Dissolution: The Wyoming Chronicles: Book One

by W. Michael Gear

  “Well, they surely got that taken care of,” Dylan insisted. “That was, like, a week ago.”

  Dylan looked past Sam, coaxing, “Come on, people. This is your chance. Maybe your last chance. Ashley? You coming?”

  Sam turned, facing the rest of the crew. “Be smart. Think. Let us figure out what’s going on, okay? Dylan and Kirstin might not even make it out of the Basin before being turned back. Or worse, might make it to Casper, or maybe Cheyenne, and hit a roadblock.” A beat.“Tomorrow, we’ll go into town, see what the news is.”

  “Last call,” Dylan snapped, turning around, and taking Kirstin’s arm.

  Sam could read the crew’s growing desperation, all but Court and Shyla who stepped over to stand with him.

  Shyla pleaded, “Jon, Ashley, Danielle, we already lost Shanteel when she went off on her own. At least give it another day. Damn it, people, think!”

  “And what?” Danielle asked. “They’ve got the cars!”

  “We’ve got the van,” Court answered.

  Shyla raised her hands in a reasonable gesture. “Hey, listen, I’m smart enough to know a good thing when I see it. I’m staying.”

  She raised her voice, calling, “Frank? Pam? Are we welcome here, especially if we pitch in, tackle some of the chores, earn our keep?”

  “Hell, yes!” Frank and Pam had kept silent. Especially after the insult to their son. Maybe even figuring that the more who left, the fewer mouths they had to feed.

  Now Frank stepped forward saying, “People, don’t go out there. Not yet. Not until we know what’s going on. If you don’t trust Amber, that’s fine. But I’ve known Evan for years. He’ll do right by you.” He indicated Sam with a nod of his head. “So will Sam here, if I’m any judge of character.”

  That sort of set Sam back.

  But he didn’t have time to think about it as he said, “What’s left of us, we’ll make it. Or at least give it the best shot.”

  Ashley was openly sobbing now. Her voice was a miserable whisper. “I’m staying.”

  Dylan made for his truck, opened the door. He paused—one foot on the door frame—and called, “We’re leaving!”

  “The smart ones stay,” Court said simply. “How incredibly Darwinian for a bunch of anthropologists.”

  Kirstin’s BMW started, followed by Dylan’s truck.

  Sam and the crew stood in silence, rain falling, and watched as both vehicles backed out. Hesitated. Each one staring back over the seats. When no one moved, they drove off into the gray gloom.

  “Okay, all,” Sam said, “Let’s get the mules unloaded and let them roll.”

  “Hope this was the right choice,” Danielle muttered under her breath as she walked past Sam.

  Yeah, me too, Sam thought as he watched Dylan and Kirstin’s vehicles disappear off to the stormy east.

  Rating Our Way To Apocalypse

  I’ve talked about social media, sectionalism, politics, religion, social justice, abortion, gun control, self-sorting, and all the manifest issues that divided Americans to the point they hated each other. But one of the real monsters was the media. The self-serving, blathering personalities who could adopt such expressions of self-righteous indignation when dissing the “other side”. All they were doing was driving the wedge deeper, reinforcing the prejudices of their audience. Had they not first created the environment, the public humiliation of Americans with whom they disagreed would not have become not only acceptable, but the norm.

  They did it, of course, for ratings. The larger and more radical their audience, the greater the financial reward.

  Wonder who they blamed when the lights went out in their million-dollar apartments on the West Side? When their phones were cut off, and their drivers didn’t bring the limo around to take them to the studio set for their next broadcast?

  — Excerpt from Breeze Tappan’s Journal.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Supper that night was a somber affair. The whole crew packed around the dining room table this time, every one of them brimming with worry. Shanteel and Brandon still hadn’t showed up, and the rain had gotten worse; the temperature—last anyone checked—had dropped down into the high thirties. If it was that cold here, Frank said it had to be snowing up in the high country.

  Thomas agreed, carefully breaking a roll in two before spreading butter on it. Of all of in attendance, he and Willy seemed the most at ease.

