“Yeah, at a minimum,” Larry said. Chuck agreed.
Peter added up the dozen or so soldiers he’d seen dismount when the trucks had first gotten into town, plus the three police officers Bowman had before the Event, maybe double that deputized since. Assuming no more were deputized as part of the crackdown that had sent Chuck fleeing to the homestead, Peter guessed more than half of the troops and cops were on shift.
He shared his assumption with the other two.
“They’re pulling even more hours on patrol than we are,” Larry said. “And there’s a lot more for them to deal with. We’ve only got to keep eyes outward. Seems like they’re looking out as well as in.”
“I imagine, after yesterday, the threat from inside the town is bigger than outside it,” Chuck said.
“But they still sent some of their men up onto our road to look around,” Peter said. All at once, pieces clicked into place. “The mayor’s brother. He was arrested in town, and he knows that we’re up there. I think we need to get back.”
The three made a cautious return to the homestead, keeping eyes and ears out for anybody observing them on the road. Peter was suddenly very reluctant to let anybody see him moving about, especially since they were returning home. He had thought about bypassing his road and running farther down the highway to make a big loop around, but he didn’t want the rest of the folks to worry about them being gone too long, and he didn’t want to make a blind run into places where other people might be settled in and not welcoming to strangers passing through.
That fear was reinforced when they pulled their bikes off the road at the edge of the Meier property. Laying on the ground was a plastic bag with a letter inside of it. None of them remembered it having been there when they’d gone into town. It looked intentionally laid down, not like some random litter that had just blown in.
Peter took a long branch and cautiously poked at the bag, flipping it over a few times. Satisfied that it wasn’t trapped, he picked it up and opened it.
Fellow Free People,
We know you all a bit through your membership on our preparedness forum. We followed the military truck up today to see what it was doing, and in the process noticed you are holding your own up here.
We’ve banded with a few other neighboring families to pool resources and provide security for our homes. Your property is too far out from ours to effectively join up with us, but we wanted to let you know we’re out here as well, and that you’re not alone. Now that we know you’re up here, we’ll be happy to keep to the south side of the highway for hunting and forage and ask you to respect that and hold to the north. If you’d like to communicate further, leave a message down at the old blue barn off Tackhill Road. Address it to the username of the old Sabre pilot, and include yours as well so we know it’s from the right guy.
Stay strong, friends.
The letter made Peter feel a lot better, but also frustrated him beyond belief. It was great knowing that there were local, preparedness-minded folks that at least knew his father online and were willing to extend an offer of friendship. Sadly, whatever login Art had used on the forum, and his knowledge of who was who, was buried out behind the house. For the thousandth time, Peter really wished he’d taken more interest in that part of his father’s life.
14
The day after he broke into her house, Tom Grossman heard Ginger Harlowe come home for the evening. He came up out of the basement to meet her upstairs.
“It is very fortunate that you never left anything behind in that little hideaway I’d set up for you,” she said, referring to the makeshift bed she’d set up in the supply closet of her science classroom so he could occasionally retreat for a quick nap or to recharge for a few minutes.
“How so?”
“Prange’s guys came through the school, searching it room by room looking for you. I told them I had the bed set up in the dark room for any messengers that were available on the overnights. They bought it, but really searched the room intently anyway. Took a lot of interest in the different chemicals and glassware I keep back there.”
Grossman took a deep breath. “Yes, it is a good thing. I know I’m putting you at enough risk as it is, just being here. I’m glad I didn’t leave them reason to look into you any further.”
“On that subject, we do have to consider whether it’s safe for you to stay here,” Harlowe said. “It seems like they’ve got a list of your best friends in town and have been harassing them all day. I don’t know if they’re eventually going to go house to house looking for you or anything like that. But if they do any investigation, I’m sure somebody must have noticed that I was covering for you to get away from work for little breaks when you needed them. It’s only a matter of time before they show up here.”
Grossman nodded. The thought had occurred to him during the day, and he’d spent a good amount of time thinking about how he might hide if Prange’s men made a concerted search of Harlowe’s home. The basement didn’t have any closets or nooks where he could camouflage a door. He hadn’t wandered the first floor of the house while she wasn’t home, but he didn’t think there was any place he could become invisible up there. Maybe the attic, but if he was remembering what her house looked like, she had a low crawlspace at best up there. “The last thing I’d want is for you to get in trouble for harboring me,” he said. A part of him desperately wished she’d argue the point with him.
“Mostly, I worry about you getting caught,” she said. “Prange is really pissed off about you giving him the slip. Things will not go well for you if he gets his hands on you. We need to figure out whether we can make my place work, or if there’s a better place you can stay, or if we need to just get you out of town.”
“I’m not going to leave, Ginger. I’m going to defend this town, regardless of whether people would still keep me as their mayor or not. Whatever Jerry got himself up to, or might be getting up to with Prange, it’s no good for anybody here. I’m going to do what I can to get those guys out of town and try to set things right.”
