A Manifest Destiny: An Alternative History of the Confederacy by Douglas McDonough

Author:Douglas McDonough [McDonough, Douglas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781623471224
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
Published: 2014-09-09T00:00:00+00:00

Department of State Security, Guard Training Center

He stepped off the train, pausing briefly to survey the bleak, rugged landscape. Forrest sure didn’t pick this spot for esthetics, he thought. The Guard training center sat in a long, narrow valley. On all four sides surrounding mountains formed a snow-capped, craggy barrier. Except for the single rail line that snaked its way through and over the forbidding peaks the valley was almost inaccessible. Other than the training facilities there was little but cactus, sagebrush and an occasional rattlesnake or scorpion.

A few hundred feet from the station were a cluster of sun-baked buildings. As Harry and the rest of the new trainees made their way across the sandy soil a man came out of a building.

Harry stopped as the man approached, saluted, and said, “I’m Centurion Carlos Ramirez, sir, we were told to expect you.”

“Yes, well, I’m here,” responded Harry. “Not much in the way of creature comforts, centurion, are there?”

“Sir, we built it the way Consul Forrest said to,” answered the centurion.

Harry offered a wintry smile while thinking, guess it’ll help us keep our minds on our business. Later that day he officially assumed command and began creating the training envisioned by Forrest. He quickly became immersed in his work and it was not long before his training procedures were being implemented. One morning shortly after dawn, he had just finished dressing when there was a knock on his door.

“Enter.”

A decurion entered, braced rigidly to attention, and said, “As you ordered, sir. All trainees are in formation, full kit, sir.”

“Very well. Stand easy,” responded Harry.

The decurion relaxed and looking about the small, bare quarters noticed a daguerreotype of a lovely woman and two small children on the desk. Nodding toward it he said, “Lovely family, sir.” Harry replied with a noncommittal grunt and a nod, got up and left to join the waiting troopers, the decurion trailing behind. For the next few days he trained with the men.

Along with two deks, he trotted across the hot sandy soil. Drenched in sweat, shoulders rubbed raw and bleeding from the friction of the straps of his rock-filled haversack, Harry doggedly trotted up the rocky incline right behind the next to last trooper. We’ll be some tough sons of bitches when we’re done, he thought, assuming of course, this training doesn’t put us all in the hospital. Panting, his countenance beet red, he drove himself on. When the man in front of him collapsed Harry simply ignored the prostrate form and as per his own doctrine kept running. Only fifteen of the twenty-one men in his group made it back to camp on their own power. Those that didn’t were shipped out the next day.

Since embarking on this grueling physical agenda he’d found that the last of his inner turmoil had dissipated and that he was almost at peace with his inner demons. It was as if the strenuous exercise he was engaging in on a daily basis was burning out the last of his hatred, leaving in its stead only honest patriotism and a desire to protect and defend his country.

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