Abbie is staring out into the fields to the west, thinking of his beloved Lorna, when he hears Carissa start speaking to him. Turning around suddenly, "Why uhh, hello there miss," he says, his voice a raspy mumble. Carissa would note that he doesn't carry a local accent - more west coast/neutral, but it carries a slight country drawl nonetheless. "Sorry, I didn't hear you walk up on me. Guess ya done caught me day-dreaming."

Abbie gives Carissa a quick once over, not in a creepy way, but clearly noticing she was kitted up and reassuring himself that she wasn't about to try and steal his friend. Deciding that she looked nice enough and that she was simply offering help, he responds, "Yes, please. And pleased to meet ya. My name's Abernathy, but most jus' call me Abbie." He motions to the horse trailer after offering a handshake to Carissa. "His name is Red, and I'm afraid he's probably angry with me for having him all cooped up in there for so long. I guess now that Nash is inside, it would be okay to take him out for a few to cool down." Abbie walks to the rear of the trailer while slinging his M4 over his shoulder opposite the hunting bow.

Standing by the back of the horse trailer on the left side, Abbie removes a pin and unhooks the double-latch, and swings the wide door open, exposing Red in all his equine glory. He grabs the horse lead off the back of the door and lets Carissa attach it to the halter around Red's head, before slowly leading the mustang out of the trailer himself. When Red reaches the ground, Abbie gives him a couple of pats on the neck in compliment for a job well done.


A view of Red

Still holding the lead rope, Abbie turns back to Carissa (presumably she's told him her own name by now), "Thank ya kindly for the help, Carissa - you seem like you know a good bit about horses." Then, motioning to the gear strapped around Carissa's torso, he continues awkwardly, "So are you with the police here?" It comes out as Abbie's unsubtle attempt at trying to figure out if Carissa is part of the ASDF, the locals, or some other group entirely.

Paddock can't hide her disappointment. She follows Cao's lead, looks to Guillory for the final call.

-

Scott inclines his head toward Lauren.  "Chief, the administration -" the Governor is the heavy subtext - "takes a pretty hard line toward this particular New Orleans demographic.  The captain and I are in agreement for the reasons we've already briefed you on.  Now, what's left of the state health department also recommends mass cremation because of the public health concerns around mass graves, regardless of who's in them."

He shrugs.  "What you do once we pull out of town is up to you, and it sounds like we may need to move on sooner than we'd like.  But we're really not minded to leave any remains or grave sites as rallying points for renewed voodoo bullshit, and if there's any further disorder as a result of that, the instigators can go right on up to Little Rock along with the Sneks.  The surviving Sneks," he emphasizes.

Paddock is clearly crestfallen.

"OK, then," she says, head bowed.

There's an uncomfortable pause, then, "I'd like your team to have a visible presence at the... cremation. I'd feel a whole lot better with an armored car on site. I'll be there too, of course. I represent the law here. Bottom line, the Second Wavers need to see this as a joint, state-local operation. Like I said before, we still got to live together after y'all are gone."

Despite her displeasure, sadness even, Paddock greets the new additions to Sierra warmly.

"These are good folks you're joinin' up with."

-

Lauren tries to keep her expression neutral as she replies to Paddock. Maybe if the Air Force officer had lived here while the insurgents had been carrying out their reign of terror she might have understood where the local woman was coming from. But she hadn’t, and as far as Lauren is concerned they are making absolutely the right decision. And at least they are affording the dead gangsters some semblance of decency. It’s not as though they’re planning to leave the bodies hanging from lampposts as a deterrent. ”Whatever you need, Chief, it’s yours.”

One thing is puzzling the Vietnamese American Captain though. ”I didn’t think we would be having any sort of ceremony per se, though? I presumed we’d just be transport the bodies to somewhere remote and burning them in private, with no audience. ”   

"This was y'all's idea, but yeah, I agree we should move the bodies out of the camp and do the deed somewhere out of the way. The Second Waver's will probably see the smoke, though, so I reckon we'll have observers. And I'm not sure where we're gonna get the fuel to do this right. If we're going to burn these bodies to ashes, we're going to need a big fire that burns real hot and real long. Everything dry's already been used up, and everything else is real green from the rains."

