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country,” said Specialist Sparrow. “We fight to protect their freedom of speech, and they wanna give us trouble?”
    “I said listen up!” McFee shouted. His eyes flicked from us to the protestors in the street.
    “At ease on that tough-guy stuff,” Kemp said to us. “We’re professionals. We have a job to do.”
    Sergeant Meyers glared at the crowd. Lieutenant McFee wiped his hand down over his face. “Okay. Um.” He pointed toward the street. “So our mission is to secure this road right out here. We’re going to move out to the middle of South Capitol Boulevard and move in an, um, kind of diamond formation north above University Drive. We’ll stop all traffic and, ah, people who are trying to get to the riot downtown that way.”
    “Remember your military bearing,” Kemp said. “Do not say one word to those protestors.”
    “And stay alert!” Sergeant Meyers said. “They may start getting violent. Watch to see if they have weapons. It’s called situational awareness.”
    Sergeant Kemp shook his head. “Yeah, yeah, but try to calm down. Keep under control. These people out here are just mad about a lot of different things. They’re probably harmless.”
    “But don’t be complacent,” Meyers said.
    Watch for weapons? What did these guys think was going to happen? I hoped the other Guard units around the city were having a better time than us. From the shouting and sirens coming from downtown, I was glad I wasn’t one of the police officers assigned to break up whatever was happening down by the capitol building.
    We formed up into two tight wedges. Alpha team was in the forward wedge. Sergeant Kemp had point. Me and Luchen were staggered back at an angle to his left and right. Bravo team marched behind us, forming a diamond with Staff Sergeant Meyers, Lieutenant McFee, and Specialist Sparrow in the center.
    “Group, halt !” Lieutenant McFee ordered when we approached the crowd. He stepped up until he stood right behind Sergeant Kemp at the front of the diamond. “Okay, listen,” he shouted to the crowd. “Our orders are to secure this road out here. I’m going to have to ask you to please step back.”
    “What if we don’t want to?” the hot girl said.
    McFee tried again. “Okay, folks, you’re going to have to move.”
    “He didn’t say please this time!” Dreadlocks called out.
    Sergeant Meyers stepped up next to the lieutenant and shouted at the long-haired guy, “Get the hell out of the way, you hippie piece of shit! You will move voluntarily or we will move your sorry asses for you!”
    “Come on, Meyers,” Kemp hissed.
    The crowd wailed. Instead of moving away from our formation, they came closer. “This is bullshit,” Dreadlocks yelled. “We have rights! We got every right to be here.”
    “Hell yeah!” Another college guy held up his can of beer. He chugged the rest of it and threw it at us. The empty can landed about six feet away. The drinker cracked open another beer and clinked it against his friend’s can. “Hell no! We won’t go!” he shouted.
    Others joined him in the chant. What was their problem? This wasn’t a party. Why wouldn’t they move?
    “Sir, we can’t afford to lose control here,” Kemp said. “Let’s go around them. We have to move up the street to block the road off at our assigned point.”
    The lieutenant nodded. “Sergeant Kemp, guide the formation around the crowd to the left. We’ll move around them. Everybody stay tight. Forward, march !” We walked forward, sweeping toward the side of the crowd, but the protestors shifted over in front of us again. “Okay, Sergeant. Straight through the crowd then,” said McFee.
    “Hold your weapons tight,” Sergeant Kemp called out.
    There were so many protestors. Some were staggering drunk. Some looked mad. Others laughed. It was chaos, and we weren’t even downtown to the real disturbance yet. The tip of the diamond formation reached the crowd. The group parted around us, but they were