“And she was saying no, I guess?” said Jacob, eyeing the firearm.
“That’s right. What about you?” said Charlie. “Ever held one before?”
“Not a big ol’ bazooka like this,” he said, accepting the AR-15 assault weapon from Charlie. It was perhaps twice as heavy as he’d expected, even when unloaded. “Wow.”
Ignoring Emma’s resentful scowl, Charlie walked Jacob through the basics. “Keep the barrel pointed low and away from other people,” he said. “This here is your safety catch. That should be ‘on’ almost all the time, okay?”
The entire thing struck Emma as wasteful, egotistical, and alarmist. “I’d hate to ruin your hormonal bonding moment,” she said derisively, “but there’s plenty of other stuff I can be doing at the camp.” She made to set off back, seemingly intending to return alone.
Charlie didn’t want to see his group split up. “We haven’t finished all the flares, and…”
“Wait, seriously, Emma, you need to try this,” Jacob said, dwarfed by the weapon he was holding. “I feel magnificent.” He was the quintessential teenager who’d been given an important permission too early for his own good.
“I’m glad for you. Enjoy.” She turned and began walking, but within seconds, Charlie was by her side.
“Hey…”
“Don’t bother,” said Emma. She had begun to resent Charlie’s assumption that, as the oldest, he’d always have the last word.
“It’s easy, you know,” he said. “Firing a gun. Easiest thing you’ll ever do. There’s only a coupla things to remember, really.”
She stopped suddenly on the rugged path, turned to Charlie and gave him an icy stare. “I’m sure it’s like falling off a log or riding a bike, or any of those dumbass little sayings. But here’s what’s difficult, Charlie. Forgetting, that’s what’s difficult. Forgetting the sound of bullets hitting things all around you. Forgetting what it feels like to be covered in something wet, and for a moment, to not know for sure whether it’s your brother’s blood or your own.”
Wisely, Charlie said nothing.
“So, I’m not in the mood to be taking military orders from some dude I barely know. And I’m sorry if it hurts your feelings that I’m not interested in handling your ‘precious.’”
“It’s not like that. It’s just…”
“How are you still arguing?” she said, cutting right across him. “Didn’t you just hear me?”
“I’m sorry, it’s just our rules, you know, for defense and…”
“Rules?” Emma scoffed. “I thought this was a haven for freedom lovers? What happened to ‘Don’t Tread On Me,’ and all that good stuff?”
“It’s alive and well.”
The voice had come not from their group of five, but from the forest. Charlie spun around, searching for the sound. He was instantly furious to be forty yards from his weapon when it counted. “Who’s there?” he called. “Show yourselves!”
“We already are, dipshit,” said another voice. “You just ain’t lookin’.”
“Charlie?” called Bryce from farther along the path. “I hear voices. What gives?”
“Got company,” he said. “East of the path.”
“How many?”
The answer came from the woods. “We’re not telling you.”
It was humiliating. Months of training in exactly these conditions, and the very moment Charlie’s attention should have caught the imposters, his focus had been squarely on Emma. Now he had to play catchup, against hidden opponents and in failing light. “All right, we get it,” said Charlie. “Good stealth from you guys.”
“Hey, thanks,” one said, chuckling. There was a sound as though he’d spat on the forest floor.
“But you’ve crossed some lines on the map, fellas,” Charlie continued, keeping his tone affable. “Maybe you don’t realize, but this is private property.”
“We didn’t see no signs,” came the disembodied reply. “You sure?”
“You’re trespassing on a homestead,” Charlie announced.
“Sounds homey,” came the voice. “Just one family, is it?”
Bryce and Max finally arrived, jogging down the path with Jacob. Charlie met him halfway and urgently retrieved his AR-15. Whispering to the trio, he said, “Don’t tell them anything about the camp or yourself. No names or numbers of people, all right?”
“Got it.”
“Hey, Mister Homesteader?” one of the voices said. At most, three people had spoken, and perhaps only two. “You got yourself some firepower there, and that makes us a little nervous. What say you set those aside so we can talk normally?”