Then there's the dark clouds scudding their way slowly towards the town. It's a bit cooler outside at this time than it was the day before, with a almost pleasant southerly breeze.

-
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:55, Sat 03 Aug 2019.

Carissa shrugs and taps the "Born to Ride" patch on her body armor, then smiles at Abbie's question.  "Bit of a horse girl, you could say."  She scratches Red affectionately on the nose and wishes she had a spare apple for the animal.  Still, she radiates "now we're friends" at the animal.

"As far as police...I'm part of Sierra Team down here.  Well, my dad is Sierra and I'm keeping my eye on him.  So Sierra bonus?" As if that description began to capture what she's doing down here.  She stopped being bonus personnel about the time she shot an escaped prisoner.  Not to mention urban assault and one woman sniper operations.  The cowgirl steps back and gives Red a more close once over with a trained  and unsubtle eye, confirming what she could see from the trailer.  The horse is well cared for.

"And you Abbie?  What brings y'all down here to the land of voodoo and gang-warfare?"

"Thanks mam," Nash replied to Lauren, still standing at ease and not sitting down. He'd figured that a salute indoors in an office was probably safe but he was pleased to note that the Air Force Captain wasn't interested in salutes otherwise. That view of military formality was always good news.

He had nodded in greeting to each of the people he had been introduced to before continuing to answer the questions he'd been asked. "We've actually got some spare ammo we were tasked to bring down to you mam. For food though we weren't issued any as we were told that your team is self supporting via foraging and already has a good number of field rations as a reserve. I hope that's true 'cause I wasn't able to scrounge anything extra at all."

He scratched at his chin before continuing. "Additionally Corporal Clark has a horse with him but he knows how to keep it fed. Hopefully that will be useful."

At Acting Chief Paddock's comment about Sierra being good people, Nash just nodded and smiled in response, inwardly wondering who the Sneks and Second Wavers were and what the connection to New Orleans was. Clearly the Sneks were an issue that Sierra had mostly dealt with already but one which might well reappear.

Lauren’s out of patience with Paddock. ”Chief, maybe you missed it a minute ago but this isn’t just our idea. Mr Guillory just told you that the Arkansas State Health Department recommends cremation. Or maybe you want to have an outbreak here when some of these fuckers try to dig up Madame Chloe because they believe her voodoo bullshit and think she’s not really dead?”

“As for starting a fire, I was right up close to a bonfire last night. The insurgents -“ the word is emphasised. There is no way that the Air Force Captain is referring to them as anything else going forward and anyone in military uniform that she hears refers to them as Sneks, Snek Boys or any variation thereof will soon get the message. ”- didn’t seem to have any problems finding fuel for that.”

The Air Force Captain shakes her head, pushes her chair back, looking over at Scott and Saul as she rises to her feet. She’s obviously pissed. ”I think the disposal of bodies is a civil affairs matter rather than a military one so I’ll leave you two to finalize the details with the Chief. If consensus is to bury them then fine. Military personnel will assist with security but under no circumstances will any of my people be digging graves for insurgents.” And if there’s come back further down the line it’s not on me. "And whatever is decided, any attempts to disrupt it will be met with force, up to and including lethal force if that proves necessary."
This message was last edited by the player at 16:22, Sun 04 Aug 2019.

Paddock can't hide her exhaustion. She shakes her head slowly, frowns. "The last thing I need right now is a lecture, Captain, and I'm too tired to argue with you. We'll figure out a way to get the job done. Now, if y'all will excuse me, I need to get on this."

With that, Paddock exits the briefing room, radio in hand.

-

"You're Sierra?" Abbie interjects before hearing the part about Carissa's father. "Oh, that's good I guess." Abbie responds awkwardly. He seems to be trying to piece together what to say next after learning that this woman is a part the team he's joining, then proceeds, "Yeah, us too. Me n' Nash, that is. Coming down from Little Rock with orders to join up with you guys. Also, to send someone named Anderson back on up the road. That's probably what they're talking about inside right now."

Abbie realizes he's breaking opsec by relaying the message about Anderson to Carissa rather than waiting for things to go through normal channels, but he figures she'll know soon enough in any case, and he likes that she seemed to actually give a shit about Red - most people these days saw the animals as little more than distractions at best, and food at worst.

