Radical

by E. M. Kokie

“Hello, Shelley, Myrt,” Riggs says to two women passing by.

  Then we’re just standing there, Riggs smiling, waiting for what, I don’t know. “So, Bex,” he says, “I’m glad you’re here.”

  Usually when Dad goes anywhere with me, he looks down or to the side and keeps a body’s space between us. He doesn’t look at my head, except when someone else does, and then he’s embarrassed all over again. But now he has a hand on my shoulder. I’m Riggs-approved, and he’s proud. I’m not sure how I feel about that.

  “Are you going to the open training session?” Riggs asks me.

  “Yes,” Dad says. “I was going to walk Bex over and then check in with Steven.”

  “I know where it is,” I say.

  “You sure?” Dad asks.

  “Yeah. I can find my way there.”

  “I’ll meet you back at the lot after,” Dad says.

  “Excellent. Then we can get to work,” Riggs says.

  By the time I make my way out to the range, they’re already readying to shoot. Most of them are clustered around the first six firing points, with Carl and Karen supervising. But Randy has a small group all the way at the other end of the range, guys and girls.

  “You’re with Randy,” Carl says when I start toward his group. Karen gives me a welcoming nod, but Cammie looks through me like I’m not even there.

  In a lot of ways, it’s just like last time I was here, at least for my group. Randy makes everyone start with rifles and prone, even though a few of them are over eighteen and last time we were allowed to stand or sit. I glance at the other firing points. The others are shooting more or less independently, with Carl and Karen offering only tips and corrections. They’re upright and selecting their own targets. But there are more of us now. Maybe Randy’s nervous at the numbers, or maybe someone made him nervous at one of the sessions I missed.

  “We’re going to be moving on to other weapons and exercises in the coming weeks,” says Randy. “I just want to be sure everyone is ready.”

  So Randy is evaluating us. When it’s my turn, he gets close and watches every move I make. Even more intent than Carl was last time.

  I take a deep breath and then smoothly run through my safety checks and setup. I’m confident in my skills. He needs to see that I know what I’m doing. Once he gives me the go-ahead, I try to block him out and shoot. Maybe not my best accuracy, but smooth, easy, and better than the rest of them. After prone, we repeat sitting, kneeling, and standing. When I show clear on my last round, Randy gives me a curt “Good.”

  There’s one more to go in my group. Instead of watching him, I inch over so I can watch Cammie shoot. And then a girl with short hair. Karen steps in to give her some correction, but it’s about accuracy, not safety. Karen’s good: encouraging but correcting. And she can flat-out shoot. Maybe I should have just joined her group last time. I assumed the girls wouldn’t be as serious. They are, or at least most of them are, and they probably don’t ever have the wannabes to deal with.

  “Bex.”

  Randy’s standing there with two of the others. I walk back over to them.

  “You three are cleared for all of the open training sessions. Bex,” he says, holding me up as the others go over to where their friends are, “there are a few sessions and drills that will use handguns. Those will be marked on the schedule. You can have a parent attend, or you can observe. We’ll work you in as much as we can with a long gun or at least positioning, once we move on to maneuvers. Understand?”

  “Yes, sir,” I say. The “sir” was a good move. Randy’s pleased.

  “Good shooting today. See you next week.” From Randy, that’s like a personal invitation.

  A group of the older guys, with Daniel at the front, intercepts Randy as soon as he moves away from us. Lobbying, I’d say. I can’t really hear, until one of them says, “But we can start that now. We don’t need this stuff,” he says, pointing toward the rest of the group. “We can train as a patrol unit now, and then patrol the land, look for trespassers, and map —”

  “We already have surveyors and —”

  “Then on a trial basis,” one of the others says.

  “Hey,” Randy says. “You can take it up with Riggs if you want, but he was clear. Under twenty-one, you’re here. At least for now.” Again with the “for now.”

  “But we shouldn’t have to be with the children,” one of them says.