He had to think quickly, and wished Cabot or Cody were with them. “You wouldn’t really ask someone to disarm themselves on their own property, right?”
“All right. But that means my buddies have got to stay hidden and cover me. Provided you’re okay with that.”
His use of the plural was more likely an improvised lie, Charlie decided, than an inadvertent revelation. Figure on three of them, maybe four. All hidden and in cover. All aware of our location, here on an obvious path. Had the imposters begun by firing, rather than talking, it would have been a classic ambush with no survivors. “How about we all come out, weapons above our heads?” he offered. “No funny business, we promise. You already kinda got the drop on us,” Charlie said, hoping this would seal the deal so he could find out who the hell these people were.
“We can do that,” the imposter decided, and suddenly, there he was, not twenty-five yards away, materializing out of a bush as though he himself were made of the very same branches and leaves. “Howdy.” As promised, he was raising the rifle high with both hands.
“Howdy,” said Charlie, searching for the others. Only one other shape appeared, morphing out of the forest until it became another man. The pair were in their late twenties, perhaps, and their gear had a weathered, no-nonsense look; this was not their first time in the woods, nor was it likely their first attempt to get close to the homestead, Charlie felt sure. “Just the two of you?”
“For now,” said the first of the pair to have spoken. He was pale and unshaven, and when his partner stepped forward to reveal himself, they saw that he was heavier set, with a patchy red beard. “And you’re… what? Five kids? Where’s everybody else?”
“Close by.”
“Right. Of course.”
“So, how you wanna do this?” asked Charlie.
With a suitable amount of mutual suspicion, the group agreed to stack their weapons by a nearby tree, and then to hold a ‘parley’ where the path ran along the edge of a clearing. Relieved to have established diplomatic relations, Charlie was nevertheless bothered by their very first question. “What the hell’s a girl doing up here?”
“Learning how to shoot trespassers,” said Emma without missing a beat. “Want to help me practice?”
“Oh, man, got to love a feisty one,” said Redbeard while Paleface chuckled. “She must be fun to have around back at the camp.”
“Easy, fellas,” said Bryce, certain that Emma would shortly explode at these unkempt, impolite pseudo-soldiers. “No need to be disrespectful.”
“Shut it,” said Paleface. “We ain’t afraid o’ you. Don’t matter how many you’ve got. Our divisional commander says this place is gonna be part of the National Redoubt. That means we’re incorporating all this,” he waved expansively, “into the North-East United Territories.”
“Into the what?” asked Max, but Charlie recognized the terminology and gestured for his cousin to be quiet.
“And, I suppose,” Jacob said, amazing himself, “that ‘resistance is futile,’ huh?”
“Oh, no way,” said Paleface, grinning. “Resistance is what we’re all hoping for!” He turned to Redbeard and asked, “Ain’t that right?”
The other man hollered something that might have been in a foreign language and rubbed his hands together.
“Well, if you keep showing up here, armed to the teeth, you’ll get som
e,” promised Charlie. More than ever, he wished Cabot were here; after five minutes with him, these two numbskulls would have been smarting like they’d been called to the principal’s office.
“Oh, yeah? Just like you did with Big Dog?”
Jacob asked, “Whose dog?” before Charlie could stop him; this parley was awkward enough without the younger members of the patrol stepping all over his negotiating strategy.
“We know what happened up here,” said Redbeard. “When was that, Junge?” he asked his comrade.
“June, the year before last,” answered Paleface. “We know all about it.”
Charlie intervened. “You don’t know shit.”
“Oh, yeah?” said Redbeard, taking a threatening step forward.
“I was here,” said Charlie, “when three of your guys came to have it out with us.” An hour of threats and shouting had yielded only stalemate and bad blood.
“Yeah, you know why they did that?” said Paleface, his voice raised. “Because you murdered Big Dog, in cold blood, right over there,” he said, pointing down the trail, toward the camp.
“He died of a gunshot wound,” said Charlie, “that’s true. But it was self-inflicted.”