"So that's what I'm doing down here at least. Well, that and trying to find a friend, but I think she's probably gone by now. Taken out by that nuke down at Shreveport." Abbie then motions to his mount once more. "As for Red, I found him down near there; poor guy was a little sick when I found him wandering near the river, north of town. That's why his name's Red, ya see? Like the river." As he pats Red on the neck a few more times, he speaks to the horse, "Isn't that right, big guy?"

The fatalities resulting from last night's firefight are transported to a barren lot east of the police station, along with a number of spare railroad ties. The Second Wavers on hand to witness the removal of the dead are told only that the bodies are being disposed of immediately for the sake of public health and safety. Proving unacceptable to most, the somewhat disingenuous explanation draws vociferous protests, but, blessedly, the demonstration fails to devolve into a full-blown riot.

A pyre is hastily built in the ersatz cemetery lot east of the police station, topped with the corpses, already ripe, and soaked liberally with methanol. The resulting blaze is fed with green wood and additional splashes of methanol, producing a tower of thick grey smoke redolent of carbonizing flesh. A few brave Second Wavers are soon on scene wailing and hollering as their loved ones are reduced to ashy chunks.

When the Second Wavers catch wind of the ad hoc cremation and scattering of the resulting ashes, the wedge between refugees and locals will be driven even deeper. The bitterness and mutual distrust that already existed between both communities will continue, strengthened rather than diminished, but the townsfolk are now clearly back in the driver's seat.

Leaving the authorities in McGehee to deal with the fallout of the cremation, Sierra turns its focus to the future. The governor's office has requested that the MEMS STAR team visits the site of a POW camp in Jerome, a tiny hamlet about 20 miles south-southwest of McGehee. This visit was already on the team's itinerary, and the background of the camp as included in the team's mission briefings.

The current Jerome Prisoner of War Camp was opened in late 2026, on the site of a WW2-era Japanese-American internment and relocation center (later in the war, the site was converted to a POW camp for fanatical Nazi officers), near the tiny town of Jerome, Arkansas. During that era, landlocked, rural, Jim Crow Arkansas was considered an ideal place to warehouse ethnic undesirables and enemies of the state. Almost 80 years later, when the U.S. DoD was looking at sites to build prisoner of war camps for captured enemy troops during the early years of the Third World War, Jerome's history did not go overlooked.

The current camp was hastily rebuilt on the foundations of the old, just south of the hamlet of Jerome (population 40), to accommodate captured PLA officers. The racial overtones of warehousing hundred of Chinese detainees and their attendant, albeit tenuous, connection to Japanese-American internment during the last world war was little noticed and even less protested by a state civilian population subjected to rationing, the convulsive death of the internet, and the fear of imminent nuclear Armageddon.

At its World War 3 height, the camp housed approximately 800 Chinese POWs, mostly officers, guarded by roughly 50 U.S. Army personnel. Over time, the camp became nearly self-sufficient, with selected prisoners employed as farm laborers assisting the nearby communities (principally, Jerome itself).

As global transportation systems ground to a stuttering halt in late 2027, the flow of of prisoners quickly dried up and the camp's population began an initially slow decline. When the federal government of the United States was riven by schism, the state took over administrating the camp. Initially, the transition was relatively smooth. As time went on, however, tensions between the prisoners and the ASDF guards grew, and a riot reportedly sparked by deteriorating living conditions and escalating detainee abuse resulted in death of at least 8 prisoners (rumors abound, however, that the number of dead was, in actuality, several times the reported figure, most of the dead shot down by the guards). A change in prison commandants came too late, as disease picked up where violence left off. In the six months following the change-over, a one-two punch of typhus and cholera further whittled down the camp’s prisoner population. At last accounting, only about 200 prisoners remained, presided over by about a dozen ASDF volunteers. Many of the prisoners that remained were ill at that time, with multiple deaths occurring on a daily basis. There’s been no word from the camp since the tail end of Hurricane Gary finished pummeling the state.


Your Turn.

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This message was last edited by the GM at 23:08, Sun 11 Aug 2019.