  “And you’re not,” Randy counters. “Sixteen and older, and there are at least two sixteen-year-olds who could probably outshoot half of you. Now, you want your own sessions? Recruit more members. But for now, it’s this or you’re on your own.”

  “Sucks,” I hear Mark say behind me.

  “Only three percent,” I hear Wannabe say, just like Mark. He’s even using that stupid three-finger gesture. “The next time, we’re going to need . . .”

  He parrots the same spiel Mark’s been doing lately. Wannabe drones on and on about how no one is telling him what he can shoot, and how not even Riggs is telling him he can’t carry — next year, when he’s old enough for a permit — and police states, and how the next “war” is going to start with someone like him stepping up and blah, blah, blah. These guys don’t know anything. Not about what would really happen if the shit hit the fan. Yet here they are, talking their bullshit about how they will “light the match.” Like they would know what to do once the world was on fire. And then they think what, they’re just going to come here and hunker down? Total BS.

  “What did you say? Hey,” Wannabe says. “Hey!”

  I look up. He’s pointing at me.

  “What?”

  “What did you say?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Come on, Zach,” one of the others says, trying to pull him away.

  “Bullshit, nothing,” Zach says, moving closer. “You said ‘Total BS.’”

  I look at Zach, at the guys around him.

  Mark’s not there anymore. He’s over by Daniel, not paying any attention.

  “Too chickenshit to say it to my face?” Zach asks.

  Okay. “It’s bullshit to think your big survival plan is getting here.”

  They stare at me.

  “Right now, there’s nothing here to sustain more than a few people long-term. No shelters. No food. No organization. This place isn’t remote enough to be safe long-term.”

  “So we go somewhere else,” Zach says.

  “How?”

  “We’ve got trucks.”

  “Damn right,” the tall kid says. “Fully loaded. Or will be.”

  Will be. Typical. “When? You can’t know when a crisis scenario will erupt. And if a massive four-wheel-drive truck stocked to the rims is your ‘bug out’ plan,” I say, with finger quotes, “then you’re done. Roads might be barricaded, clogged, or unsafe. And trucks are loud. Especially when the ambient noise dies down. There’d be no finesse or stealth to them.”

  “Who needs stealth?” Zach mocks. “We’ll have power.”

  “The extra weight will give it extra ramming power,” the tall kid says. The others laugh at his “ramming” motion. “Ram our way through. Full provisions, ammo, the works.”

  They probably see themselves as action heroes, kicking ass and taking names, probably with a harem of women they collect on the way.

  “Where are you going to fuel once the grid goes down? Most gas pumps these days run on electricity. Those massive trucks are guzzlers. And what about food, water?”

  “Hunt,” Zach says, “raid stores and businesses. Whatever, until we could get somewhere defendable.”

  “What place could you defend with the number of people you could fit in a truck — along with everything else you’d be carrying? Assuming, of course, that you’re not killed for that truck in your first confrontation with a hostile group.”

  “What do you know?”

  “I know that none of you could make it on foot, and it’s unlikely you could make it long in a truck. You couldn’t possibly carry enough
provisions and people to defend yourselves. You could maybe fit three or four of you in that truck, but that would be it, unless you started pitching your provisions. And then how are the four of you going to defend any site worth defending, alone?”

  They don’t argue. Zach and the tall guy are red-faced pissed, but I’m on a roll.

  “What you need is to be mobile, and in a small-enough unit to move efficiently. A three-day assault pack, holding just what you absolutely need to defend yourself and make shelter and find water and food, and then the skills to survive. If you’re relying on a truck full of crap, you’ll be dead in a month. Sooner if it’s winter.”

  “Won’t need any of it when this place is ready,” the tall guy says.

  “Maybe,” I say. “But a compound is a refugee magnet. And there’s trying to defend it with the number of people it could support. But, again, how are you even going to get here if the crisis hits without warning and the roads are closed or blocked? If what we’re facing is the police state you were just talking about?” I ask, waving toward Zach. “You four are going to all fight through the barricades and forces to get here? Without bringing the hostiles with you? You think that gate is keeping anyone out who really wants in?”