“Bullshit!” Redbeard countered. “You trigger-happy assholes blew him away!”
Jacob whispered, “What’s he talking about?” but Charlie virtually shoved him to the side.
“Payback is coming,” was all Paleface would say.
“Payback for what? One of your idiots fell over his own shotgun because he was drunk off his ass?” Redbeard made to advance on Charlie, but Paleface hissed at him. “Well, we got plenty of back-ups, people who know how to handle themselves,” Charlie warned them.
“Yeah?” Redbeard said, reaching to unbutton his tattered, sweaty shirt. “You got backup? Well, we got this…” Unmistakably inked into the man’s chest was the world’s most hated, most terrifying symbol, enshrined in thick black. He flexed his chest muscles, then pounded the symbol with his fists and raised them victoriously. “That’s our backup, motherfuckers. Any questions?”
“Yeah…” Emma began, stepping slowly forward with her eyes fixed on the ugly, angular Swastika emblazoned across the man’s flesh. “It’s… real?”
“One hundred and ten percent, honey,” Redbeard said. The extreme contrast of his red-orange beard against the black of the cross had the effect of adding hairy flames to the upper arm of the Swastika.
“Wow,” Emma breathed. “Must have taken hours.”
“Sixteen of ‘em, with some tidying up after,” he said, proud of his fortitude in the tattooist’s chair.
“So, a professional did this for you? Someone around here?” she asked, still apparently genuine in her inquiries. It certainly made for a striking adornment, even if it turned her stomach.
“A friend,” Redbeard said. “Not a lot of professionals will go near it. Goddamned cowards.”
“Of course, of course. I only ask because,” Emma said, coming to a halt a few yards from the shirtless Redbeard, “it looks like you did it yourself, in the mirror, with a black crayon, while drunk.”
Thunderous, unmitigated anger flashed across Redbeard’s face. The unfamiliar neurochemistry of being found fascinating by a woman collided horribly with the much more familiar sensations of being bullied because of his size and appearance. “Fuck you, Taylor Swift.”
“Okay,” said Paleface, “you had your little joke. Ain’t neither of us taking crap like that from a chick.”
“It’s the colors that I liked the most,” Emma said, continuing her one-woman art criticism presentation. “Such a completely dark black, as black as your soul, standing strong against the utter whiteness of your pasty blubber. Quite a sight, really.”
Redbeard glanced at his weapon, yearning for it like a trainee Jedi, whose lightsaber remained out of reach. “You gonna put your girl back on her leash, or are we gonna teach her a lesson?” Redbeard wanted to know. His body language spoke of a craving for the latter.
“You talk to her like that again,” said Jacob from out of nowhere, “and I’ll bury you in these woods.”
Now the obese Nazi was roaring laughing. “You hear that?” hollered Redbeard. “Some nerd thinks he’s gonna…” He regained his composure and delivered a lecture, his eyes boring into Jacob’s. “You don’t understand this yet, but we’re here from the future.”
“Right,” Paleface said. He’d found a cigarette in his belongings and was toying with it, unlit. “We’re like time travelers.”
“Cool. Where’d you hide your DeLorean?” Bryce asked.
“What I mean is,” Redbeard continued, “we’ve seen how things are gonna be, in this country, and soon around the world. We’re here to bring everyone along. There’ll be those who don’t like it, but they’ll fall by the wayside. What we need is people who see what we’re trying to do.”
“And what’s that?” Charlie asked, angry at being lectured by a couple of mouth-breathing morons. “A racist ethnostate in New Hampshire and Maine, right? Whites only, Christians only, guns everywhere, no government to speak of, no rules… It’s not a homestead you guys are trying to make or even a homeland. It’ll be an inside-out concentration camp with the armed guards behind the wire, and all your ‘prisoners’ living free and happy without you.”
“Bullshit,” Paleface commented. “Your teenage mouths are gonna get you in trouble, real quick.”