The briefing is taking place in a conference room in McGehee Police Station. A long rectangular table occupies the center of the room, enough chairs around it for the entire Sierra team to seat themselves. As is common with such rooms, one wall is glass, allowing anyone walking past to look in, although a band of white frosting at waist length partially blocks the view. The Cisco phone in the middle of the table is the sort that was more or less standard for such a room before the War, allowing various parties to be conferenced in over speakerphone. Its LCD screen is blank now, a thin film of dust on it, the wires protruding from the back not connected to anything.

It also has a white board and a flip chart. And pens for both. Naturally Lauren had put both to full use. It’s almost as good as being able to give a PowerPoint presentation. Almost. The white board has the name of each vehicle written on it in hand writing that verges on OCD levels of neatness, each one with names under it, representing the revised seating arrangements required by Anderson and Rios’ departure. The flip chart currently has three words at the top Jerome EPW Facility beneath which is a list of bullet points. How many prisoners, how many guards, the estimated population of Jerome.

Lauren is standing next to the flip chart. The last vestiges of voodoo war paint are gone, her hair is pulled back into a regulation bun, she’s got on a clean t shirt, albeit it’s a blue Air Force Falcons one rather than OD or coyote tan. Every now and then her left thumb will move almost instinctively, as though expecting to find a laser pointer.

”Ok.” Lauren coughs to bring the briefing to order. ”First of all, I’d like to welcome Staff Sergeant Carterby -“ she nods towards Nash ”- and Corporal Clark.” It’s Abbie’s turn to get a nod. ”As some of you already know they will be replacing Sergeant Anderson and Lieutenant Rios, who are travelling back to Little Rock tomorrow morning.” It had been agreed that it made more sense to travel with as much daylight as possible. The Air Force Captain doesn’t expand on why they’re going back, doesn’t think it’s her place to do so. They’d all have a chance to speak with Anderson before he left, so she’s leave that to him. For her part, she’d said her goodbyes, made sure he knew that his absence would leave a big gap, that he would be missed. ”Sergeant, Corporal, it’s good to have you with us.”

”Now, our next tasking is to check out the Enemy Prisoner of War facility just south of here, at Jerome, which currently holds approximately two hundred prisoners, mostly Chinese People’s Liberation Army officers. The camp has been out of contact with the outside since the hurricane passed through, so Little Rock have asked us to go take a look.”

She pauses, looks around the room at the faces looking back at her. ”Now as most of you know when we had a similar situation to this in Grady it turned out that the prisoners had taken over. I am not assuming that is the case this time but I do want to make sure we take adequate precautions. Therefore I do not plan to drive straight into Jerome as though nothing had happened. My plan is to head down the 65 in the direction of Lake Village.” She pauses, turns over the flip chart to reveal a crude map hand drawn on the next sheet.

”We’ll stop at the turn off for Jerome - “ a finger stabs at the map, to where, if she had been able to use google maps to put together a PowerPoint, you would turn right off the 65 and onto the 144. ” - where we will stop and put a drone up for an overflight of Jerome.” She looks over at Xandra. ”Mz Murray, you’ve got point for that.” With Anderson headed north, Murray had just been promoted to Chief Drone Pilot. It was a good job that her and Watkins had had some training on operating the drones. ”I want to see what’s happening there, who is in charge, whether it’s the guards or the prisoners. Until we know otherwise, we adopt an appropriate defensive posture. That means helmets and body armor at all times.” She can’t help but look at Guillory for a split second before she continues.

”If the prisoners have broken out we will take appropriate measures to deal with the situation.” Her voice is unchanged, her tone professional, but inside there’s a flicker of excitement at the possibility that she might finally get a chance to emulate her grandfather, former Captain Cao Văn Thanh of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam’s 81st Ranger Group and fight godless Communists.

”Before we leave here I’d like to find out what - if anything - the locals here can tell us about Jerome and the camp. Do they know anyone down there, have they heard any rumors, have they ever seen or heard anything suspicious, that sort of thing.” She turns to Saul Noble. ”Saul, can you take the lead on that please?” It fell under his remote anyway and he might have some goodwill left amongst the locals in McGehee. Unlike her and, maybe, Guillory.

