"Where are these geniuses now?" asked Alderman.
"In the brig, still sobering up," replied Lincoln. "They could hardly walk when we found them on the roof. One was sitting on the tar with the Stinger in his lap, bent over the tube and sound asleep."
"What are you going to do with them?" asked Alderman. He already knew the answer.
"We are going to give them a fair trial and line them up and shoot them," said Lincoln with an odd grin.
"Good man," said Alderman. "We can't be wasting missiles, even old ones. Now what do you have for me that couldn't wait?"
"You better have a look at this!" said Lincoln, and he handed the major a collection of print outs from recent encrypted Internet communiqués. "We have a major development in South Florida."
"The first one is from Douglas," said Captain Kimsey as he approached the two, "alerting the region to an imminent invasion from some mercs who call themselves 'Island Security' and hold sway over anyone who might want to crash the garden parties on Sanibel Island."
"Sanibel?" says Alderman. "I hope we don't have to mess that place up. I've thought about moving there myself someday."
"The next series of messages is from Blaylock, the captain of the division in Fort Myers," Kimsey continued, ignoring his commander's retirement dreams. "He confirms that Island Security came in hard and heavy, basically massacred Douglas and his men. Killed their families, too. Left them to rot; left the wounded to die slow - real slow."
"No shit!" exclaimed Alderman. They had his undivided attention now.
"No shit. And there's more," Kimsey paused. "Blaylock thinks Island Security is sending a message to mainland forces: Don't mess with us or else…"
"No shit!" scoffed Alderman. "We'll see about that. Won't we?"
