by A. American
Sarge’s brow furrowed as he looked at the drawing.
“Kinda close to the bad guys,” Ted said.
“Real close,” Sarge said. “Morg, you can get us there without using the paved roads, right?”
Using the stick, I drew another meandering line off from the back of the lake angling away from 19. “There’s a trail back here we can use that cuts through the woods. We’ll have to cross one paved road and some dirt roads, but it’ll keep us far from this mess over here.” I tapped the X for the camp.
“How far you reckon it is?”
“It’s probably twenty miles the way we’re going.”
“We need to leave earlier, then. I want to be on the trail by oh three hundred. We’ll take both buggies.” Sarge looked at Mike. “Bring your two oh three. Ted, you take my M1A. There will be a SAW on each vehicle as well. We’ll find a place to stage our rides. Two of us’ll stay with them and three of us move into a position where we can watch the area for them to show up. Doc, you and Mike will stay with the rides. I don’t want you out there if there’s any shooting; we might need your hands.”
“I thought you said there wasn’t going to be any shooting,” I said.
“Morg, one thing you learn in this business is never assume anything. Ted will take up a position where he can cover us with the M1A. You and me will go out and talk.”
“Why me?” I jabbed my thumb toward the small circle. “Any of these guys are infinitely better when the lead starts to fly than me.”
“You said you might know these old boys.”
“I don’t know about that. Last time I saw those guys, only one of them walked away. They might have some hard feelings toward me.”
Ted looked up. “Did you kill any of them?”
“No, I tried to help them, get them to take cover, but they ran out and started shooting at that damn helicopter.”
“Don’t worry, you’ll be all right.”
“Go on and get some rest. I’ll rattle your cage at oh two thirty.”
I nodded and got up. “See you then.”
On the way back to my cabin I stopped by Danny’s. He and Bobbie were sitting in camp chairs under a big live oak. Mel and the girls were there too.
“Sorry to hear about the house, man,” I said.
Danny made a “whatever” gesture with his face. “We knew it would happen.”
“At least they didn’t burn it down,” Bobbie said.
“Yet,” Danny added.
“I’m going with Sarge in the morning; he needs me to guide him somewhere. Can you keep an eye on Mel and the girls?”
Mel looked up. “I can keep an eye on myself, thank you very much.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yeah, I ain’t going anywhere.”
“I thought you said you weren’t going to run around and play soldier anymore,” Bobbie said, looking to Mel.
Oh, thanks for that. “I’m not, it’s just to meet some guys and talk.”
“Can I come?” It was Taylor.
“Sorry, kiddo, you can’t.”
“Why not?”
Mel looked up. “Yeah, if it’s just a meeting, why not?”
Well, fuck me running! I didn’t have a good comeback to that, so I tried deflection instead. “I don’t know if Sarge would want her along.”
“You don’t work for him. Take her along,” Mel said, an edge in her voice.
I knew what she was doing, trying to get me to back out of the deal entirely, so I called her bluff. “Okay, you can come.”
“Really?” Taylor asked with a big smile.
“Yeah, it’s just a ride in the woods. Why not.”
“I want to go, Daddy!” Little Bit shouted.
Mel looked at her. “No, you’re too little. You’re staying here with me.”
She kicked the dirt. “I never get to do anything.”
Mel was obviously pissed about the plan, but there was nothing she could do. I gestured to Taylor. “Come on, then. You and I have to get a little sleep before dinner. We leave at three in the morning.”
She and I both headed to the cabin to take naps. A few hours later, we got up and ate dinner with everyone. Mel had cooked fish in a Dutch oven with some rehydrated vegetables and potatoes, served over rice. While a very basic meal, it was good and filling. Over dinner, Mel told everyone that the food stocks were running out, that we needed to find other sources besides the MREs. Everyone agreed, and Jeff and Thad said they would help launch an expedition, which helped her mood a little bit.
After dinner I went back to try and lay down for a while, though I knew I wouldn’t sleep well. Sometime later, Mel came in and lay down. She put her arm over me and laid there without saying anything. I held her hand and together, we drifted off to sleep.
Chapter 35
Before I knew it, I woke up to Sarge beating on the side of the cabin. It was like some bad déjà vu.
“I’m up, I’m up! Knock it off.”
“Hurry up.”
Taylor sat up rubbing sleep from her eyes. “Is it time?”
“Yeah, get dressed.”
Mel stirred but didn’t wake, so I left her alone as I got dressed and put on all the hardware by the light of a flashlight. Once we were dressed, I handed Taylor a camo shirt. “Put this on.”
I picked up my rifle and handed Taylor hers along with a small shoulder bag of magazines. Kneeling down beside Mel, I kissed her head and said I’d be back.
“You better, and take care of Taylor too.”
“I will. It’ll be all right.”
“Love you, Mom,” Taylor said.
The guys were waiting at the buggies. Sarge looked at Taylor when we walked up, and I braced myself for what I was sure to be some interesting verbal abuse. To my surprise, he didn’t bat an eye.
“I got coffee. Want some?” Sarge asked.
“Sure, why not,” I said.
“Me too, please,” Taylor said.