Lauren pauses again, looks around the room. ”Any questions so far?”

Abbie sits up just a little straighter in his chair during the briefing, trying to appear as though he was paying more attention than he realistically was. He was never fond of meetings, and preferred to just have things happen rather than sitting around talking about it. The whiteboard, the flipchart, it all made him chuckle a bit on the inside.

Plans were great and all, but usually things just went haywire the second contact was made. Not that Abbie had a ton of experience or anything, but he'd seen at least a modicum of combat back in Afghan. Still, uptight as she seemed, he'd try and give this Cao lady the benefit of the doubt - maybe she was more competent than some of his old COs.

When asked if there are any questions, Clark raises his hand. "First, thank you ma'am. Glad to be aboard and you all seem very welcoming." He gestures around the room to the other members of Sierra. He then stutters awkwardly for a moment when he continues, "Second, what if uhh....what if we ain't got a helmet? You all have any extras?"

Saul sits, relaxed and against the wall, as Cao gives her briefing.  Carissa sits next to him, alternating between paying attention and picking at the seams in her jeans in an effort to stave off boredom.  It's always been hard for her to sit still.  Looks like she's recovered from the evening before, none the worse for wear.  To be young and able to operate on little sleep.

EPW's are a terminal headache.  You round them up and then what?  Send them to jail?  Send them to the rear?  Eventually you have store them somewhere (see these Chinese folks) and sometimes that just ends up being on the dirt of the good ole' USA.  Nobody could have foreseen that the trip to the Land of the Big PX would end up being one way.

"Two hundred prisoners, even sick, seems to indicate at least some level of cooperation with the locals.  Lot of work for twelve folks if they aren't playing nice.  Recon followed by a slow approach makes sense to me.  And we don't want to join in the illness."  Saul leans forward, the front legs of the chair returning to earth.  "I'm happy to see what I can dig up with the locals when we're done here."  At least he's got a little cred left with Paddock than he can spend. Maybe take the chance to fill her in on some little hints and tricks on dealing with a rising insurgency.

Nash nodded in appreciation of the welcome from Captain Cao and smiled at the other members of the Sierra team that he hadn't met yet. He wasn't a big fan of formal meetings like this but it was a necessary part of a good briefing and the Captain seemed to have the outline of a basic plan. Until they had the information from the drone recon they didn't really have a clue about what they were up against or what the situation dictated so trying to plan further was rather speculative. One step at a time seemed like a good idea.

He glanced at Abbie when his companion mentioned his lack of a helmet. If he had mentioned it previously Nash could have tried to requisition something for him from the supply depot when he had acquired the spare ammo but it was too late now. "Maybe one or other of the two people leaving can pass over their helmet," he offered as a comment to Abbie.

Returning to the plan that Captain Cao was putting together a thought occurred to him. "With about a dozen ASDF troops guarding the POWs they will have had some vehicles. They probably wouldn't have been military vehicles assigned due to shortages so it's unlikely that there is any information on them but it's worth checking. If there was an armored vehicle there originally then it would be good to know that in advance."

Xandra feels, rather than sees, Chevelle twitch slightly at the notice that she's been sidelined for UAV duty.  She leans over and whispers, "Well, if it's a choice between having me fly or having me shoot, I know which is the less dangerous option."

The corner of Scott's mouth twitches at Cao's reminder.  Having made the point with the suit - we're still Americans and Arkansans, dammit, so act like it - he's back in his usual attire of khaki cargo pants and an expedition shirt - today's is a threadbare vintage TAD Overland in a faded blue-grey.  The top of his soft armor and the sweat-wicking undershirt beneath it are just barely visible in the notch of the shirt's collar.  His battle belt is slung over the back of his chair in a compromise between accessibility and comfort, but his plate carrier and long gun don't seem to be present in the conference room.  To say nothing of his helmet.

When Cao pauses for questions, he raises a finger.  "I suspect I know the answer, but do we have access to anyone who speaks Cantonese or Mandarin?  Also," he turns to Carswell, "what are our medical precautions for whatever was last known to be circulating in the camp?"
This message was last edited by the player at 01:36, Wed 21 Aug 2019.

