Apocalypse Coming

by William Dunaway

  “How many would you estimate Len?”

  “It looks to me like about 50 or 60 of them.”

  “What kind of weapons do they have?”

  He looked at the crowd using his scope, “They seem to have an assortment of hunting rifles, shotguns, and a couple have handguns,” then after a pause, he chuckled and said, “You’re not going to believe this, but it looks like a few of them in the back are only carrying baseball bats.”

  “The crowd’s roar has definitely got quieter. As loud as they were when we first heard them, the sound should be overwhelming as close as they are.” Phillip Akers said.

  “They’re probably worn out from having to walk that far,” Harold, his brother replied.

  “Jake, Check Two, how ya looking?” I asked over the radio.

  “All peaceful here.”

  “Check Two. We’re clear.”

  “Wit, you guys get up here. I want you in place.” I said.

  “On the way.” I could hear Wit’s bike speeding up the road. When he arrived, Blake was holding the SAW in his arms on the back of the bike. Wit grabbed the saw and ran up to his position in the loft of the barn. Blake followed carrying an extra belt of ammo for the SAW and had his M-4 shouldered. Within moments, I saw the barrel of the SAW sticking out of a hole that Wit had placed in the barn wall.

  When I looked back up the road, I saw the heads of several from the crowd peaking the crest of the road.

  I said over the radio, “Don’t fire until ordered to. Maybe we can end this before it starts.”

  When the crowd got within about 75 yards of us, they stopped. Some of their expressions made it look like they didn’t know what to do next.

  “Does anyone see Lebowski or his crew?” I asked.

  Mike, scoping the crowd said, “The only ones I see are his sons. They’re front and center. But I don’t see……, Wait a minute, Lebowski and his friend are sitting on bicycles, right on the crest of the hill. They’re not approaching. Apparently, they’re going to leave the fighting to everyone else.” He paused, “You know; I could take him out, very easily.”

  I had to think of a reason not to let Mike pull the trigger. It would eliminate a lot of problems with just one shot…. but the crowd hadn’t fired and wasn’t getting any closer, so I said, “Negative, not yet.”

  We sat there for a good minute, and no one was doing anything. I was just getting ready to address the crowd when Thatcher and Billy stepped forward from the mob.

  “I don’t agree with this, but we’ve been told to talk to you about what we want,” Billy said with disgust.

  “Well, come on up,” I instructed.

  “Aren’t you going to meet us half way?” Thatcher asked.

  “Well, let’s see here. You outnumber us a little less than ten to one. You guys seem to be ready to attack our position. I think you can either talk from there or come closer if that’s what you were told to do.”

  “How do we know you won’t just shoot us down.”

  “If we wanted to shoot you, you’d have a bullet in you already.”

  Billy acted disgusted, but both started to approach. When they got within 10 yards of us, I told them to stop, “What do you want?”

  With a sarcastic tone and body language, Billy started yelling where the crowd could hear him, “What gives you the right to block the road? That’s a public road, and you're breaking the law. We’ve been appointed deputies by the mayor of Pine City, and the town has annexed this area. We’re here to inspect the new township. Are you willing to give way?”

  You could tell he was saying all of this as though he had to memorize what he just said.

  I laughed, “Let me interpret what you just said. Your daddy told you to come up here and try to get us to surrender. Well, you can tell daddy, we said no. By the way, why is your daddy hiding way behind the crowd?” The guys on our line couldn’t help but laugh.

  I could see the anger grow in Billy and I could tell he was ready to pop.

  “Billy, seriously. You’re about to get a lot of people killed, including yourself. You need to turn these people around and let them go home.”

  He started laughing, “As you said, we outnumber you ten to one. You don’t have a chance against us.” I could tell, that now, he was speaking for himself.

  “Billy, numbers can be deceiving. I’m telling you to take these people home.” I then made a dreadful mistake and stepped up where my upper body was completely visible, but I wanted to try and talk some sense to the crowd, “Folks, you all need to turn around and go home. I promise you, that if you listen to the Lebowski’s, most of you are going to end up shot or dead.”