Sarge looked at her. “You drink coffee?”
Taylor nodded and I said, “Like a bubblehead.”
“What’s a bubblehead?”
Sarge handed her a cup. “They’re crazy people that go under the ocean in big black coffins.”
She didn’t get it.
“Submariners. Sailors on submarines.”
“Oh,” she said as she took a sip of the coffee, then immediately spit it out. “Ugh, what is that?”
“Coffee,” Sarge replied.
“Where’s the sugar and creamer?”
“Sugar and creamer? Where do you think you are? Starbucks?”
“Oh, I can’t drink this,” she said and went to pour it out.
Sarge grabbed the cup. “Hey, little lady. Don’t pour it out; there’s precious little of this stuff.”
“That’s just nasty! I don’t know how you drink it.”
“It’s an acquired taste,” Ted said, taking a sip of his.
“Saddle up, everyone! Morgan, you’ll drive my buggy.” I got in and Sarge handed me a pair of night-vision goggles. “Here, no lights.”
The route we were taking was way out in the forest, in a rather remote area. The roads through the Ocala National Forest consist almost entirely of deep sugar sand, which is very fine and, unfortunately, means it is easy to get stuck. The other kind of roads were mud holes—which are exactly what they sound like. Today, we would to take both to ensure the safest route.
We drove in silence, mostly. We did have a moment of levity, though. At one particular muddy crossing, I had to gun the engine a bit, and the tires threw mud all over Taylor. She took it like a champ, though, and didn’t complain, laughing as she wiped some of the splatter from her face. It even got the old man chuckling a bit.
After about thirty minutes of driving through the forest, we ap
proached the lake from the south side. Heading west, I drove slowly—at this point, we were closer to the camp than ever, and I wanted to be aware of our surroundings, since the sun was already coming up. It was coming on five thirty when I caught the first glimpse of the antenna and pointed it out to Sarge.
“Let’s see if we can get close enough to put this mast up and take a look with the camera.”
I started easing closer while Sarge looked for a place where we’d have a shot at seeing the site. He told me to stop and pulled the small camera console up in front of him. The hydraulic pump that raised it sounded loud enough to wake the dead. I leaned in through the driver’s side to check out the camera. It was set to thermal and we could see the antenna and the small building under it. Sarge panned the camera back and forth. The only thing we saw was a lonely armadillo rooting around in the woods beside the building.
“All right, Mike, you and Doc stay here, keep an eye on this and let me know when they show up. They’ll probably be in a Blazer. Ted, you and Morgan come with me.” Sarge handed out the small radios to each of us.
“What about me?” Taylor asked.
“You stay here. Don’t wander off, just stay with the buggies,” I said.
A small road ran in front of the antenna. At a small bend in it, Ted dipped off into the bush, about fifty yards from the site where Sarge told me to find some cover.
“Stay in there. I’ll go out first, and if it’s clear I’ll wave to you.”
“All right,” I said as I walked off into the scrub.
“Keep your eyes open.”
I gave him a thumbs-up and moved as quietly as I could through the tangle of brush, until I found a large log lying on the ground with a palmetto in front of it. I lay down on my stomach and took a camo face mask out of my vest and pulled it over my head.
We had a long time to wait, the sort of thing that takes patience, something I don’t have. As the sky lightened, I was able to see more around me. I soon got bored and started poking ants on the log with a stick. Every minute or two, I would look up. My ears were always listening for the telltale snapping of a twig or brushing sound of someone walking through the palmettos, but in this case, silence was the sound track to this leg of our adventure.
Once the sun was up, I heard Sarge’s voice in the little earpiece. “Everyone good?”
Mike immediately replied that there was no movement by them. I keyed my mic and told him I was 10-4. Then it was silent again. Eventually, I had to roll over on my back and stretch my shoulders and back by doing small crunches. I was not made to lie prone like this for so long. I don’t know how those snipers do it. Noon was a long ways away.
During one of Sarge’s radio checks I asked Mike about Taylor. He said she was sleeping in the backseat of the buggy. I smiled. That kid could sleep anywhere. Not long after that call, Mike came back over the radio.
“We’ve got a truck inbound with two outriders on ATVs.”
“Roger that, let me know what they do,” Sarge replied.
After several minutes he came back on the radio. “They’ve stopped. Looks like the ATVs are going to provide security. They’re moving, you should see them any second now.”
“Roger that.” There was a pause. “I got ’em.”
The old K5 Blazer pulled right up to the building and stopped. Four men got out. One went to the back and opened the rear gate, letting a fifth man out.
“I got eyes on five bodies,” Sarge said.
“Roger, I count five,” Ted replied.
“I’ve got five,” Mike said.
I pulled my binoculars from my pack so I could get a good look that them. One of them looked familiar, but it was really his rifle that jogged my memory. I keyed my radio. “Sarge, the guy with the scoped long gun is the survivor from the helo attack.”
“Roger that. You stay put, I’m coming out.”
I couldn’t see Sarge until he started down the trail. The men didn’t see him right away; he walked a good twenty yards before one of them pointed him out. While they had their weapons in their hands, they didn’t make aggressive movements, which was a relief. I kept the binoculars on them regardless, carefully looking each man over.