  The two guys in back look at each other.

  “Assuming you keep the truck gassed up, stocked, and ready to go, and the crisis scenario doesn’t hit until you are fully prepared, there is still no guarantee you’ll be able to get here. We need to be doing more than shooting. Survival skills. Foraging and shelter. Scouting and evading.”

  “You’re not even a member,” Zach says. “But even if we keep your family on,” he says like that’s in doubt, “we’d have a better chance than you would.”

  I smile at him. “No, you wouldn’t. Because I could get here, or wherever else we decided to go, on foot. We’d be mobile. Adaptable. We wouldn’t need a truck or a compound to survive. I know what it’s like to live out of a pack. To find food and water and build shelter. Do you?”

  “Sure.”

  I feel the smirk creeping up my face. “Really?”

  He advances. “You think you could really take any one of us?” he asks, and then he pushes his finger into my chest, daring me.

  I smack it away and spin, moving to sweep his legs, and then someone yells, “Hey!” and I pull back. Zach stumbles, and then one of the other guys has Zach by the arms. “Cut it out,” the guy yells, like we were goofing around.

  I hold my stance in case Zach comes at me again.

  “Come on, dude,” one of the others says.

  “She’s not worth it,” another says.

  Finally Zach shakes him off and falls back.

  “No, it’s not,” he says. “Stupid dyke,” he adds, just loud enough for me to hear.

  I watch until they seem to be moving away, Zach included, and then I turn to get my bag where I dropped it.

  I’m shoved out of the way by someone moving fast.

  “Oh, I know you aren’t that chickenshit,” Karen says, advancing on them. Zach looks like he just sucked on a lemon, caught readying to hock a loogie at my back. “Go ahead,” she says, “swallow it down.”

  Zach looks trapped, and the others shift their feet, putting a little distance between them and Zach. Instead of swallowing, Zach pulls back and lobs a huge gob of spit into the dirt off to the side.

  “Nice.” Karen shakes her head in disgust. “The way you shoot, you should do less talking and more watching. You might learn something.”

  “You gonna teach me a lesson?” Zach asks.

  “Sure.” Karen smiles, and then says, “I could whoop your ass any way you want. Any day. You just name it.”

  “Really,” one of them says, stepping up beside Zach. He grabs his crotch. “You got a dick after all?”

  “No, you little pissant, which is why it would make it all the more satisfying when I kicked your ass. And let me tell you,” Karen says, “you whip that thing out around me, you better make sure you came to play. I have no issue with slapping you — or it — down.”

  “Bring it in,” Randy yells over from where he and Carl are waiting to dismiss the others. It’s clear Randy knows something is up, but not what, and that he’s letting Karen handle it. I walk over, not really knowing what to do. But Karen walks up front as if none of that just happened.

  “Hi,” the girl with the sparkles says, sitting down beside me at the back of the group. “Trinny,” she reminds me.

  “Trinny, yeah, hi.”

  She’s just so happy, in her sparkly shirt and sparkly headband and weird rubbery belt.

  “I like your hair,” she says.

  “Thanks,” I say, but I’m not sure she means it. Her braids are very girly and old-fashioned.

  “Don’t worry about those guys,” Trinny says. “They’re just jerks. Are you coming next week?”

  “Maybe,” I say.

  “Good,” she says. “You did good.” She is up and moving toward the path before I can even register that Randy is done talking. She catches up with one of the older guys and they walk on together, looking very friendly.

  Mark’s already gone.

  I have a dilemma. I can run ahead and put some distance between me and Zach and them. Or I can stick close to Randy and Carl. Either way, those jerks will know I intentionally took a defensive posture. I’ll have to watch my back forever around them. Or I can attack and go on the offensive, and maybe get double-teamed and marked as a troublemaker. Or I can hang back and let the chips fall, but not be the aggressor.

  “Are you ready?”