But Charlie was on solid ground. These were the topics that his grandfather and Ezra Cobb would debate endlessly, whiskey or none, into the small hours. They worked through the phenomena that homesteading was itself an act of withdrawing from the outside world—extending a barrier around family and property which necessarily excluded others—while also remaining dependent on it. “No point cutting yourself off and making a bunch of rules that only you’re gonna follow,” Charlie remembered Cobb reiterating during those late-night chats. “If you’ve got a good system, a fine plan for how to live, share it with people. Don’t hide away in the mountains, believing you’ve solved all your problems when all you’ve really done is to shut out everyone who thinks different from you. That’s not a homestead, that’s a retreat.” Charlie knew that old Cobb had meant both meanings of the word.
“We’re gonna recommend,” said Redbeard, “that you don’t come around here no more.”
“Amen,” agreed Paleface. “This place is ours now. All the woods from here to the camp. If you come out here, you better be prepared. And tell your parents or grandpa or whoever else: your time is almost up.”
With that, the shirtless Redbeard walked over to retrieve his assault weapon and then handed Paleface his own. Charlie copied the gesture, and in the silence, the two opposing sides eyed each other for any sign of betrayal.
When the two men turned away, laughing together as they descended the slope, Charlie watched them leave, and then breathed a sigh. “I’ll give each of you ten bucks if you agree not to tell my Grandpa how badly I just fucked that up.”
28
The Russell Homestead Later that night
Cody was moving before he knew why. As his feet hit the floor, his senses ignited in a search for danger. It had been a scream; he was certain. “Emma? Jacob?”
She was sitting up in bed, hugging herself, crying, as Cody reached her upstairs room. “Honey?”
“Bad dream,” she said, at first ready to turn her father away, but then reaching for him. “Real bad.”
Cody held her, the usually confident teenager shrinking down until she was like a doll in his arms.
Mary was only two steps behind Cody, rubbing sleep from her eyes. “A dream about what’s been happening lately?” she asked tenderly, sitting on the bed with them. There was no need to make her daughter re-live the nightmare, but Mary harbored fears that the stresses of post-EMP life would harm her children.
“Kinda,” said Emma. Flanked by her parents, with a sleepy Jacob watching concerned from the doorway, she tried to explain. “There was shoot
ing. It was all around me, but I was just tiny and helpless and alone,” she said, shivering visibly.
Sensing that it was the most useful thing he might do, Jacob made tea and returned with a mug for Emma while her parents comforted her. Then came a soft knock at the cabin door, and he volunteered to answer.
“Everything okay?” It was John Cabot, sidearm strapped to his waist.
“We’re good,” Jacob told him. “Emma had a bad dream.”
“Must have been terrifying,” he said, without saying the rest: a woman’s scream in the quiet woods is always loud and scary, so the entire camp is awake and wondering what’s happened. “She okay?”
“I think so,” said Jacob.
“Good. Mind if I come in for a moment, just to talk with your folks?”
Cabot found the rest of the Russells at the cabin’s small fold-out dining table, each nursing a mug of tea. “Just checking in,” Cabot told them. Cody rose to meet him at the doorway and quickly explained before inviting him to join them.
“Mr. Cabot, I… I feel like an idiot,” said Emma. She was wrapped in a green wool blanket, every inch the traumatized victim. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
Jacob found Cabot a chair, and the old man sat with the family while Jacob loitered by the stairs. “It’s been a tough few days. Lots of change and uncertainty,” said Cabot. “And what goes in has a tendency to come out again.”
“I don’t even know…” began Emma; everything was hard to explain. “It wasn’t a memory of being shot at, just a feeling…”
Cabot sought and received permission to sit up with Emma for a while. “I think I’ve got something that’ll help. Something I want your parents to hear, too,” he said, scotching Mary’s plans to return to bed. He brought out a leather-bound book. “Mind if I read you a section?”
If Cabot was about to reach for the scriptures, as Jacob feared, then he’d misjudged his audience; neither of the kids had ever shown much interest in faith. But what emerged couldn’t have come from any version of the Bible.
Protecting Our Home Page 17