"It's all good," Chevelle replies, trying to reassure Murray, and herself, with a smile. The airman tries to look on the bright side. Maybe Captain Cao is counting on Chevelle's security experience, or, as Murray just intimated, marksmanship, for the upcoming op.

"One of these days, I'll take you to the range, get you some trigger time."

-
This message was lightly edited by the player at 02:58, Wed 21 Aug 2019.

Nash shook his head in answer to Guillory's question about Cantonese or Mandarin speakers.

"I speak Choctaw and some very basic Spanish and Russian but that's it," he commented.

Carswell sits back in his chair, turns in Guillory’s direction and looks thoughtful for a moment before he replies. ”Well, according to the briefing they’ve suffered from both cholera and typhus. You get cholera by drinking water or eating food contaminated with the cholera bacterium. In an epidemic, the source of the contamination is usually the shit of an infected person contaminating water and or food. It spreads quickly in areas where there’s inadequate treatment of sewage and drinking water. The good news its that it is not likely to spread directly from one person to another so casual contact with an infected person isn’t usually a risk.”

“Typhus is a bit trickier because there are different types and the report doesn’t say which type they have so I need to make an educated guess. Therefore I will be handing out disclaimers for you all to sign so your grieving families don’t sue my ass, OK?

It’s probably not scrub typhus. That is usually only found in parts of Southeast Asia. Given we’re dealing with Chinese prisoners I can’t absolutely rule it out but it’s unlikely. Epidemic typhus is also rare. Most likely strain is Murine typhus, which is flea borne and has been reported in the US before. You catch typhus from fleas and lice not direct contact with an infected person. There is a correlation between poor sanitary conditions and typhus.”

“Tee el dee ar, we need to try and keep direct contact with any infected persons - including guards - to a minimum. On the plus side, both are treatable with antibiotics and, in the case of cholera, fluid replacement. On the down side, I am only carrying a limited supply of the necessary drugs. I’m not equipped to deal with an epidemic. So if it turns out that we are dealing with an outbreak, either Saul needs to see if the locals here will help out or you’ll need to get on to Little Rock Mr Guillory. But let’s cross that bridge if we come to it.’

All medical advice brought to you courtesy of the United States Centers for Disease Control

https://www.cdc.gov/cholera/general/index.html

https://www.cdc.gov/typhus/hea...providers/index.html

Lauren tries more or less successfully to hide her surprise that one of the new guys doesn’t have a helmet. Being the Governor’s representatives so to speak she had thought that the Sierra teams had a priority on what they needed, but then again neither of these pair had originally been part of the team. And doubtless there were people in the supply chain looking out for themselves.

None of that solved the problem though. ”I would expect Lieutenant Rios and Sergeant Anderson will probably want to keep their personal gear.” She replies to Carterby. She knew she would if she was taking a road trip back to Little Rock. ”And we don’t have any spares. We’ll check with the locals, see if they can help out.” Which really meant that Saul would check with the locals. She doubts that her or Guillory would get an affirmative response. Her head swivels towards Noble Senior. ”Saul, can you follow up on that as an action point? Maybe they recovered some helmets from the insurgents.” She has brief visions of Clark showing up for duty wearing a football helmet.

Or maybe Mr Guillory can donate his as he never seems to wear it she thinks to herself as she turns to Scott. ”As far as I know no one here speaks Mandarin or Cantonese.” Her eyes flick back to Saul again, her tone almost apologetic. ”Can you ask Paddock if they have any Chinese speakers that would be willing to volunteer for a day’s duty?” Her gaze shifts back to Scott. ”Can we pay someone if they are willing to help us out?” She’s not even sure if she should be offering payment, whether it sets a precedent.

”Anything else?”

"Will do ma'am," Saul says to Cao's requests.  "I want to brief Chief Paddock on some COIN stuff anyway.  Local knowledge, Chinese speakers, and one kevlar or steel pot for the new arrival."  The recap is brief at to the point.

"Looks like I should have made you take Chinese in high school," Saul says quietly to Carissa, who stirs just enough to come off the wall.

"Yeah, that would have worked," she grins.  "Besides, it would have been a lost cause in Arkansas anyway.  And not even you could have foreseen the end of the world."  She guesses at the next part of her dad's words. "You want me to go with you to meet Paddock, right?"