  “What?”

  Cammie gives me a duh look. “Are you ready?” she asks. “To go back? I’m heading that way.” She looks at Karen and rolls her eyes. Karen nods. Karen appointed her my bodyguard.

  “Oh, yeah, right.” Good. This is good. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

  I want to thank Karen before we go, but Cammie says, “She has to take the range guns back to the Box for her dad.”

  “Box?”

  “Armory,” Cammie says, like I should have known that. “We call it the Box. And I don’t have all day, so . . .”

  “Right.”

  We walk in silence for a while. Not because I don’t want to talk, but because pretty much everything I’ve said in front of her thus far has made me sound like an idiot, and I don’t know what to risk next.

  And Cammie doesn’t seem to want to talk.

  “Karen’s really good,” I finally say. “I mean, you’re good, too, but, I mean . . .” I stop talking.

  “Thanks,” she says, dripping with sarcasm. “And yes, she is. She should be officially on the training staff.”

  But she’s young and a girl. “Yeah.”

  “Think you can find your way from here?” Cammie asks. I look up to realize we are at the main path that runs behind the buildings and near the trails. “Just around that bend it will open up to the lot. Okay?”

  “Yeah,” I say. “And thanks. And tell Karen —”

  “Bye.” Cammie turns and heads off down the path toward the buildings, one of which I know is the armory — the Box — without looking back.

  I make it to the lot without incident and then cop a squat on the rail of the gazebo to wait for Dad. I scroll through my phone while I wait, but it doesn’t get great reception out here.

  “Hello.”

  Riggs is crossing the grass.

  “Don’t get down,” he says when I start to climb off the railing. “I hoped I might find you.”

  He comes over and sits down on the top step, facing out toward the lot and the administrative buildings. He’s so tall it feels sort of like we’re sitting next to each other, even with him sitting on the step.

  “What did you think of the training session?”

  “It was fine.” He just looks at me. “Good, I mean. It was good.”

  “I know we’re starting slow, with the basics, but we think it’s important to . . .”

  I nod, because we already heard all this fr
om Randy. And Carl.

  “Anything I should know about?” he asks.

  “What?”

  “About training, anything you think I should know?”

  “About?”

  He studies me and then smiles. “Okay,” he says, looking back toward the lot.

  He knows something — I just don’t know what. I can’t believe he would be down here about Zach, but maybe Cammie ran right to him? Or one of the others? Karen? Or maybe he thinks I’m the problem, like I shouldn’t have provoked him? Or maybe Zach went right to him, saying I was talking trash about Clearview? Crap. Dad will kill me if I’ve made Riggs think he’s the one being critical.

  He waves to someone in the lot.

  “You’re right about the survival skills.”

  Someone did run to him.

  “We’re planning to integrate foraging, trapping, scouting and evasive techniques, finding water and shelter”— he waves his hand —“all the basic survival skills, into the training sessions. But when you’re building something like this from the ground up, you have to start with the basics, and with the areas of highest interest.”

  Meaning they don’t have any confidence the guys would show up for hiking and survival skills. Or they really are making all this up as they go along, and they hadn’t really thought through the immediate survival needs.

  “I heard that you’re handy,” he says, finally twisting on the step to face me. “That you can fix things. That you’re learning auto mechanics from your uncle. Those are valuable skills.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Maybe we can find you some work around here.”

  For fees? Or free labor? Because I don’t think either Mark or Dad has gotten a single cent for what they’ve been doing around here. Yeah, no. But Riggs is waiting for a response, looking like he’s just made me some great offer.

  “Maybe,” I say, because I don’t know what else to say. “But I’m not sure how much time I’ll have between working at the station and training. And I need to be earning money. Things are tight. I can’t work for free. I mean, if there are fees or . . .”

  “Of course,” he says, smiling wider, like I said exactly what he thought I would say. What he wanted me to say. “I appreciate your focus. Your father said you were loyal,” he says. “To your uncle, I mean.”