First Blood (Rambo: First Blood Series Book 1)

by David Morrell

“Sure, and that bunch in the woods might get jumpy again and take a shot at your men. Anyway, you’ll never round everyone up. Tomorrow morning there’ll be civilians all through those hills. You saw the way they’ve taken over town. There’s just too many of them to control. The worst hasn’t come yet. Wait until the professionals show up.” “I don’t know what you mean professionals. Who in hell are they?” “Amateurs really, but they call themselves pros. Guys with nothing better to do than chase around the country to every place that has a search. I met a few of them when we were looking for that little girl. One guy had just come from the Everglades where they were tracking down some lost campers. Before that he’d been to California helping search for a family out hiking caught in a brush fire. That winter he’d been to Wyoming after skiers hit by an avalanche. Between times he went where the Mississippi was flooding or where miners were sealed off by a cave-in. The trouble is, types like him never work with the people in charge. They want the power of organizing their own groups and going off on their own, and before long they confuse the search pattern, interfere with official groups, run ahead to places that look exciting, like old farms, leaving whole fields unsearched—”