  Most of the crew had a mixed anxiety—a fear that they’d made the wrong choice in staying, against the real concern that Kirstin and Dylan were headed off into disaster. All that was churned up with worry about what was happening to their homes, families, and loved ones back East.

  That latter anxiety was fed by the absolute lack of news. Sure, the big TV in the front room worked, but all it did was post scrolling lines of rules and regulations, many of which were absolutely ludicrous: Right of way will immediately be granted to military vehicles.

  Yeah, right. As if anyone in their right mind was going to stand in front of a tank.

  Nor were those the only worries pressing down.

  “Something’s wrong. Bill’s not back,” Meggan kept repeating. Her glance kept straying to the door, no doubt praying that he might walk into the room at any second.

  “Must be quite a meeting,” Pam added, periodically sending her glance that way as well.

  “Ah, it’s Dad and his old friends,” Frank answered bluffly. “Wouldn’t be the first time he and the rest stopped off for a drink and the chance to swap lies about the old days.”

  Sam kept thinking of that 1911 old Bill was packing.

  “What about Brandon?” Sam asked. “It’s long after dark. The storm doesn’t seem to be letting up. Do we have two people lost out there now?”

  Pam chuckled in a way that was supposed to ease tension. It didn’t. “Sam, any time you’re in the back country, it’s dangerous. There’s a thousand ways to get into trouble, from lightning to a tree falling on you. That son of mine? He knows that country better than the elk do.”

  “Don’t none of you worry about Brandon,” Willy said, lips oddly quirked as he sipped from his wine. “Can’t think of anyone I’d rather be in the mountains with.”

  “What about the storm?” Sam asked.

  “He and Shanteel will hole up,” Thomas replied with a shrug. “There’s always shelter to be had in mountain country. It’s the open plains that will kill you.”

  Frank said softly, “He’ll bring Shanteel back.” He looked around the table. “I know there’s some concern about how he and the girl might feel about each other, but I give you my word, if there’s breath in his body, he’ll get her back here safely.”

  “Why?” Amber asked sharply. She’d been bitter from the moment she stepped out of Dr. Holly’s cabin to see Dylan and Kirstin’s vehicles vanishing into the distance. Sam thought it was a feeling of having been betrayed, and it cut more deeply given Amber’s history.

  “Because he’s a Tappan,” Meggan answered somewhat stiffly. “We take care of our own. And that young woman is one of us, no matter where she comes from, or what she thinks of us.”

  Meggan glared around the table, eyes filled with green fire. “You think Brandon gives a damn that she’s black? That she thinks we’re all racist hicks? Knowing Brandon, he’s all-fired amused by the notion that he’ll bust his silly neck to save a woman who despises the life he lives and the ground he walks on.”

  “Easy, Meggan.” Frank raised a hand.

  “Something I gotta say.” Thomas spoke softly, eyes absently fixed on the center of the table. “I know it don’t work this way in the East. And it doesn’t work in a lot of places in the West no more either, but here, in this place, you are judged by what you do and believe, not by where you come from, or what you look like.”

  “Take these taipos,” Willy flicked his fingers at Frank and Pam. “Gave Grampa and me Brandon and Celia’s beds ‘till the storm blows over’. Some places they’d say, ‘You Indians can sleep in the barn�
� but more likely they’d tell us, ‘Be off our land by dark and don’t come back’.”

  Frank smiled thinly. “Yeah, and come morning, you can help feed, then move the water on the alfalfa.” He looked around the table, mildly asking, “Anyone else want more wine? I opened one of the good bottles. McNab Ridge. They make one of the best Petite Sirah wines in the world.”

  Dr. Holly extended his mostly empty glass. As Frank poured, he added, “One day at a time, folks. That’s how we’re going to get through this.”

  Lights flashed in the window, and everyone scrambled for the front room and out onto the porch.

  Sam was hoping with all his might that it would be Dylan and Kirstin. Instead, old Bill’s big dual-wheel one-ton Dodge gleamed wetly in the porch lights.

  Old Bill opened the door, hitched his stiff left leg out, and stepped down. Rain pounded on the brim of his hat; beneath it Sam could see the man’s steely eyes taking in just the Jeep and the van. Then those remaining on the porch.