  Suddenly a man yelled out from the crowd, “Fuck you! You need to share your food with us.”

  Another man yelled, “Yeah, we were told you had about 10 acres of garden and a stockpile of food. Enough to feed a small army.”

  “Folks, you have been lied to. We have a garden but it’s a normal size garden, and we don’t have stockpiles of food. We have just enough to feed ourselves for a short time.”

  Billy yelled over his shoulder, “He’s lying. I’ve seen it for myself.”

  “He’s a liar folks. Did any of you know the Jones’ at the end of this road?”

  I heard a woman say, “Yes, I knew them.” Then a couple of other voices spoke up and made comments like, “Yeah, I knew them also.”

  I noticed they were saying the word knew and not know. “Well, they were murdered two nights ago, by Billy here.”

  Someone yelled out, “We were told you guys murdered them. That you killed them for their food.”

  “Folks, that’s another lie. We found them with their throats cut and it looked like Mrs. Jones was raped. It was done with a large knife. How many of you have seen Billy here with that big Bowie knife?”

  The crowd started mumbling among themselves, saying comments like, “That’s right, he does always carry that big knife.”

  “Folks, please turn around and go home.”

  A couple of them acted as though they were going to turn around, then another man said, “What about the food? We need food.” That seemed to stir the crowd up again.

  I held my arms up trying to get the crowds attention and yelled, “Folks, you….”

  At that point, Thatcher pulled a revolver out of his belt and fired three shots in my direction, with the third one hitting me on the left side of the chest. The force of the shot knocked me down. I felt intense pain; it felt like I had gotten hit in the chest with a baseball bat.

  Immediately, Mike fired and put a round dead center into the side of Thatcher’s head, dropping him to the ground. Mike immediately followed up with a second shot into Billy’s chest, dropping him to the ground as well. Billy had been drawing his gun but with hesitation. He obviously wasn’t expecting Thatcher to shoot.

  Everything seemed to go in slow motion for several moments to me. I could see, but there was a shadow that encircled anything I looked at. I thought I lost my hearing for a moment as it seemed like the crowd went completely quiet. But in reality, it was as though they were all stunned at what happened. Then two or three of them started firing at us, then the rest opened fire. Soon I heard the SAW open fire, and then all hell broke loose. I looked up and saw all of our people firing. I was still stunned, and the pain was still intense, but the shadow I had in my vision seemed to be disappearing, and things were becoming a little clearer. I then heard Tag yell over the radio, “Brandy, get down here. Vince has been hit.”

  Brandy didn’t hear the call because she was sitting right next to the SAW, which was capable of shooting 750 rounds per minute. No, Brandy didn’t hear the call, but Kim, Carmen, and Mia did.

  While Carmen and Mia were riding the borders of the farm, they took the job very seriously, taking the time to observe everything. Carmen was riding Lucky, and Mia was riding Ornery.

  “It seems like they have been up there for a long time,” Carmen said.

  Mia was just replying when three s
hots rang out from the intersection area. Then immediately, two more.

  Carmen said, “The first three sounded like a handgun, but the next two were definitely a rifle.

  All at once, they heard the SAW machine gun, and within moments it sounded like a war was going on.

  They both stopped and stared with fear. Neither one of them knew what to do. In one way, they wanted to go help, but they knew they had a job. They were almost in a daze of frustration.

  Suddenly, the radio came on, “Brandy, get down here. Vince has been hit.”

  Carmen felt like she had been kicked in the stomach and yelled out, “NO! Please, no.”

  Immediately, she kicked Lucky against his sides, and he took off at a full run towards the house. Mia immediately did the same.

  Kim was on the tower when she heard the firefight start. She said a silent prayer, asking God to protect us. When she heard the call come over the radio she went into shock, she felt lost and stumbled, having to grab the rail surrounding the tower.

  She glanced out to our field and saw Mia and Carmen coming up at a full run. She got off the tower and ran to the gate that was between the field and the driveway. Even though it only took seconds for the girls to get to the gate, it seemed like forever to Kim.