"Yep.  This is gonna be a tough sell.  I don't want you looking tough, just present."  Carissa could serve as a reminder of what Sierra accomplished and just what they'd been willing to put on the line to try and take down the voodoo mafia.  Could work.  Maybe.
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:47, Sun 25 Aug 2019.

In reply to Good Ol' Rae (msg # 370):

Having already met Carissa earlier, Abbie casually introduces himself to the rest of the team after the briefing concludes. The others notice the gaunt Montanan saying each of their names in turn a few times to ensure he remembers them all, but doing it in front of them and out loud gives yet another awkward vibe. The man clearly is lacking in some social graces.

As things start getting underway for the next op, Abbie meets Anderson and Rios right before they head out. He takes the proffered helmet with a genuine measure of gratitude. "Hey, thank ya much. At least you won't be needin' it anymore, hopefully I guess. Go on, go be with your mom. Family needs to come first." Abbie says to Anderson as he shakes his hand, a wistful look in his eyes as he recalls his own forlorn relationship with his parents, and his own absence when his mother had passed. "Sorry we couldn't have gotten to work together," he states to Rios and Anderson before meandering away back to where Red was tied up.

Paddock, increasingly resembling the walking dead, informs Sierra that, to her knowledge, there are no Chinese speakers in McGehee. She'll put out the word, though, see if anyone comes forward before Sierra leaves town. Similarly, there's no joy when it comes to finding body armor in the town for Clark. Anderson, clearly feeling some degree of personal guilt regarding the potential fallout of his unexpected departure, hands over his ballistic helmet to Clark with a half-hearted joke about needing a receipt for the government property. Similarly, not anticipating encountering much trouble on the road back to Little Rock, the airman trades Kabua his M249 PIP SAW for the soldier's M4 carbine (also swapping respective ammo for the weapons).

Paddock says that citizens from Jerome visit McGehee from time to time, most often to visit the monthly swap-meet, where people from McGehee and several outlying hamlets gather to barter goods and services. She says they are neighborly, hardworking folks, who, despite the odd complaint, have largely made the best of a difficult situation (i.e. having a POW camp plopped in their backyard). The last swap meet was held a week or so before the big storm. The next one is scheduled for the next weekend.

Anderson and Rios hurry to depart ahead of the approaching storm. They remove their gear from their respective vehicles and pile it aboard an old Ford Bronco belonging to a McGehee Auxiliary who's volunteered to take the pair as far as Pine Bluff. After a series of slightly awkward goodbyes, Anderson and Rios head north, bound for ASDF HQ with a hastily-written report.

In the middle of the sultry afternoon, the threatened rain finally arrives, falling hard for about a half-an-hour. The funeral pyre, having burned for several hours, is liberally doused, but the rain fails to completely extinguish it. The stink of the smoke is worse after the storm, hanging in the humid post-shower air and seeming to permeate everything. The field cremation continues, but the whole process of rendering the bodies to ash is set back by at least a couple of hours. On the plus side, the brief but heavy rain dispersed the small crowd of Second Wave mourner-protesters, at least temporarily.

Murray and Skillins find a suitable tow hitch on a derelict pickup and transplant it to Bourbon Street, transmogrifying the armored state police SUV point vehicle into an ersatz  equine hauler.

While Sierra preps for the next leg of their southern Arkansas odyssey, Chief Paddock does a little investigating and returns with Millie Bloom, septuagenarian widow and former baptist missionary. As a result of a decade of ministry on Formosa, she speaks fluent Mandarin with, she admits, a bit of an accent. She agrees to accompany Sierra to Jerome to check on the POW camp there. Paddock also provides Sierra with a few names of folks she believes live in Jerome or its environs.

Sierra spends a last night in McGehee, this one much more peaceful than the last. Even with a rotating watch schedule, everyone gets about 8 hours of much needed sleep before a relatively late stand-to at 7am. After breakfast, Paddock and a few other MPD officers see the MEMS STAR convoy off, its fuel tanks topped off with donated methanol.


End of Chapter 3.

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This message was last edited by the GM at 20:31, Sun 08 Sept 2019.