  “What’s happened, Bill?” Meggan demanded, stepping down to wrap him in a bear hug despite the downpour.

  “Where’d those vehicles go?” he demanded first thing.

  Dr. Holly told him, “The kids that owned them struck out for Denver.”

  “Aw, shit.” Bill tucked an arm around Meggan, using the other to wave everyone back into the house. “In case you didn’t notice, it’s Goddamn cold and raining. Let’s get back inside. I’m only gonna tell this once, and by God I’m gonna need a stiff whiskey to get through it.”

  After they all filed into the big front room, Bill took off his coat—a long-tailed thing with a Western-cut yoke on the shoulders. Sam could just see the pistol grip sticking out of a brown-leather holster on Bill’s right side. Then the old rancher limped over to his recliner and plopped himself down.

  Meggan elbowed through the crowd, handing Bill a whiskey tumbler filled with three fingers of amber.

  “Light and set,” he said, taking the drink.

  Dr. Holly, Amber, Pam, and Frank got the couch. The crew dropped to the buffalo rug, while Sam stood in the rear by the stuffed elk that he had once thought so garish and barbaric.

  Shyla, as if sensing the gravity, stood beside him, taking his hand and giving it a squeeze. Her fine features were pinched, tension in the set of her full lips.

  “All hell’s broke loose,” Bill began before people reached their seats. “Had a meeting today with our idiot FEMA director and some dickhead from Homeland Security. Everything’s gone to shit.”

  “How so?” Frank demanded.

  Old Bill looked at his son through eyes that seemed to peer out of Hell itself. “It’s about as bad as it can get, son. Even the Homeland Security shithead didn’t have all the answers. Supposedly we’ve been invaded by the Chinese. But no one knows if it’s true. No one’s heard from DC for the last week. Not in person, anyway, just spokesmen. Speaking for the president. For the joint chiefs. For the who-the-fuck-ever. No visual, mind you, just orders and proclamations.”

  “What kind of orders?” Meggan asked.

  “Martial law orders,” Bill said sourly and took a big swig of his whiskey. “Everything’s frozen. No one’s allowed to move. Army’s got the highways shut down. That’s the official version. I know for a fact though, that it’s hit or miss. Fred Willson was in Cheyenne on some state business for the agriculture committee. Governor gave him a pass, and he drove back from Cheyenne yesterday. He didn’t see any military, but he said it was eerie.”

  “How so?” Frank asked.

  “’Cause of the people who are out of gas and stuck on the highway,” Bill answered. “He picked up a family who’d stopped to help some guys who’d flagged them down. But when they stopped to help, it was to have the family’s own car taken at gunpoint, and them left on the road.”

  “Jesus,” Danielle whispered. “What about Dylan and Kirstin? We’ve got to...”

  “Got to what?” Sam asked, seeing her reach for her phone. “There’s no service. We can’t call them. Can’t warn them.”

  He felt a flare of anger reddening his ears. “Damn it! I told them. Begged them.”

  Shyla squeezed his hand, saying, “It was their choice, Sam. What were you going to do? Put a gun to their heads? Dylan said you’d have to shoot him to stop him.”

  “Which way were they headed?” Bill asked.

  “Denver.”

  Bill growled, “Doubt they made it past the Highway Patrol checkpoint outside of Casper. Even if they were smart enough to figure a way around the roadblocks it’s even money that those kids could make it to the state line. And, if they did, it’s dollars to donuts they’re not getting past the Guard. And if they do, it’s a nightmare south of the state line.”

  Pam said, “I don’t get it.”

  “Governor Agar called up the Wyoming National Guard first thing. Had them ready and deployed on the state line even before the martial law order. They’re turning back anyone who isn’t a Wyoming resident returning home. People can either head back south, or stay in a tent in a big refugee camp just south of the Terry Ranch on the Colorado line. FEMA’s supposed to supply it from some warehouse. Same thing down at The Forks south of Laramie on 287.”

  Pam closed her eyes, seemed to sway. “But...Breeze is down there.”

