Vicky quickly considered her options as she looked around for the best place to hide close at hand. There wasn’t time to run back to the barn before whoever was riding those horses came into view if they turned into the drive, and besides, being the only structure still standing there, the barn would be a magnet to them as it had been to Eric. Vicky couldn’t risk it again. Her top priority was to stay out of sight until the approaching riders left, and that meant she had to disappear from view right now. She slipped through the trees some 200 feet to the east of the driveway to a small outcrop of jagged rock that would provide concealment as long as the strangers didn’t approach it directly. By the time she had settled in behind it, lying flat on her stomach in a position where she could watch the entrance, the riders were in view, heading straight onto the property just as she’d feared they would.
Vicky had Eric’s Glock in her hand as she propped herself up on her elbows just enough to see over the rocks. For all she knew, the approaching strangers were friends of her grandparents, finally making their way here to check on them. But until she knew, she had to assume everyone she encountered was a threat. That was the world she now found herself in, whether she liked living that way or not. Her actions yesterday would have failed her for certain if the man who found her in the barn had been one of the bad ones. Vicky was determined not to make another such mistake, and as the approaching horses and riders drew close enough that she finally got a good look at them, she was glad she was well hidden. One of the three horses was unmistakably a gelding named Tucker that had been her grandpa’s favorite. The other two were Appaloosas as well that she recognized from the ranch, and seeing them together, she knew exactly who had taken them and who was riding them now. The three thieves in the saddles weren’t strangers at all, but rather her former friends that had stolen those horses as well as all the supplies they could carry when they set off from the ranch in pursuit of Megan and Aaron. Vicky’s grip tightened on the Glock as she stared at the rider on Tucker’s back in disgust. What in the hell was Gareth Mabry up to now? Why would he and Jeremy and Brett come back here after what they’d done? And where was Colleen? Why wasn’t she with them?”
Two
VICKY WATCHED AS GARETH and his two companions reined in their stolen horses at the sight of the burned-down ranch house. She was pretty sure they weren’t expecting to find this, as they had taken the horses and left several days before the men who’d attacked the place arrived. She assumed they were back here because they wanted something, maybe just a place to go after running into no telling what out there in the mountains. She also thought it was safe to assume that they hadn’t found Megan and Aaron, or if they had, they hadn’t been able to persuade Megan to return with them. Colleen’s absence was more puzzling though. She and Brett had been mostly inseparable since they’d first hooked up. Unless Colleen was waiting behind somewhere nearby, Vicky thought it likely something must have happened to prevent her returning with him.
Regardless of why the three were back, Vicky had no use for any of them after what they’d done. Megan had made a good decision to get away from Gareth while she still could, and Vicky could only hope he’d indeed been unsuccessful in his attempts to track her down. She hoped too that they would simply turn around and leave when they saw that there was nothing left of the house but burned-out rubble, but of course, they didn’t. Instead, Gareth dismounted and pulled the rifle that had also belonged to her grandpa out of its saddle scabbard, handing his reins to Jeremy before walking over to the house site to investigate. As he kicked around in the rubble, probably hoping to find something still useable, the other two got down and tied off the horses to the hitching post that was still out front, so they could join him. Vicky was furious as she watched them. They had no right to be here, but she didn’t dare confront them, outnumbered as she was. Eric Branson could have handled the situation if he were still here, and no doubt would convince them to leave, but she didn’t dare try. The best she could do was stay out of sight behind the rocks and hope they would move on. With all of them dismounted though, she doubted they planned on leaving right away, at least not until they had investigated the barn.
Vicky cringed as she watched Gareth walk directly to the two graves as soon as he noticed them. She heard him call out something to the other two about how it was the “old man” and the “old woman”. Yeah, that’s right! Vicky thought, the very same ‘old man’ and ‘old woman’ who took you jerks in and gave you food and a place to stay before you left with all that you stole from them! Vicky watched him drop to a knee between the graves, studying them closely. Eric had piled on enough extra rocks that the bodies were now well covered from view. If Gareth and his friends started moving some of those stones away though… Vicky tightened her grip on the Glock. It wasn’t aimed directly at any of her three former acquaintances, but she wouldn’t hesitate to take on all three of them before she watched them desecrate her grandparents’ graves.
But thankfully, it didn’t come to that. Gareth seemed to lose interest in the graves, but she heard her own name come up in the exchange of conversation as Brett and Jeremy made their way around the ruins of the house to join him. Vicky was sure they were wondering where she was, knowing she had still been here with her grandparents after they left in pursuit of Megan. They had to be wondering exactly what had happened here and where she was now. Someone had dug those graves and moved all those stones, so they likely suspected she’d survived. The barn was the only shelter left, so naturally, they would search it for any sign she’d been in there, and Vicky knew that they would find the wrappers from the MREs she’d shared with Eric, as well as the unopened ones he’d left with her. Now she would go hungry tonight, regardless of whether the three hung around or left when they didn’t find her. Vicky didn’t know what she could do about it though. She eyed the horses and considered how long it would take to get up and sprint to the hitching post, mount Tucker and ride off. Tucker knew her, and she’d ridden him many times, so she knew she could trust him, but no matter how fast she might be able to gallop away on him, she would be an easy target for a rifle, and Gareth would shoot too—Vicky knew he would—because without the horses they would be stranded.
