The Day America Died Trilogy

by A J Newman

  Jackie started crying and replied, “What do you want to know?”

  “Is my brother still alive?”

  “No, they killed him and his son.”

  May went into a rage and knocked the breakfast dishes off the table.

  “Tell me what happened and who killed my brother.”

  Jackie was so scared she was trembling as she replied, “They knocked on the door, and Alf tried to kill them, then they broke down both doors and shot him dead.”

  She went on to tell everything she knew about the people who had risked their lives to free her.

  ***

  Mike came in from early morning guard duty, caught up with me and said, “I think someone is watching us from the woods. I caught a flash of reflected light a couple of times on the west side of the property. I waited, made my rounds over that way and saw some tracks that I’m pretty sure aren’t ours.

  I also found some cigarette butts. I think they came in at night and watched until the sun was up before returning home.”

  “Let’s warn the others and get ready to defend ourselves. I’m thinking some trip wires, bear traps and ambushes. The guys we killed were selling women and drugs to someone. Those people are probably wondering what happened to their source of goods.”

  “I agree, I think they will case the place for a day or so and then hit us at night while we’re sleeping. We need to get more sleep in the day and have more of our team ready for a night attack.

  Zack, old buddy, why don’t we follow the tracks back to their place and attack them first.”

  “Oh, uh, yeah, I guess that’d work, too. Let’s get the team together and discuss a plan to attack them before dawn tomorrow.”

  “Whoa, Einstein, we haven’t tracked them back to their homes yet, and can’t track them in the dark. Let’s just follow them back to their homes in the morning and watch them a bit before we attack. Whew, man, you are getting quick on the trigger in your old age.”

  “Ok, ok, we’ll follow them home and make sure they are unfriendly before we start shooting. Let’s make that happen, good plan.”

  I asked everyone, but the guards to attend a planning session after breakfast. I intentionally included the four girls we had rescued since the ones watching are probably friends of their captors.

  I asked the girls if they remembered anything that would help us against this new threat.

  The oldest, Cindy, replied, “I remember hearing the men who captured us say they had a family this side of Rolling Hills.”

  Another girl said, “They always chained us in our rooms when they were dealing and trading unless someone wanted a woman. We had another seven girls come through, but they got traded off to Alf’s friends and customers. They’d show us to the men like we were at a cattle auction.

  Some of the men didn’t like that they were trading women, but they still traded for drugs. I was shown to more than 10 men, but none of them was in the gang. I was loaned to four men for a day or two, and they all lived 4-5 miles from here. People came from as far as Anderson to buy drugs and women.”

  I spoke to the team,” We could be facing three to as many as 10 of these piss ants. Let’s set some of the large traps to take out as many as possible today before they come back. Roger, I’d like you and Paul to work on the traps, while Mike and I get at the trip wires and booby traps.

  We will follow them back to their camp and be prepared to render them harmless when they get there. I would think they would gather around their returning people to find out what we are doing, and that’s when we attack.

  They won’t expect an attack. We’ll take out their guards with the compound bows.

  Paul, do you have two of your archers that can handle the bows at 150 feet?”

  Paul got thoroughly excited and said, “Absolutely Zack, from 150 feet they will never know what hit them. Come on, it’s only half a football field. I guarantee it’s much quieter than suppressed AR’s. Zack, consider it done.”

  I smiled, and said, “Thanks, Paul, we’re all counting on you. I know you’ll do us proud.

  So, after the guards are laid to rest, we’ll throw a couple of grenades through a window and have snipers prepared to take out anyone trying to escape. It should be quick, deadly and we’ll be home before dark. Any questions?”

  Mike made everyone smile when he said, “…render them harmless? They ain’t big words, but they sure ere fancy.”

  When the tide of laughter died down, I raised my hand, and replied, “Well, yeah, it’s a bit fancy, but I’m tired of words like ‘killin’. I thought it might in-ter-ject a bit of class into our planning session.”