“You’re going to throw in against the state government and the National Guard?”
“Not at all. They’re not what they claim to be.”
“What?”
“I first noticed it yesterday. There were things that weren’t right with the soldiers. I noticed a couple of obvious things that struck me as odd, and from there, I realized that they’d never quite sat right with me. Once I started thinking about that, there were things I hadn’t realized bothered me about Prange. I don’t know for sure what they are, but they’re not state government, and they’re certainly not here to help us out.”
Harlowe poured two glasses of water from a big cooler. One thing Grossman had figured out about her was that she didn’t have the collection of useful outdoor gear, like gas lanterns or field stoves, that many people in town had. The school cafeteria had been a godsend for her.
“Are they militia or something?” she asked.
Grossman gave that idea some thought. “No,” he finally said. “They don’t fit the mold. We used to have some guys that had been in the Posse Comitatus out around here. Another time, we had some militia group buy up some land about ten miles south to set up a training camp or something. Those guys acted nothing like Prange and his men. They were more straightforward about things, everything up front with them. Prange and Carter both always seem like they’re hiding something.”
Harlowe sat down and picked at her nails, obviously trying to puzzle out the problem.
Grossman broke the silence. “How are they acting today?”
“Prange is clearly stressed. He’s short with people, twitchy. Literally, not just metaphorically. He’s got this facial tic that I hadn’t noticed before, and he’s constantly fidgeting now.”
“And Carter?”
“He’s good at delegating, so it’s not hitting him as bad, but he’s still not happy and is stretched pretty thin. I’ve seen a lot more of him today, because they took over the ea
st wing of the school. They moved the soldiers out of the gym and gave them half the classrooms to use as barracks. The rest are being used as a jail annex. Word around town is that they hauled in more than a dozen people yesterday.”
“So much for setting me up a headquarters in the boiler room, huh?”
Harlowe let out a soft chuckle. “Well, if you wanted to try hiding under their noses in the place they’d least expect it…”
“I suppose there’s way too much action around the firehouse for Thorssen to stash me away there.”
The tension returned to Harlowe’s face. “They hauled Thorssen in, too. Some mumbo-jumbo about him mismanaging medical supplies and sensitive pharmaceuticals. Bad move, that. It makes sense if they want to get your allies locked down. Terrible idea if you want people to support you.”
Grossman had to think about that. He did a semi-annual review of the supply inventories for the fire house and ambulances. He couldn’t recall ever seeing anything that would qualify as a controlled substance or narcotic. Some of the drugs in inventory were kept under lock and key because of cost or because they were dangerous if misused, but he couldn’t think of anything that could be considered “sensitive,” which led him to believe it was a bogus charge trotted out as an excuse. “I suppose Cathy Berkman was brought in, too?” he asked.
“Yeah. They’re charging her with the same thing they want to charge you with. Conspiracy to abet the price gouging that was going on. They’re trying to make a case that your policies weren’t only creating an environment where it could happen, but that you and Cathy were directly benefitting.”
Grossman shook his head in disbelief. From where he was sitting, the whole thing seemed so obviously a thin veneer of proper procedure over a steaming pile of crap designed to overthrow the leadership of the town and replace it. He wondered how many people actually believed it, and how many were willing to play along because they thought Prange could do better, by himself or by putting different people in charge of the town. He really wanted to know if his brother was cooperating with all of it.
Grossman said, “I know that Prange and Carter had proposed the idea of moving any detainees from here up to Black River Falls or Fort McCoy, where there supposedly were consolidated detention facilities. This was back when we had fewer than ten people locked up. Any sign they’re planning on moving anybody?”
“Really? If you’re right that they’re not government at all, I shudder to think of what they might do to anybody they haul out of town.”
“Which is why I can’t let them do that.”
“I haven’t seen anybody taken away yet, but that may just be a matter of available manpower. They have one truck out doing something right now, took off with four soldiers a couple hours ago. The rest of the soldiers are out looking for you, walking a beat, or guarding things. They’re spread really thin.”
“How do you know how many soldiers left on the truck?”
“My messengers. Prange and Carter still need them to keep in touch with their people and with Schuster’s. They get information back to me.”
“I don’t know if I’m comfortable with that. Your whole network is kids between thirteen and seventeen, isn’t it?”
“A couple younger, but yeah.”
“Things could go really bad for them if Prange thinks they’re spying on him. I’d rather go without information than put them at risk getting it.”
Harlowe nodded. “I have been thinking that myself. I’ve pulled all the girls off duty, at least. Most of Prange’s men are in that age range where I really don’t trust them around high school girls in a situation like we’ve got here.”
“Good call,” Grossman said. Even if Prange’s men were actually soldiers, he’d seen enough bad behavior among young men under his command when he’d been in the military to know exactly what Harlowe meant.
“Oh!” Harlowe said suddenly. “I forgot. I got you dinner.” She went to her purse and pulled out a cloth bundle.
