Tour de Force 2009

J S Galvin

Description

In a small country in Europe, terrorists try to get an ISIS-type foothold. They capture an old castle and ruin a Saturday night date for the duchess CC. She is about to turn twenty-one and is in no mood for party crashers. With the help of some special friends, she gets even.

Sujets

• Historical Fiction
• Ghost Stories
• Science Fiction
• Terrorism
• Histoires de fantômes
• European
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Xlibris US
• Date de parution: 29 juin 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781543435412
• Langue: English

Extrait

Tour de Force 2009
Part of the Montefloran Chronicle Series
 
Monte Floran Chronicles
 
 
 
 
A NOVE L BY
J S GALVIN
 
Copyright © 2023 by J S Galvin.
 
Library of Congress Control Number:
2017910712
ISBN:
Hardcover
978-1-5434-3540-5
 
Softcover
978-1-5434-3539-9
 
eBook
978-1-5434-3541-2
 
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.
 
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
 
Rev. date: 06/29/2023
 
 
Xlibris
844-714-8691
www.Xlibris.com
762977
Contents
7:40 pm on the evening of Saturday June 27 th , 2009
June 27 th , 2009 10 pm Saturday, day one
5 pm Saturday, June 27 th , 2009
The next morning, June 28 th , 2009 Sunday
June 29 th , 2009 Monday, day three
June 30 th , 2009 Tuesday, day four
July 1 st , 2009 Wednesday, day five
July 2ndt, 2009 Thursday sixth day
July 3 rd , 2009 Friday, day seven
July 4 th , 2009 Saturday day eight
July 5 th , 2009 Sunday day nine
July 6 t h , 2009 Monday day ten
July 7 th , 2009 Tuesday
July 8 th , 2009 Wednesday day twelve
July 9 th , 2009 Thursday
July 10 th , 2009 Friday day fourteen
July 11 th , 2009 Saturday day fifteen
July 12 th , 2009 Sunday day sixteen
July 13 th 2009 Monday day seventeen
July 14 th , 2009 Tuesday day eighteen
July 15 th , 2009 Wednesday
Epilogue
7:40 pm on the evening of Saturday June 27 th , 2009
Robert open the bedchamber door. Inside he found the girl laying across the bed, eating some fruit. She had nothing on but a smile, and what a smile it was! To his right Michael was coming out of the water closet, adjusting his robe. Michael looked up, surprised to see anyone at the door.
“Get dressed, we have a problem!” said Robert. “That formal?” said Michael.
“That kind of a problem!”
Michael thought about some witty response, but Robert was way too serious to joke with this evening. He quickly got dressed and left the still languishing girl on the bed.
“Angelique, I will be back as soon as I can.” said Michael. “Uuh, huh!” She was still eating!
As they were leaving the room, both the 25-year-old Michael, and the 30-year-old Robert looked back at the 23-year-old girl, and paused. Then Robert closed the door or they would never have gotten out of there.
Down the short corridor to the chalet office where the rest of the men were waiting for the meeting to commence, Robert opened the door, and the two of them entered a crowded room. Michael moved over to get into his traditional seat behind the desk. Robert took his traditional place, directly in from of the desk. The rest of the men were standing in the room.
“Relax everybody!” The men seated themselves around the room.
Robert started the briefing, “About three hours ago, terrorists attacked and captured the Castle. Of the thirty men that were stationed there, we know that ten have been killed. We are assuming that all thirty are, or will be killed shortly. The attacking group has made no claim of responsibility for the acts, but we believe that will come soon. From observers, we now know that a set of four buses were used to bring in some hundred odd, men. Following it was a panel truck, and then a media van with a generator trailer. They left the buses outside the gate, they couldn’t get in, but the other two vehicles managed to make it inside.”
“They came prepared! How . . .” said Michael.
“The dead men were thrown over the parapets in pieces!” “Right! What . . .”
“Heads and then the rest.”
Michael looked away from Robert for a moment, shook his head, coughed, shook a bit more, then rejoined the discussion with Robert. There was a lot of shuffling in the room, as some of the others, were just as disturbed by this news as Michael was.
“What do you need from me?”
Robert continued, “We will need your signature on several documents, that will start our response to this event. The first, is the initiator of the 2002 terrorist response plan “C”, for Castle.” Robert shoved a document across the desk, that was handed to him by one of the military men in the room. Michael thought it was O’Hara of the engineers, but it could have been one of the others. Michael looked for the title on it, found it, confirmed that it was the plan “C”. He then looked for the end of the document and the signature section, found it and signed it: Michael, Duke of Monteflora CCIX.