  That, of course, got everyone laughing again.

  Davi raised her hand and asked, “What can I do?”

  “Get well; protect the clan if we don’t come back.”

  Chapter 9 - Operation Hillbilly

  The Campground

  Callie came along to help set the trip wires and was a big help in making sure they were all well hidden. All but a few were simply noisemakers to warn us of any approaching threats.

  We placed all of the trip wires, booby traps and animal traps close to the cabins so they wouldn’t scare off their scouts. They stayed about 100 yards out and probably watched us with the aid of binoculars.

  Callie asked, “Why are we taking so much time to install trip wires and booby traps when we render them harmless tomorrow?”

  Smiling, I replied, “Baby girl, what if these aren’t the only threats in the area? The same traps will also warn of an attack by wolves and might even trap a few.”

  “Okay, that makes sense. We really need to make sure our guys don’t walk into one of those bear traps.”

  “I’ve told everyone to not go past the signs we put up that say “Camp Bear Paw.” I can’t help them much if they don’t pay attention.”

  Placing the trip wires was easy, but the traps were a bitch in the deep snow. We looked for places where the terrain and trees made natural paths down towards the main building.

  “Damn that spring is strong.”

  “It has to be to hold a bear after it’s triggered. Now you see why the mechanism has to be set with your feet outside of the jaws,” replied Paul.

  “I know we have safe paths for our travel but are you sure we’ll be able to find all of the traps when the danger is over? The fresh snow covers them well, but we’ll eventually want to take them with us.”

  Paul showed Roger the black Paracord attached to the trap and said, “I’m tying a cord to every trap with the cord covered with snow and tying the other end to a nearby marked tree that is in our safe zone. We just walk to the tree and follow the cord to the trap. The wind will cover the traps.”

  We finished installing the traps and trip wires by early afternoon and watched as the beautiful sunny skies slowly turned cloudy and dark. The dark clouds were scudding across the sky, bringing flurries.

  The wind picked up and began blowing the trees and rattling the window an hour later. Then the snow came in from the northwest. This wasn’t a heavy snowfall, but rather a light dusting with blowing and drifting.

  I was pleased to see the front move out quickly and leave enough snow to cover our work, but not bad enough to make the intruders stay home.

  We spent the afternoon checking and cleaning our weapons. I had to dig through my supplies to find the grenades and our military grade body armor.

  Our guards regularly wore the military grade body armor, but I wanted everyone on the raid to be more fully protected.

  We only had eight of the military models, so I planned to give them to the six men and then have the women draw straws to see who stayed clear of the fight and sniped at anyone trying to escape. Ally and Sally lost and were to join the men in the raid while Callie, Joan, and Lynn became snipers. Lynn was over four months pregnant, and we did our best to keep her away from danger, but she kept jumping into every fight. Bert hadn’t fully recovered, and his wife was useless with a gun.

  We
covered our plans several times then started playing bean bag toss in the dining room to help settle our nerves down a bit.

  Ally and I had the 10:00 pm guard shift so we turned in at 7:00 pm and tried to get some sleep. The alarm woke me to see Ally watching me wake up. She had her head propped up on a pillow. She was softly rubbing my chest as the alarm sounded.

  I rolled over on top of her and tried to get amorous, but she pushed me away and said, “We don’t have time. I don’t want to be late. We have plenty of time for that after the raid.”

  “Yes, we have time, but I’ll be cold and sleepy, and probably grumpy.”

  “Maybe, but it won’t matter, because I won’t be tired, sleepy, or grumpy.”

  Guard duty passed quickly with no threats or issues, and we were soon back inside by the fire taking off our cold weather gear. Ally wasn’t too cold, and she was very talkative.

  “Darling, what if these are good people that feel threatened by us intruding in their area?”

  “I think they’d do what we’d do and introduce themselves and try to see what we want. I think these are scumbags and somehow friends or relatives of the ones we sent to whatever hell, slavers go to.”