Grossman unwrapped it and assessed the contents. A sandwich made from two thick slices of bread, some sort of spread he couldn’t immediately identify, and a couple slices of cheese. It came with a little bit of rice and beans and a little bag of chips.
“I talked with the folks in the cafeteria today,” Harlowe said. “When Prange took over all the stores, restaurants, and bars, anything edible went to them. There’s going to be a lot more snacks and canned goods going into rotation for the next few days. They’re really worried about what’s going to happen when the dry goods like flour, rice, and beans run out.”
“So, he’s kicked the can a couple weeks down the road, but we’re still needing to set up for long-term survival on our own.”
“Unless whoever he’s working for has access to provisions and can distribute them. I think a lot of people in town would be willing to put up with quite a bit if he could reliably put food on their tables.”
“I have no idea,” Grossman said, taking a bite of the sandwich. It seemed to be a tuna salad, very light on the mayo but with some other dressing to liven it up. “For now, we should probably figure out what to do with me, so they don’t find me if they come kicking in your door. And then it’s time for me to get in touch with people I know I’ll be able to rely on. These guys are bad news, and I want them out of my town.”
“If you’ll let me keep getting information from my messenger net a little longer—” Harlowe started.
“No,” Grossman said firmly. “I’m not putting any of the town’s kids at risk by having them running messages or spying for me. Some kid gets arrested or shot for me, I’d never be able to live with myself. Please, Ginger. Don’t risk them.”
“All right,” she said. “The thing you need to know is that they’ve been bringing me the information of their own accord. I haven’t been asking for it.”
“So, they know something’s wrong, and they want to help put it right?”
“I think so. But I’ll discourage them from doing it.”
“I’d appreciate that. It’s good to know that I’ve still got support in town, though.”
“You do. You know, now that I’m thinking of it. If you want somewhere that you can stay hidden and still work, what about the water treatment station?”
“Why do you say that?”
“There are three guys that go down there every day, and they’re firmly in your camp. I used to take the kids up there for a field trip every year, so I’ve been inside the place. There are plenty of rooms inside, most of which have windows, so you’d have light during the day. It’s right at the edge of town, but also one of those things that I imagine Prange won’t have any interest in, assuming he’s not actually an emergency management officer. I think you could set up there. Let me feel it out for you tomorrow, see if I’m right about the guys working down there being on your side.”
15
Two days after taking over Bowman, Daniel Prange wasn’t sure how much control he actually had. Taking control of the shops and putting an end to the price gouging had bought him some goodwill, but he knew that would only last as long as the food and other goods he was now able to sell. Cathy Berkman, the town’s acting Secretary/Treasurer, had set up a rationing system, but all that was going to do was slow down the inevitable emptying of the store shelves. Unless the cartel could get supplies moving, his hold on the town had an expiration date.
Prange knew that the cartel controlled at least one major distribution warehouse in Black River Falls and had been consolidating its hold on food processing plants in the area. The number of little factories and plants was really stretching the cartel’s manpower, and the simple lack of operational vehicles was seriously hindering their ability to distribute what they had.
Stepping out of the town hall, he kicked at a stray stone in frustration. He’d held up his end of the deal—find a pressure point in some town up in the area and push at it until he could turn the government to his ends. The cartel was falling short on their end, which was to put fo
od in people’s bellies.
He knew that sending one or both of his trucks back to Black River would help a lot, but he didn’t feel like he could spare either of them quite yet. He needed to deal with the people that had shot up his guys the other day; he needed to figure out where exactly the people the mayor’s brother had a shootout with were holed up; he needed to find out how many little families and cells of survivalists were between Black River Falls and Bowman, who’d be more than happy to ambush a truck full of supplies…
And he needed to figure out where Tom Grossman had gone.
Of all those tasks, the first seemed like it was most likely to yield results. Not only would he be able to extend his foothold out a little bit farther to the west, but his men had first taken fire out there trying to see if the mayor had fled for a plot of land he owned to the west of town. If that was true, capturing the mayor could be a bonus of that effort.
There were eight men lined up in front of the trucks. It didn’t seem like enough for the work to be done, but it was well over half of the men he had available. He needed to keep the rest in town, paired up with the local police to guard the town hall and school, and keep up their street patrols.
Some of the local deputies had offered to join in on the mission, but Prange and Carter had both agreed to not take the help. He often referred to his crew as his “soldiers,” but they weren’t. Not in the military sense. They had their own ways of dealing with resistance and adversity that really wouldn’t sit well with the locals. It would blow their cover right off if any of the townsfolk were to see the action.
“Mount up,” Prange said, reaching up to open the passenger side door of the lead truck. His driver hopped up into the cab beside him, and the rest of the men climbed up into the bed.
“You remember where you guys got lit up?” Prange asked.
Age of Survival Series | Book 2 | Age of Panic Page 13
