Special to L. Neil Smith’s The Libertarian Enterprise

"He that putteth his trust in me shall possess the land and shall inherit my holy mountain; and shall say, Cast ye up, cast ye up, prepare the way, take up the stumblingblock out of the way of my people."
— Isaiah 57: 13-14

[Continued from Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five]

Three years of not-quite open warfare between the deep state and the American people had taken their toll. The centralised elements of the economy were a mess, and the hoax stream media were constantly showing heads of major corporations lamenting their inability to profit. Pensions and other wealth had been seized to keep the broken system afloat, trying to kick the can down the road. But the road was at the end of a box canyon.

No longer pretending that Americans were free, large scale concentration, indoctrination, work, and death camps had been established on the DelMarVa peninsula, mostly in Delaware, and in the pine barrens of New Jersey, as well as in some locations on the West coast. These camps were controlled by "owners" who had been prominent politicians under the old system.

The rest of the country had moved dramatically toward decentralised systems, a wide array of digital currencies, an enormous number of small companies producing things using rapid prototyping, 3D printing, just in time inventory-less production, and mobile production systems.

In many places a container full of manufacturing equipment would be brought in and hooked to 3-phase power. A few truck loads of parts would arrive. The temporary factory would crank out the desired items for that location, and be relocated faster than the permitting and disapproval process could prevent it. These new methods and the "taxation is theft" and "regulations are slavery" mindset behind the entrepreneurs responsible meant that prosperity was growing rapidly in the uncharted economy. It was growing so rapidly that many who had lost their 401Ks to confiscation found themselves better off despite the losses.

Those facts drove the political and confiscatory class to the brink of insanity, and such people only have a limited toolbox. Wherever coercion and violence fails to produce the results they desire, they always apply more coercion and more violence. In the current situation, the propaganda machines posing as the hoax stream media giants were excusing all the open slave camps and violence as necessary and " more in sadness than in anger," while the economies of the large and festering coastal cities continued to disintegrate. Everyone able to move away was doing so.

Bob Nolan had been aware of the capture operations for several years prior to the election mess of 2020. With his connections in different agencies, he had built a network of whistleblowers, surveillance gurus, and systems entry experts who were able to alert him whenever a major operation was planned.

The example of Wikileaks and the experiences of Manning, Assange, Snowden, and many others made it clear that trying to publish to the above-ground media was to court torture, captivity, and death. It had grated on his conscience that the tech teams, including himself, building drones, 3D printed firearms, and advanced systems for command, control, space operations, and logistics had taken so long to get everything in place.

Meanwhile, the decentralised networks had built an extensive war college for "war gaming" based on differing sets of assumptions. Some of that software used really great simulation and video gaming techniques to help realise practical understanding of the terrain, people, and systems involved. Dozens of groups were focused on creating results and trading on various dark web sites for assistance in different elements of the work.

Everyone knew that there had to be a breakdown in the formerly dominant, centralised systems before long. Therefore they had been planning for this day under various names. The name which Bob's group chose was "Operation Stumblingblock Removal" and frequently tagged #OSR for short. OSR was envisioned as a simultaneous deployment against the slave camps to free everyone inside as quickly as possible.

The deep state and its minions had learned about the planning, had tried to identify "ring leaders," and had applied their customary model of centralised command and control to a radically decentralised movement, one with many leaders, many groups, extensive cooperation, and limited identity sharing. Where some groups had a philosophy of "no leaders" the decentralisation crowd had a philosophy of "no followers." In an analogy familiar to Quakers, they had made all of the laity into priests. The planned round up of the available "suspects" and especially their family members that had targetted Bob's family was symbolic of the deep state's fear that everything was in place, everyone was ready, and massive counter-strikes were coming.

As self-fulfilling convictions often do, the very actions of the deep state to target and capture key people proved overwhelmingly convincing to those remaining fence-sitters who felt they could use more time, more training, and better gear. The dice were cast, the game was afoot, and all the dogs of war had been let slip. Havoc was the watchword of the day.

The Northeastern Zone

All across the region from Indiana to Maine, Michigan to Tennessee, people were on the move. Squads of riflemen were heading toward Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey by cars, trucks, and aeroplanes. Tracked vehicles of the Kill-dozer class were also being deployed, along with helicopters, jets, drones, and special weapons platforms. The people of America were galvanised into action and would soon be freeing their enslaved brothers and sisters. Ambulances and other transport vehicles were behind the combat teams.

Just after dawn and at considerable risk, several low level approaches were made to the various camps to eliminate the anti-aircraft batteries around them. Guard towers were then destroyed and brightly marked paths through fences and mine fields were provided using systems that first detonated mines and shredded fences, then burst forth with paint bombs in bright fluorescent and glow-in-the-dark colours - paints that would gather sunlight from near dawn and be bright well after nightfall.

A huge number of aid packages with streamers and parachutes were distributed above the camps, including concentrated foods, purified water, tools, weapons, and instructions on where to go as slaves made their way out. All the major bottlenecks, all the stumbling blocks, were around the Philadelphia area. A flotilla of thousands of privately owned vessels had put to sea and into the estuaries all around the region. People who could get to the shore would be able to get away from the slavers.

The boogaloo, the dance to freedom, had begun.