The idea of taking back her grandpa’s horses appealed to her because of the principle of it most of all. The horses, saddles and some of the guns the three were carrying all belonged to her grandpa, and it burned her up to think of how they’d betrayed him and taken them. While it would be easier for her if they just rode away after looking around, Vicky considered too that Eric might return tomorrow or the day after empty-handed, unable to find horses they could use to go after Megan and Aaron. If she could steal back these three, they could serve as a backup, but if she did that now, she couldn’t wait here for Eric to return, so that was a problem too. These were the thoughts she weighed as she watched Gareth and his friends walk to the barn. She was so tempted, but she wasn’t sure if she could realistically pull something like that off. If there was going to be a chance at all though, she knew it might come in the next few minutes, when the three of them were inside the barn and out of sight. The window of opportunity would be brief though, she was sure, because there wasn’t much they’d find to keep the three of them in there for long.
Vicky didn’t get the opportunity to see if she could actually summon the courage to make such a bold move though, at least not then. Just as he reached the barn entrance, she saw Gareth stop and look out across the far pasture while saying something to the others. Then Jeremy turned and started back to where they’d left the horses. Gareth had sent him back to get something while he and Brett went inside the barn. Vicky was still stuck and unable to make a move, and she was getting impatient, wondering what they were going to do next and how long they might hang around.
By the time Jeremy made it back to them, Gareth and Brett were outside again. Gareth had two green packages in his hands; the two remaining MREs that Eric had given Vicky. With those and the trash from the opened on
e, they had hard evidence that someone was around, and Vicky figured they would think it was her, because who else would bother to bury her dead grandparents? Gareth took the binoculars Jeremy brought him from his saddlebags and used them to carefully scan the surrounding pastures and wooded slopes. Would they go out looking for her now? Vicky didn’t know, but their trip back here had proven fruitless as far as finding supplies or anything else they could steal. They might think she had more food hidden away somewhere, or they might think anything she had wasn’t worth the effort. Still, Vicky would never trust Gareth again. She knew what he was capable of, despite how nice he may have seemed in the beginning.
It wasn’t a mystery why Megan fell for the guy back then. Gareth Mabry was good-looking, outgoing and friendly and seemed to take a keen interest in the people he met. It was rare to find a guy that would listen, but Gareth did, and Megan found that to be his most charming virtue. When he came over to their place or Vicky went out with them somewhere, he listened to her too, and she had to admit it occasionally made her a bit jealous of her roommate. Vicky was doing her best to focus on her classes at the time, having been through a bad breakup with the guy she’d thought she was in love with just the semester before. She was happy for Megan, but she still sometimes wished she had someone that paid that kind of attention to her, and what girl wouldn’t?
The events that began taking place earlier that spring semester, however, revealed another side of Gareth. He quickly lost interest in things academic and shifted his focus to politics and activism, not just watching, but getting personally involved. Wherever there was a protest or similar gathering, Gareth was there. He wanted to participate, and he was convinced that it would make a difference. Vicky and Megan wanted no part of that stuff and just hoped things would settle down to normal again, but by then, Megan was in deep with Gareth and was going along enough to keep his interest. Neither Megan nor Vicky believed anything they could do would stop the terror attacks, but many students did. They blamed the actions of the government for it rather than the terrorists themselves, and they were convinced that if enough of them made themselves heard, those actions would be changed or stopped. When that didn’t seem to work, they got louder, but when words clearly weren’t enough, they started to break and burn things. This wasn’t just at their particular campus, of course—it was happening all over—and it intensified as the weeks went by and the semester was drawing to a close. It went far beyond the universities and student protesters though. Organized anarchist and anti-government groups that had been preparing and waiting for just the right circumstances to act seized on the opportunities created by this growing chaos. Their indiscriminate acts of infrastructure sabotage left citizens on both sides of the argument cut off from power, communications and the delivery of essential supplies. People died as an indirect result of these actions and then more died as the authorities responded and the use of force escalated.
Vicky had watched as Gareth became more excited about these developments and she listened as he defended the position of the insurrectionists, saying that it was time for a regime change and time to get rid of the old, corrupt system and help bring about a new one that would be fair for all. Gareth wanted to be a part of this change, and he wanted Megan there with him. Vicky remembered the long, heated discussions they’d had in the apartment, but Megan was infatuated with him despite their disagreements. At the time, things hadn’t turned truly violent there in Boulder just yet. There was some arson and property destruction, and lots of arrests when the police in riot gear responded, but so far no one had been seriously injured. The worst then was that the normal functions of the university ground to a halt, and just at the time final exams would normally be taking place. Even then, Vicky thought it was futile to hang around and she’d already suggested to Megan that maybe they should leave and go to her grandparents’ ranch. But Megan wasn’t going anywhere without Gareth, and he wouldn’t hear of leaving.
