Chapter 26

Going Rogue

I consider myself to be a brave man. Not necessarily fearless, since fear’s a good part of what keeps you on your toes and living through danger, but courageous. Growing up, I fought plenty with my fists, sticks, rocks, knives and guns. Not too many situations give me a true sense of dread, but there are exceptions. Purchasing military-grade weapons from Oklahoma Blue definitely earns a spot as one of those exceptions. The man’s a straight-up nut.

Oklahoma Blue hails from, well, Oklahoma, I guess. No one seems to know his whole story and chances are that’s because they figure it’d be safer not to. To most of those working in shadier professions, he’s considered a legendary myth. Only a few in Seattle have encountered him personally, despite the fact that he lives close to our city, because Oklahoma Blue does business on a global scale. I’ve met him on a couple occasions, unfortunately. I say unfortunately because I’m certain that merely knowing the face that goes with the name and reputation would earn me life in federal prison if not a straight out snuffing by the CIA.

You see, the man has a complicated past. From what I understand, he served in Vietnam as a young kid, fresh out of high school. This was at the beginning of the war and Okie, coming from a long line of proud military men, volunteered out of fierce patriotism. During the many years he served he made plenty of friends. He also witnessed atrocities committed by both sides, but his youthful mind refused to see Americans as capable of anything but justice. It didn’t take long until he came to view the Viet Cong as wicked. Then he decided, after seeing so many friends die in the fields of combat, that the Vietnamese, as a people, were evil. Having grown up on war stories from relatives who fought in the Pacific theater of World War II, he had heard plenty about the Japanese and none of it was good. Eventually, he began feeling that the real problem’s roots sprang from racial incompatibility. By the time he returned to American shores he’d evolved into a full-fledged white supremacist with years of combat experience and a wide network of veteran military personnel he considered friends.

Throughout the 70’s he rose in prominence among his peers, turning his back on a government and civilian population that he felt had turned its back on him. Due to his connections, obtaining weaponry to support the cause proved to be easy as cake for Okie. Some of those who smuggled firepower to him knew what it was for, others didn’t. In Okie’s eyes, his work supported the cause of brotherhood among white men, an endangered species needing protection from a planet brimming with lesser savages, of other skin tones, waiting to slaughter them. He honestly believed an apocalypse lay just beyond the horizon so he put forth his most vigorous effort to arm his brethren. He sold a lot of machine guns, grenades, rocket launchers and survival gear of all types, never concerning himself with profits. He knew that at any moment World War III would break out and it’d be survival of the fittest.

Then came the 80’s and with it, no Armageddon, no great war to end all wars. More of the same bullshit he’d endured up to that time. Only now there were militias and openly proud Neo-Nazis appearing in the media. It turned into a political game, a media circus. That kind of attention could endanger the cause, Okie reasoned, expose him to the feds who couldn’t wait to bring him down. In response to the whoring of the great cause, Oklahoma Blue started cutting back on the quantity of supplies he’d once offered so freely. He grew paranoid, suspicious of anyone new who’d been referred to him. This made his comrades in the white supremacist movement angry. They refused to tolerate their movement being criticized by anyone, much less a lowly arms dealer. After all, he was just an ignorant farm kid from the Midwest who’d killed a few gooks overseas before turning into a crook. Probably a Jew anyway, they said, betraying them out of cowardice. If he wouldn’t give them what they wanted, then by God, they’d take it.

And take it they did. Instead of a foreign invasion or federal raid like Okie’d always feared, he woke up one morning to find his compound being overrun by the same people he’d been aiding for years. Rogue skinheads killed his entire guard force, stole everything they could find and burned every building on his property, including his home, to the ground. Like a nightmare revisited, he witnessed the madness over his surveillance cameras. His own kind turned on him like rabid dogs, tearing everything he’d worked and fought for to pieces. He escaped to his hidden fallout bunker, but his wife and children did not. The most precious people in his life burned alive in his home while he lay pinned down in a hidden room beneath a shed several hundred feet away.

Devastated, Okie turned to the leaders of all the various groups he’d been loyally serving for years. Know what they told him? That’s right, they couldn’t help him because they didn’t want to support fighting between rival factions of their own proud race. They also told him that if they did retaliate against the rogue group of skinheads, it’d draw negative federal and media attention they couldn’t afford because it would tarnish the movement. Okie’s devastation began to transform itself into a furious rage. His hatred shifted its focus so that he no longer even identified with white supremacy, no longer gave a flying fuck what the color of anyone’s skin was. The metamorphosis was complete. He’d become a total misanthrope.

Having no other real option left in life by which he could support himself, he returned to dealing the tools of warfare. Since he had no loyalties left among men, he was free to buy from and sell to whomever he pleased. The motive, beyond helping people kill each other, now became profit. He traveled the world in search of new providers of quality product, marking it up so he’d make a handsome commission with each sale. He sold assault rifles to street gangs, explosives to cartels, US helicopters to African warlords, Chinese missiles to South American dictators and chemical weapons to nations in the Middle East. In short, the man did whatever the fuck he felt like doing because he had no reason not to. Anyone who’s got very little left to lose is a dangerous person. Oklahoma Blue ain’t got shit left to lose in this world, as far as he’s concerned.

Tags: Okie, Oklahoma Blue