  I know you are right, but it seems that we have to fight all of the time just to survive. Will we always have to fight? Why can’t we move on to another area?”

  “Darling, moving on would be easy after the snow clears, but where to? Anderson, Owensville, many other cities and the countryside have gangs, crooked politicians, and meth dealers. We could end up running every month or so, and every time we leave, we lose what we have built and most of our food and supplies.”

  “I know, I know, it’s just that I am so tired of the fighting and afraid I’ll lose you in one of these fights.”

  “Damn, it’s 1:30 and we have to get up in thirty minutes.”

  We got out of bed before the alarm, joined Callie and Paul by the fireside and dressed in our cold weather gear and body armor. Roger and Joan were on guard duty. Sally and Mike were heading out ahead of us to relieve them.

  I heard Joan say, “Mike, you’re 10 minutes late. You need to crawl off Sally a few minutes earlier and get your ass out on time.”

  “Look, sister, just because you aren’t getting laid, don’t jump my ass.”

  “Sally, slap him and get him moving.”

  “For being late?”

  “No, for reminding me that I’m not getting laid.”

  “Mom, I can hear you.”

  “Little girl. You wanted to get married and become a woman, so you have to listen to me complaining about my lack of male companionship.”

  Callie laughed and said, “TMI, Paul, let’s go outside, so I don’t have to hear this kind of talk from my mom.”

  “Wait, Callie, I want to be serious here for a minute. In this new reality there does seem to be a subconscious need for companionship, and love, which, of course, includes sex.

  I just realized that we all feel that same need. It has to be in our gene pool to repopulate the Earth after such a major die-off. I mean, I don’t mean to sound so crass, ok, horney, but it’s there, and we all feel it. We simply need someone to hold us, protect us and love us. Callie, I’m sorry for my language. Do you understand?”

  Callie hugged her mother, and said, “Yeah, mom, I do feel it. I love you.”

  They were still in their embrace when we heard a clatter from one of the trip wires and a tortured scream in the woods.

  “Oh shit, my leg’s been cut off. Help!”

  They saw flashes and gunfire from that direction. Everyone poured out of the building, and the attackers greeted them with a hail of bullets. One caught Callie in the chest, knocked her flat on her butt and scared her out of her wits.

  “I’m hit. The vest stopped the bullet, but this hurts like a son of a bitch.”

  Paul checked her out while the others returned fire.

  Roger yelled to them and then ran over to their position.

  “Those assholes decided to attack tonight. It sounds like we caught some in the traps and there are several more advancing from the woods, plus several others sniping from the woods. Use your NVGs and kill any of those bastards that stick their heads up.”

  I gave Ally my NVGs and said, “Mike, you and Roger follow me, and we’ll go around the first cabin and come up behind them. Give your NVGs to the women. The rest of you keep the gang pinned down in the woods. Come on.”

  Ally and Sally could see the intruders hiding behind trees and logs. A couple of them were hiding behind bushes.

  Ally carefully placed the cross hair of the NVG scope on the first man and slowly squeezed the trigger using the pad of her finger. The rifle bucked, and the man died. She taught them the difference between concealment and cover when she placed .556 bullets in their chests.

  Sally killed another and wounded two more. The sniping from the woods ended.

  We turned the corner of the cabin and crept down the side using the shadows to conceal our movement. We were in the open about half way to the back of the dining room when we started taking gunfire from an automatic weapon.

  The only cover was the shallow ditch that drained the parking lot. The bullets passed over us but pinned us down, and we could not effectively return fire. We burrowed deep into the snow and kept our heads down.

  Two men with AK47s were advancing, and all we could do is poke our ARs up and shoot without looking.

  I felt a thud on my left hand and intense pain. I had been hit. The shot knocked my AR out of my hands, and I couldn’t reach it. I grabbed my pistol and tried to fire it in the attacker’s direction, but they kept firing and coming at us.