  “God damn it.” Frank’s face had taken on a mask-like agony.

  “Yeah,” Old Bill snapped. “She’s down there. In the shit-storm that’s Denver. My bet? She’s holed up. Locked and loaded. But that is as it is, and no changing it now.”

  Pam didn’t look reassured.

  Sam pondered the hidden meaning behind the looks the Tappans shared with each other. Call it grim.

  “You said it’s a shit storm in Denver?” Amber asked, her voice strained thin.

  Bill studied her through hard-slitted eyes. “Electricity is out for most of the city. A lot of looting. Army was originally deployed from Fort Carson and Piñon Canyon. They just started restoring order, then they got called back. Ordered to deploy to California. Soon as they pulled out, the rioting and looting started all over again.”

  “You sure of this?” Thomas asked.

  “That’s what the DHS dickhead says.” Old Bill swallowed hard, his voice a rasp of sound. “He officially informed us that the Constitution has been suspended and will remain so until the crisis is over.”

  The silence in the room had the weight of a tomb.

  “What about...?” Jon wet his lips. Tried again. “What about back East?”

  Bill took another swig of his whiskey. “Can’t tell you, son. There’s been no communications. No news. I did hear that you can get to western Nebraska, at least as far as the panhandle. The roads to Montana are open, but there’s no news about Billings.”

  “What about the bombers that flew over a couple of days back?” Sam asked.

  “Headed for someplace in northern California. The Homeland Security shithead got real mysterious about that. Just said that America was striking back.”

  “Back at the Chinese?” Frank and Pam were gripping each other’s hands in a death grip.

  “That’s the mystery part,” Bill muttered and took another swallow of whiskey.

  “You keep calling him a shithead.” Amber had pinned the old man with her fear-glittering eyes.

  “Yeah. Something about the term fits.” Bill lifted the glass to the light and studied the remaining amber fluid. “Says he’s taking control of the Basin in the name of the federal government. Says he’s authorized by Congress and a whole slew of Executive Orders to implement federal control and to ‘conduct the administration of this district according to emergency regulations’ to quote him exactly.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” Meggan asked.

  “He called us all together to inform us that not only was he in charge, but to read us all the applicable laws, the fucking C.F.Rs, EOs, and other legal horseshit. Said he was implementing General Order No. 1.”

  Bill’s eyes slitted gimlet
thin. “Which says that within seven days every landowner in the Basin must submit an inventory of all equipment, grain, feed, and acreage under cultivation. The crops those acres are planted in. A list of all livestock, saddle stock, and poultry. And, of course, a complete list and description of all guns, including serial numbers, and a detailed accounting of any ammunition currently on the premises.” He paused. “Down to the last round.”

  “And the purpose of this is?” Frank asked through gritted teeth.

  “To make them available for confiscation and seizure for, and I quote, ‘the common and beneficial use of the federal government during and throughout the current state of emergency’.”

  “They want to strip us of our livestock?” Meggan cried angrily. “Over my dead body.”

  “If that’s how they have to do it,” Amber said woodenly. “We can’t let that happen.”

  All eyes turned her direction.

  Amber was trembling as if every muscle in her body had gone electric. “You understand, don’t you? It’s...It’s Daesh all over again. This is what they did in Syria and Iraq. It’s happening here.”

  Sam had never heard her call them ISIS, only Daesh, and then rarely.

  Dr. Holly sprang to his feet, hands open in a non-threatening manner. “It’s all right, Amber. Ease down. That’s it. Ease down.”

  She was still trembling when she finally nodded, swallowed hard, and exhaled. She shot a desperate glance at Meggan, voice hoarse as she asked, “You got any more of that whiskey?”

  “Hell, yes. I got a whole bottle.” Meggan stepped around the speechless crewmembers on the floor and hurried into the dining room. Everyone was watching Amber as she struggled to hold it together.

  “Confiscation? That can’t be allowed to happen,” Dr. Holly said to Bill; his eyes however, stayed pinned on Amber. Like him, they were all trying to read how close she was to a psychotic break.

  “Why not?” Pam asked.