  When they arrived, Mia immediately jumped off Ornery and handed the reigns to Kim. Kim, who over the years, always seemed to get on Ornery carefully, this time, looked like a professional cowgirl, leaping into the saddle. Both Kim and Carmen ran the horses out of the driveway and then really kicked them into full speed when they got out on the road.

  Neither one of them put any thought into what they were riding into. All they knew was they had to get up to where I was. They had to be there with me.

  At first the horses pretty well stayed neck to neck but eventually, Ornery’s younger age was winning out, and by the time they got within a couple of hundred yards of the intersection, Kim had a good 20-yard lead on Carmen.

  Kim could tell that Ornery was starting to get reluctant of running into the sound of the gunfire. Both horses had been around a lot of shooting but never like this. Even though the gunfire had slowed down considerably, the closer Ornery got, the jumpier he became. About 100 yards from the intersection, Ornery stopped running and started revolting. Every time he would hear the SAW, he would start to bolt off to the side. Kim finally dismounted and started running toward the intersection.

  Lucky was doing the same, but Carmen tried to force the issue. When Lucky saw Ornery trotting back towards him, he reared up on Carmen, causing her to slide, fall off and land on her leg and then back.

  Kim looking back saw her falling off and stopped for a moment to check on her. Carmen yelled, “Keep going, I’m alright.”

  About this time, I had come out of my daze, so I looked down to look for blood on my chest, but there was none. There was a hole in one of the M-4 ammo pouches, so I pulled out the two mags which almost burnt my fingers, and one was badly dented and split on the side where the bullet made an impact. The one behind it had a nice dent but not near the damage as the first mag had.

  We discovered later that Thatcher had shot me with a .38 special. Thank God it was, because when the round hit the double stack of magazines, it pierced the first magazine but when it hit the second, it either broke the bullet up, or it ricocheted. Apparently, the extreme blunt force and the pain was caused by the magazines being forced against my chest.

  I stood up and saw Brandy starting to run out of the barn to check on me. I waved her off and got on the radio, “I’m fine, get back to your position.”

  She hesitated, but with another shot being fired, she ran back up to the loft.

  The gunfire was now just sporadic. I looked over the vehicle that we had used for concealment and saw a gruesome sight. There were at least 25 bodies from the mob dead or dying. The SAW alone made this a one-sided fight. Then when you add the M-16 and all the rest of the weapons, it was a wipeout.

  Wit and Brandy desperately wanted to help the wounded, but there were still a couple of hard-liners hidden in the soybeans on both sides of the road, still firing at us from hidden positions. Wit had tried spraying the soybeans with the SAW, but it didn’t take them all out. We had to stay in position. Two-thirds of the mob started running away the minute we had opened fire. Most of our group was trained and only fired at anyone that was raising a weapon but like in all conflicts; I’m sure there were a few that weren’t. Anytime you open up with any automatic fire, complete accuracy will not happen.

  Besides myself, we only had one other injury. Phillip had been shot in the right arm, but it only caught the flesh, missing the bone completely. When the gunfire had slowed down to occasional random shots, his brother put a bandage and direct pressure on the wound.

  I was looking the area over, when I spotted Kim running up to us, in a squat type stance. I yelled at her to take cover. She ran over to the sprayer unit that was sitting in the soybeans, about 50 yards from the roadside.

  I then noticed Carmen limping up the road to us. I yelled at her to get out of there and take cover. She ran into the ditch about 20 yards from Kim.

  When I tried making my way over to where Kim was, I got pinned down by someone that started firing from the soybeans. We couldn’t tell exactly where it was coming from so I yelled at both of them to stay down.

  While Kim was taking cover behind the sprayer unit, she started hearing rustling from the other side of the sprayer. She looked around the wheel that she was hiding behind and saw a barrel of a rifle emerging and pointing towards us at the roadblock. She raised her carbine and fired three times, about 3 feet behind the end of the barrel. She heard a man groan loudly and saw the gun fall to the ground.