“If we back down now, nothing will ever change. Running away will just let them win!”
“They’re going to win anyway, Gareth. They always do. No one can overthrow the government, not here, in the most powerful nation on the planet!”
“All governments fall eventually, Vicky! History proves it! This one isn’t immune. None of them are.”
“Maybe so, but how many people have to die for something like that to happen? Do you want to die for it? I know I don’t! Megan can certainly tell you what you’d be up against if you try. Right or wrong, her dad has been fighting wars for this country her entire life. He’s somewhere in Europe now, and you know how bad it’s been there. Do you really want things to get like that here?”
Gareth was smart enough to know all this, but he didn’t let that stop him. Megan was smart enough too, but lately, she wasn’t exactly proud of what her dad had been doing, even if she did know very little of the actual details of his work. When she was younger, she had thought it was pretty cool that he was a Navy SEAL, and she’d looked up to that. He was a hero to her then, fighting to rescue people and help those who just wanted to have the freedoms everyone dreamed of. But he’d left regular military service years ago, and now worked as a private contractor, supposedly for better pay and so he could be home more. She didn’t know about the pay, but the being home part certainly didn’t happen. Her mom said he wasn’t a mercenary, but Megan knew better. Combat was the one thing her dad was truly good at, and she doubted he was merely working in a supporting role, and she wondered if he was even one of the good guys anymore. Megan had told Vicky many times that she didn’t know. She said the more she learned about what was actually going on in the world, the more she doubted everything she’d ever believed in. Vicky had her own doubts, but no one in her family was in the military now, fighting in those wars, and so she could only imagine how Megan must feel. Vicky’s grandpa had been in the Army as a young man, but that was after World War Two, so he’d never seen actual combat.
Gareth said that because the military was spread so thin all over the globe fighting wars in countries where they had no business, this was the perfect time for revolution to happen at home. He believed that once it gained enough momentum, it would be unstoppable, and as things worsened with the beginning of summer, it seemed that he might be right. Vicky still didn’t know for sure, but she suspected that Gareth was involved in the sabotage attack on the local power grid that eventually led to the shutdown and occupation of the Boulder campus and opening of the detainment center there where many of their former fellow students were still locked up, as far as she knew. Gareth had told Megan he was going to be away camping for a few days, and she and Vicky both knew it wasn’t just about backpacking or chilling out in the mountains. While he was gone, there were explosions that took out two major substations, leaving the city without power, and then more fires that started during the resultant blackout. The shooting started the second night, close enough that Vicky and Megan could hear it from where they were hunkered down in their apartment. They didn’t see Gareth until the day after that, when he came back to tell Megan they had to get out of town. National Guard troops were moving into the area to back up the police and sheriff departments, and the rumors were flying regarding their intentions. Gareth said they all needed to relocate to a campsite in the mountains nearby, where many of the members of the resistance were already gathered.
After much discussion and more arguing back and forth, Vicky and Megan agreed to go with him. Camping out seemed preferable to staying in an apartment with no electricity and no Internet or cell service. The last two had stopped working only the day before Gareth returned, and he claimed the authorities had shut down the signals to prevent the resistance from organizing more actions. This was believable, because they’d already heard reports of this happening in other areas where direct action had started sooner. It made sense for them to do this, because they still had their radios and other secure means of communication and cutting off communication among ordinary citizens made them eas
ier to divide and control. Gareth said the power wouldn’t be coming on again anytime soon either. Even once the damage was repaired, the authorities would keep the grid down deliberately in most areas while working to bring the people into submission. Vicky knew there had to be a lot more that Gareth was leaving out though, and she found out she was right when they reached the camp where this “resistance” movement was gathering.
The first thing that surprised her was seeing all the firearms that were in evidence. Gareth hadn’t told them about that, and when Megan asked, he said being armed was necessary because it was the police who were escalating the violence and they already had weapons and were willing to use them. But despite what he said, it didn’t take Vicky and Megan long to figure out that mere self-defense wasn’t the motivation here. The group camped in the mountains was made up of a mix of male and female students of college age, but there were many older men among them as well. Vicky didn’t know whether the latter were locals or outsiders who had arrived from elsewhere, but many of them were very vocal and intense, taking charge each night around the big central campfire with rallying speeches that whipped the rest of the group into a frenzy. To Vicky, it brought to mind old Western movies she’d watched with her grandpa; scenes of fierce Indian warriors dancing around a bonfire in preparation to go on the warpath. It made her uncomfortable, because she didn’t believe more violence was going to solve anything. She didn’t like some of the things she’d heard the police and other authority figures were doing, but that didn’t mean they deserved to be shot. Self-defense was one thing, but what these people were stirring up and advocating was armed revolution, and whether it was part of the bigger movement elsewhere or not, it essentially amounted to a declaration of war.
Feral Nation Series Box Set 2 [Books 4-6] Page 19
