on Third Street? And could that be our address? So our votes count here where we’re going to make our home, instead of back where we—”

“We don’t never want to see it no more,” Beth said, wiping her eyes.

“Honey, you’re making sense to me, and I’m as much authority as there is. Dave’s at 442 Third Street, there ain’t no 444 or 446, and you’re closer to Dave than you are to the laundrymat at 448. So your garage is now officially 444. Are you a Mister and Missus yet?”

“Not yet,” Jason said, “though the thought has crossed my mind, and we’ve talked about it.”

“We been kinda busy,” Beth volunteered.

“I know how that goes. But look, just now, the whole government record system is me, so while you’re here, want to get married? I’ve got the registry right here.”

It seemed like a good time to do it, so they voted, married, and were put on the list for jury duty. “You could be caught in the draft, too, Jason,” Suzee warned. “There’s some idiots around here talking about the town needing a militia.”

“And there probably won’t be enough paper to make a card for me to burn,” Jason said.

She laughed. “Glad to have two more liberals in town,” she said. “That makes three of us.”

Harrison Castro looked over the assembled population of his Castle, everyone except the sentries who had voted earlier. He drew a deep breath, reminded himself that he had no mike and had to
project
, and began. “We have formed a bond, you and I. I am feeding and housing you; you live by my protection; you have brought your families in here to live, and I am the freeholder of our Castle here. In the last forty-eight hours you have all helped me turn away mobs who would have destroyed everything. By now we all understand—we are in this together. We are engaged in a titanic struggle to make a new civilization. I hope that a fully Constitutional, free, and sovereign America will be part of it, but I know for certain that a strong and free Castle Castro will be, because together, you and I will
make
it be.”

Loud cheers broke the silence; Castro noted that his four selected claques had all hit their cue perfectly, and almost everyone else had followed. He was not particularly displeased that Special Agents Bolton and Carlucci were among the few not cheering wildly; that was their privilege, and owing to their occupation, they were thoughtful men, not easily swayed and very inclined to consider things for a long time. Besides, many things would be easier if the Feds departed sometime before spring; they were handy men with weapons, and good counselors, but next summer would be easier without Federal eyes watching.

“So,” he said, “as the freeholder of Castle Castro, I would prefer that you vote in the following way . . .” He read off his list of intended votes, beginning of course with Norcross for president. “But again, it
is
your ballot. Let me offer you two options: Vote your way, if it disagrees with mine. Keep your ballot secret, if you wish. Place completed ballots in the red box to my left, and I swear upon my loyalty to my country and my family that I will report your votes faithfully and accurately to the California Secretary of State in Sacramento.

“Or, I would take it as a personal favor if you do this: Sign your name to your ballot but do not mark on it otherwise, and place it in the blue box to my right. In other words, acknowledge that because you have freely taken my protection and given your loyalty, you owe me your political allegiance, and you give over your political power to me for my use, just as you give me your bodies to use in fighting to defend Castle Castro and doing the work that must be done to house and feed us all.

“If you choose to give me your unmarked ballot, with your name on it, I will fill out your ballot for you and report it, with the others.
And
I will enter you into a list of people I will give preference to in any appointments or openings that may come up, because loyalty should be rewarded. All right—” He saw Carlucci trying to get his attention; the man might decide to be difficult, so Castro hurried somewhat at the last, spoiling some of the effect.
Damn Carlucci anyway.
“All right, all right then, now everybody
vote
!”

Later, as he sifted through the blue box, he discovered that Carlucci and Bolton had each signed their names, and rather than put an unmarked ballot in for him to mark, they had voted exactly opposite his desires on everything. Carlucci had added, “I do not think you understand what it is to be an American, sir, and I will leave your protection tomorrow, grateful for your help but unwilling to further give you mine.”

Bambi was charmed when, for the uncountable time, Quattro asked, “Do you think setting out the food and all is too much?”

She looked into his eyes and rested a hand on each of his triceps, dragging downward with her fingertips, willing his tense shoulders to descend. “Jenner is a tiny town, and it’s all laid out to be accessible to the road, the beaches, and the hills; nobody would ever have given any thought to defending it, it’s a place meant to
welcome
people. So they know that they depend on you in case of real trouble. You’ve shown them where they’ll bunk, trained their militia and armed it. It’s your canned fruit and tomatoes that’ll bring them through the winter without scurvy. They’ve gratefully accepted all of that; why would they think you were trying to buy their votes with a few sandwiches?”

“Okay. I’ll try to stop worrying. I just hope they’ll like what I could set out. I wish I could throw a real all-you-can-eat, too, you know, ’cause I’m pretty sure a lot of them are going hungry.”

Larry Mensche smiled. “Hey, truth here, Quattro? Relax and let people enjoy what you’ve done.”

“Yeah. People are just so difficult for me.”

“Just think of us as really fallible machines,” Mensche said. “Can I ask one strange question? Should we let Ysabel vote?”

“Well,” Bambi said, “she’s never been convicted of anything, she’s an American citizen, and her one vote isn’t going to change anything.”

Mensche nodded. “That’s what I think. Quattro?”