  Hearing the shots, I started crawling over to Kim. As I was, Kim heard more rustling and looked around the tire again. This time, there was another man standing there, pointing his handgun right at Kim’s head. The man grabbed her, pulling her up and wrapped his arm around her neck while holding a gun to her head. The man gave her an evil smile and was just about to put pressure on the trigger, when Carmen screamed, “NO!”

  The man hearing her scream, turned towards Carmen while holding Kim and told her to drop her rifle. She hesitated, and he said, “Drop it now, or I’ll blow her head off.

  Carmen dropped her carbine. She looked Kim in the eyes, then back at the man and said, “Please don’t hurt my wife.”

  The man got a puzzled look on his face and relaxed his grip on Kim slightly and smiled as though he was thinking about Kim and her being a couple. At that moment, Kim let her muscles go limp, and she slipped out of the man’s grasp. Carmen grabbed the Glock 27 from her side and started firing it into the man repeatedly. The man fell backward against the sprayer unit, but as he was dying, he got off one shot at Carmen, hitting her in between the chest and her left shoulder. Carmen dropped to the ground.

  Kim screamed, “Carmen!” and ran over to her. I had just circled around the sprayer and was just steps behind her.

  When we approached Carmen, she was on her back, her eyes closed and there was no movement except for the blood coming from the wound. Kim and I both dropped to our knees next to her. I grabbed the radio and yelled, “Brandy, Wit, get over here, NOW!”

  I grabbed the trauma kit off my vest, opened it and grabbed the blood-clotting bandage that I had, and I applied pressure.

  Kim broke out crying and said, “Lord in heaven, please don’t let this happen.”

  I started crying and then Carmen opened her eyes. She looked at Kim and asked weakly, “Kim, are you alright?”

  Kim calmed her own crying, “Yes Carmen, you saved my life.”

  Carmen smiled, “I’m so glad.”

  She then gasped for air slightly, obviously in severe pain. Her eyes closed for a moment, then she opened them and looked up at both of us saying, “I love both of you very much.”

  “We love you too,” Kim replied tearfully.

  Carmen then looked over at me and for the first ti
me noticed that I was crying. She reached up wanting to take my hand. Kim took over applying pressure with the bandage, and I took Carmen’s hand with both of mine. She looked me in the eyes, and due to my tears, she gave me a sweet, sympathetic look. She gasped for air again and then somehow turned her sympathetic look into that sweet Carmen smile of hers.

  “I lov…,” and her hand went limp and her eyes closed.

  Cindy Dunaway’s Final Comments

  Thank you for reading “Apocalypse Coming (Revised Edition): The Tears of Ephraim- Book One.”

  To some, it may be obvious that we’ve never written anything before, so we hope you’ve enjoyed our first attempt.

  For those that suspect it, yes, Vince and Kim’s background is based on our background, and the other main characters are based on the lives and background of our family and friends. Mike and Paul are our sons, except we changed their names. We live on a farm just like what is described in the story, and Mia and Carmen are close friends, except we changed their names and the names of the sitcom and the movie. All the veterans in the story are based on the men Bill served with while in the Army.

  I wrote most of the Carmen chapters to address the obsessive jealousy and hate that so many try to justify. Too many people use false and hypocritical excuses why they are justified to be consumed with jealousy, which always turns into hate and bitterness. Jealousy is a cancer that will destroy any relationship and will end up destroying us as individuals.

  Let’s face it; if you feel you can’t trust your spouse just because they’re around an attractive person, even if that person is flirting with your spouse, then why are you two even married? Are you saying that you shouldn’t be trusted if you’re around an attractive person or if someone flirts with you? The saddest part is, most of the time, those feelings of jealousy aren’t even justified.

  Why did we share this information and some of our background and stories? Because the history of our lives as individuals, and as a country, is how we learn. When we try to eliminate that history or even try to change the facts, that’s when we start repeating the same mistakes. Whether good or bad, our countries history, as well as our own, will only make us stronger.