Bob's Story

Bob Nolan put his visor down. His Sunday had included positioning his equipment and systems within 50 miles of the Silver Springs area in case things went wrong during his family's escape. These preparations were well-taken, as things did indeed go very wrong.

Bob had control over seven battle drones, each airborne, and he was back seat in the modified twin-engine Super Cobra. Its pilot was his next door neighbour, Sam Smith. Susan's call for help had come in minutes earlier. His team came in fast and hard. It was 08:27.

None of the people on the ground engaged in looting, rape, murder, and kidnapping deserved a moment's consideration. Even so, Bob was unwilling to make collateral casualties of any victims. The lines of waiting semis, busses, and tow trucks that filled three lanes of traffick were hit with armour piercing rounds in their engine blocks. Bob's drones had incredibly effective targeting software that used arrays of sensors to identify and disable vehicles very rapidly. They fired varietes of 20 mm rounds, some armour piercing, some tracer, some incendiary, some anti-personnel. Bob could select and combine for what he felt would do the best job.

A tow truck speeding away down the clear lane, a car on its tow hook, was stopped with a devastating hit to its engine block. Some shrapnel got through the firewall and the driver slumped over the wheel, injured but still alive. He was a thief participating in a massive looting. His vehicle jack-knifed with its tow, and blocked that lane. With the lead vehicles in the other lanes also disabled, there was no escape for the slavers. Bob, Sam, and Bob's drones began taking out bad guys.

Three sonic booms in quick succession announced the 08:53 arrival of a backup team from New Hampshire. Their fast movers were only slightly later than Bob arriving at the scene, and one of the three took the task of high level reconaissance. That aircraft soon reported a fleeing bus trying to cover the wide gap between the capture area and the traffic coming on through the on ramps several miles away. One careful burst from the plane's cannon smashed the engine and stopped the bus. Quite a lot of shattered glass hit the people inside.

The other two Free State aircraft were providing close air support for all the victims now working to extricate themselves and their vehicles from the melee. Virginia and Kentucky volunteers were parachuting in to provide infantry for the engagement. It was a gratifying response, and Bob was pleased to be able to direct Sam toward the back where his family's SUV had four shiny beacons inside, representing his wife and three children.

Susan's Story

Rather than waiting idly in the traffic jam to be attacked, Susan took the car keys from her teenage daughter and went to the back cargo compartment. She opened that locked case and armed herself. Then she handed each of her children some of the survival gear from the trunk, closed it, and returned to her seat. She had the children unbelt so they could quickly get on the floor of the vehicle. They didn't have long to wait.

As was typical with these highway abductions, the vehicles that had been blocking exit ramps now moved in behind the snarl of stopped traffic. That left each lane filled with flashing red and blue lights, deterring newcomers from behind, and open exit lanes giving those folks a path out. The drivers and their teams now left those vehicles and began surrounding individual cars to get their occupants headed toward the processing at the front of the traffic mess, subdue any resistance, and grab anything for themselves that looked especially valuable.

Susan and the children were about ten sets of cars in from the rear, and seeing the arrival of the rear closing team, Susan told the children to stay calm, get on the floor of the SUV, and she went out her door. Staying low and watching the rear guards approach, she looked for an opportunity.

That opportunity came in the form of a really unhappy redneck in a souped up and heavily modified late model pickup. The truck had extra high suspension, heavy tires, and a finely tuned engine, along with a roof-mounted light bar, front and rear winch systems, very heavy duty after-market bumpers, and a truck bed full of camping and hunting gear. Brandon Moore was also headed for Appalachia, was not happy about the mess he was in, and destiny had left him in the fast lane at the very rear row of cars.

Seeing the approaching rear guard vehicles, Brandon had belted in, chambered rounds in his shotgun and pistol, and awaited his moment. Police SUVs came up and stopped eight feet behind him. There were no shoulders in this area so he was about 18 inches from the concrete K-rail dividing the traffic going the other way from Brandon's lane. Putting the truck in reverse and flooring it, he smashed into the left-most SUV and, as he had wanted, forced it out of position. He worked his gears and damaged his truck bed irreparably, but he pushed his way back until he had created an exit for himself, and started to turn his vehicle.

That's when another rear guard vehicle that had been following up from a more distant exit deliberately slammed into his now-sideways truck at 30 mph. Airbags and harnesses in that police SUV saved the lives of its crew. Meanwhile, the rear guards opened fire on Brandon, who acquitted himself honourably. Firing back, he killed one and wounded four of the eight remaining rear guards.

This drew the fire of the entire rear area group of slavers who were now facing away from Susan. Her opportunity at hand, she came up into a firing crouch, and dispatched all the remaining enemy. Doing so saved Brandon's life. He got out of his truck with his shotgun in hand and blasted the heads of each of the capture team guards, starting with the two who were still sorting themselves out of their airbags from the crash. As his adrenaline rush faded, he sat down heavily.

"Amy, please get up," said Susan to her daughter. "I need you out here. Help me collect the weapons and treat this injured man." Looking up, Susan saw a Super Cobra and seven near-identical drones come in from the West, targetting the front end of the traffic snarl.

[End Part Six, continues in Part Seven]

 

Jim Davidson is an author, entrepreneur, actor, and director. He is the cfo of KanehCN3.com and the vision director of HoustonSpaceSociety.net You can find him on Twitter.com/planetaryjim as well as Pocket.app and Flote.app also as planetaryjim.