  Mike yelled, “I’m hit. Oh God, my foot hurts.”

  The bastards were getting close enough that the ditch wasn’t protecting us anymore.

  I heard, “I can see them. Kill the bastards.”

  I heard the AKs firing at us, and other gunfire join in the noise and then suddenly they stopped, and I heard someone yelling, “Are you okay?”

  It was Davi. She had two ARs in her hands. She walked up to the three men and riddled them with gunfire.

  “They had M249 SAWS. The turds must also be gun runners.”

  “Yeah, Gun runners with plenty of ammo. Davi, we owe you our lives.”

  Davi, helped me up while Roger helped Mike stop the bleeding and took him into the main building.

  Davi said, “Roger, come with me.”

  They left the room and headed outside to make sure the attackers had been neutralized.

  Joan and Sally worked on Mike while Ally tended to my hand. The bullet went through my middle fingers, missing the bone and out the back of my hand. She cleaned, placed antibiotic cream on the wound and bandaged it before she gave me a couple of pain pills.

  Mike’s left heel had been grazed resulting in a shallow furrow in his heel. It hurt like hell, but he could hobble around and bitch about the pain. Well, he is just a delicate flower.

  Ally told us, “We killed several in the woods. From the blood trails, we must have wounded a couple more. Davi killed the three attacking you, and we took out several more trying to join them.”

  “Thanks, Ally, you and Joan come with me to help check the campout and make sure we killed or ran those dirtbags away.”

  We checked all of the cabins and the area around the camp until we ran into Davi and Roger.

  “We found eight dead, two wounded and three alive in the bear traps. I killed the ones in the traps, and the other two are heading home.”

  “Why didn’t you kill them?”

  “Our mission was to follow them back to their base. One has a shoulder wound and the other a wound in his calf. They can’t walk very fast, and I marked where their trail starts.

  They are boogying back home as we speak. Now we have two leaving a trail straight back to their base. Let’s go.”

  I started to get up. Ally pushed me back down saying, “You’re wounded. You can’t go.”

  I got up and
said, “Ally, I have to go. We have to end this threat now. Mike, you stay here with Lynn, Bert Sam Jacob, and Callie while the rest of us end this tonight. If for some reason we don’t stop them, they might attack the camp again.”

  I took Ally off to the side and convinced her that I’d be okay and showed her that I had added two 30 round mags for my AR, and my 45.

  “Ally, I can fire 90 shots. That’s just three awkward mag changes, and I still have my .45 for any close in shit. I can get by with one hand. In a pinch, I can ignore the pain and get it done. I’ll join Mike in whining about it later.

  Besides, I have four hand grenades. I can really cause some serious damage.”

  She popped two Ibuprofens in my mouth and said, “I love you, and I’ll help protect my big fearsome man bear.”

  I kissed her. We gathered the others and headed towards the woods to pick up the trail of the wounded intruders.

  Davi was, of course right; the wounded duo was unable to walk very fast. I hoped that at least one didn’t bleed out and leave us searching for their base of operations.

  ***

  “Dad, my leg is killing me. We have to stop and rest. They won’t follow us tonight. We’ll have time to warn Mom and the others.”

  George responded, “Look pussy, I got shot in the chest, and I’m 20 years older than you. You don’t see me wanting to stop every ten minutes. We’ve stopped twice.

  Suck it up Buttercup, and make it past the Miller’s shack before we stop again.”

  “Dad, Joe got his leg in a bear trap. I saw it, and the trap pulled half the meat off his calf and took it down to his ankle. Two others got their damn legs in bear traps. Them sum bitches don’t fight fair.”

  “Don’t worry about them. We’ll round up every one of them bastards and fuck ‘em up. I promise that on your dead sister’s grave.”

  “But Dad, you killed my sister. You ain’t got no right swearing on her grave.”