Robert continued, “The next document is the authorization for martial law through out the City of Florianburg, and though out the country!”
“We do not know yet, how many targets they have in mind, do we?” asked Michael.
“No we don’t!”
“Then I will sign this, but I want it as temporary as possible. We have a lot of people coming and going this season. If we can scope this down quickly, do it!” He signed the document!
Robert continued, “This next one is to mobilize the active military and class A reserves, bringing up the regiment to full strength, and then deploying it!” Michael signed that one without comment.
“This next one authorizes the police to search and seize any one, or thing, they suspect may be a harm to this country!” He pushed the document across the desk. Michael just looked at it. He then looked up at Robert.
“Police state! Overnight? I don’t like this at all! We have thousands of tourists, visitors and refugees in this country right now. How do you expect to keep them quiet as you search them all?”
“I agree, this is Draconian, but it may be necessary! If we do not have this power granted by you to us, then we will not be able to justify our actions later. If we do have this power, we can use it sparingly and be fully justified in the end.”
“The old “ends justify the means” argument!” said Michael.
“Yes!” And he just stood there! For a long moment Michael hovered over the document, undecided, but then signed it.
“Sparingly . . . sparingly, but effectively! Try not to start a race war or an international incident with this!”
Robert continued, “This next document authorizes us to cut the power to the Castle. With out it the Electric Company will not do it!”
“Don’t I own a good chunk of the Electric Company?” asked Michael.
“Yes, you do, but they still want your direct assent to cutting power to one of your buildings!”
“Ok! They have a point!” He signed the document!
It was now near 8 pm, and an aide to the Duke opened the office door.
“They are broadcasting on one of the Spanish channels.” The aide went over and turned on the television set and got the right channel. Up came a scene from other Al Queda productions, a blank room with the terrorist flag as a backdrop, a masked man kneeling with a rifle, and a prisoner reading the proclamation in the local language, in this case English. The room sat still, as the aide got the sound up and running.
“. . . . we are calling for Jihad, against the western world! Rise up Muslims in Monteflora! Take your righteous place as the rulers of this country! Allah Akbar!”
“They started by announcing that they are the Redeemers of the Almoravids!” said the aide.
“That is the Al Queda flag on that wall.” said O’Hara. “Now we know who they are!” said General Ortiz. “Al Queda is typically well prepared!” said O’Hara. “That makes this all easier!” said Ortiz.
“How so?” asked Michael.
“Typically Al Queda will strike at major structures only! We have so few, that I can say we can cover them, and seal off the Castle with the Active Regiment.” said Ortiz.
“This is going to take some time! General Ortiz can you keep the regiment in the field for a month or so?” asked Robert.
“As long as you want it! Politically, it may be a problem the longer this goes on!” said Ortiz.
“That’s a given.” said Robert.
“Alright! Sweep the country for loose Al Queda, secure everything and seal off the terrorists! Anything else Robert?” asked Michael.
“The inevitable media tsunami, your Highness!” “You enjoyed that didn’t you?” said Michael.
“As always, your servant!” said Robert.
“It’s 8 pm ish, can you have a press release available for the 11 pm news?” “Yes! We had started one, but now it will have to be revised.”
“They are broadcasting, should we let them? asked O’Hara. “Everybody?” asked Robert.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs Gough. “Yes, let them spout forth for a while. We may learn more from them than we could in any other way!”
Brig Gen Ortiz said, “I agree! We are in the dark here now! I could use some information on them, and since they typically can’t keep their mouths shut, then I can learn from them too!”
Robert asked, “All agree?”
The room grunted it’s approval.
“Then we let them broadcast until it is no longer tactically useful!” said General Ortiz.
“Do a document on that one too, Robert! It is a sound idea. Now as for us, how and w