The fifth guy, the one that got out of the back, had caught my attention. He was bandaged in several places, with one arm in a sling. He also wasn’t dressed like the rest of them. The other four men were all wearing woodland BDU military uniforms. He was wearing what looked like a uniform, but more like what the Department of Corrections would issue. This, and the fact that he wasn’t armed, really made him stand out from the pack.
One of them, Calvin, waved and started to walk toward Sarge. They met in the road and spoke for a moment, Calvin gesturing back to the bandaged man leaning on the truck. After a minute or two of talking, Sarge keyed his radio. “Come on out, Morgan.”
I was more than happy to oblige and quickly got up, only to find out I was so stiff I could hardly walk. Holy hell, I’m getting too old for this shit. It didn’t help to realize that Sarge’s old ass had lain there just as long as I had, so I sucked it up and made my way out of the scrub as fast as I could.
“Hey, Calvin,” I said with a nod.
“Morgan,” he replied.
“You boys come on up here. I think you’ll want to meet the feller we brought.”
As we walked to the truck, I saw a familiar face.
“Hey, Daniel,” I said, eliciting some strange looks from the others. “Morgan. Remember, we met out on the river. You guys found me sleeping under a tree.”
“Oh yeah, I remember you! Did you ever make it home?”
“Yeah, I made it. How’ve things been for you guys?”
“It was rough, you know. But things are getting a little better.” He paused for a moment. “It’s good you made it. I wondered about you. This here is Omar,” Calvin said. “He escaped from the camp.”
That got Sarge’s attention.
“We found him out in the woods. He was pretty shot up, but we nursed him back to health.”
“How’d you get out?” Sarge asked.
“They were going to transfer us. Me and a couple of others stole the bus and tried to get away.”
“What happened?”
“We didn’t get far, they chased us and shot the bus all to hell. Everyone tried to run. Most were gunned down in the road. I got to the woods and hid, they searched and I was sure they were going to find me but they didn’t. I saw some shit, though. They caught a bunch of people, lined them up and shot them right there in the woods.”
“Just executed them?” I asked.
“Shot them down like dogs.”
“What do you mean they were going to transfer you? Transfer to where?” Sarge asked.
“They have, what’s the word they use, pacified parts of some cities. They’re moving people into them. They assign you a place to live and give you a job. That’s why they are trying to bring people into the camps. Once you’re in you can’t get out until they ‘resettle’ you, as they call it.”
“How long were you in the camp?”
“About a month.”
Sarge rubbed his chin. “You know the layout?”
“Yeah, real good. My job was on the trash detail, so I’ve been in every tent and building there. Well, almost all of them.”
“Almost?” Sarge asked.
“There’s a section where they take people who they deem a threat or who violate the rules. I never went in there.”
“Could you draw me a map of the place?”
Calvin reached into the Blazer and pulled a piece of folded paper off the dash. “Here, I thought you would want one, so we sat down with him and drew it up.”
Sarge unfolded the map, looking at it. “To scale, even.”
“Those distances are pretty accurate. I’m a surveyor; I know distance,” Omar adde
d.
“I appreciate this—it’s really going to help us out,” Sarge said.
“No problem, anything I can do to help. They treat everyone like damn prisoners in there. It’s a bad place.”
“I had a feeling you might be up to something around here. When it kicks off, if you need any help just let us know,” Calvin said.
“I’ll certainly keep that in mind.” Sarge stuck his hand out to Calvin. “Thanks for the info.”
They shook hands, and we started back toward the buggies. Behind us, I heard the Blazer start up and drive off.
“You think it’s legit?” I asked.
Sarge looked at the map. “Sure seems so to me.”
Chapter 36
Fred was dealing cards to herself. “I think you need to be there. Don’t you want to see the SOB get what he deserves?”
Jess sat cross-legged on her bunk, chewing on a hangnail. “I do, but I’m afraid. What if he sees me?”
“He won’t. You’ll be in the kitchen. You can watch from there.”
Jess looked at Mary. “I think you should too. I just hope it works,” Mary said nervously.
“It’ll work, trust me.” Fred held up the cup with the strained liquid. “I pour this in his coffee, and he’s as good as dead.”
“You going to cook it tonight?” Mary asked.
“Yeah, after the kitchen closes.”
“Okay, I’ll do it, I’ll go,” Jess said staring at the floor. “I want to see the son of a bitch fall over dead. I just wish I could spit in his face.”
“Good, you wait. His ass is grass.”
The spent the rest of the afternoon napping and playing cards. Their dinner was once again brought to them and Jess ate for the first time in nearly two days. Fred waited until a few hours after the kitchen closed before carrying the trays back. She slipped in and lit the stove, setting her can over the gas burner. It didn’t take long for the liquid to start boiling. She watched it as it bubbled, slowly thickening. Once it looked like a puddle of Hershey’s syrup in the bottom of the can, she turned off the heat and picked it up with a rag. She took it to the dry goods storage and hid it behind a stack of cans of dehydrated potatoes. After checking to make sure everything was in order, she headed back to the room.
