by Stalter, D
Chapter 1 Allison
Allison finished the last of her stew, sopping it up with the remaining bite of bread. She leaned back in her chair and looked around, then pushed her plate away and stood. She strode to the front of the room and stood next to the wood burning stove.
“Okay, everyone. Today is September 18th. It’s Sunday so that means we’re having our weekly meeting.”
A freckle faced girl of about twelve jumped up and ran to the first room on the west side of the building. Allison smiled when she emerged a few seconds later carrying a notebook and pen. She slid into a chair at the front table and thumbed through the notebook until she found the first blank page.
“I’m ready.” She smiled up at Allison.
“Thanks, Jaden. You are the best.” Allison took a couple steps closer to where Jaden sat. “OK. If Jaden wants to read to us the notes from last Sunday, we can make sure we’ve got everything covered that we need to and start planning for next week.”
Jaden took a deep breath as she scanned the notebook. “First we talked about finishing up in the garden and making sure we got all the vegetables picked or dug and stored.”
Allison looked at the group. “I can’t remember who was in charge of that. Is it completed?”
A short woman with her hair pulled back in a pony tail raised her hand. “I was in charge and it is all done. But, I think we still need a few people to spend a day putting everything to bed so that it’s easier to start up in the spring.”
Jaden ruffled pages to make a note on the blank sheet.
“Good,” said Allison. “You got that, Jaden?”
At Jaden’s nod, Allison asked, “Anything else?”
“We were going to have two training classes. One with Will Mead and Shane Riley teaching evasion. And another one with just Will Mead teaching how to set traps.”
Allison nodded. “That will happen this week. We couldn’t fit it in to everyone’s schedules last week.”
She smiled as she watched Jaden carefully write the note. “Okay,” she said. “What’s next?”
A piercing scream from outside caused the men to jump as one and rush to the door. After peering out the door’s window, James turned and looked at Allison. “It’s Kim. It’s okay, guys, she’s a friend of Allison’s.”
The door burst open and a woman wearing tight fitting, satin pants, a red, low-cut, frilly blouse that ended just below her breasts, and dirty red high heels stumbled into the room. Her hair was just past her shoulders, mousy brown at the roots and purple and green below.
She was followed by a girl of about nine or ten. Her pig tails were falling out of their clips and she kept one hand on the waistband of her red slacks as they threatened to fall off her tiny body. Her eyes darted around the room ending on Allison.
Behind them, two men stepped through the door. Both wore holsters with revolvers and carried rifles. They wore frowns.
Allison’s eyes widened. “Kim?”
“Allison!” Kim screamed, taking a step forward.
Allison took five steps to meet Kim near the door. She looked over her shoulder at the group. “Go ahead and clear the tables, I’ll be right back.”
Taking the little girl by the hand, she said, “Come on Kelly, let’s go outside and talk to your mom.”
She led the pair to the picnic tables and indicated they should sit. “Where have you been, Kim? Are you guys okay?”
Kim shook her head. “It’s horrible out there, Allison. People are killing each other. I thought I’d never get here.”
She bent her head and brought her hand to her face to stroke the side of her slim nose.
Allison’s eyes widened. “Do you have a manicure?”
Kim quickly dropped her hand and smiled sheepishly. “It was a gift. I couldn’t refuse it.” She turned and picked up her backpack. “Here. I’ve got the nail polish. I can give you a manicure.” She unzipped the backpack and clothes tumbled out. Most looked as if they came from a Victoria’s Secret catalog. Kim reached in and dug around the bottom until her hand came up with a bottle of nail polish. She grinned.
Allison shook her head. “The world is falling apart, Kim, and you are getting manicures. Really?”
Kim’s face fell. “They made me. I didn’t want it, but they made me.”
“Who made you?”
“We stayed with some people on the way here. They wanted me to look good. Please don’t be mad at me, Allison. I just wanted to get here. I knew you would take care of us. You are always taking care of everyone.”
Allison bent her head and closed her eyes before looking back up at Kim. “I don’t take care of these people. I can barely take care of myself. These people are taking care of me. Everyone works together to make this place safe and secure.”
“But, you’ll let us stay, right? Please, Allison. You’re like a mother to me. I need your help.”
Allison sighed. “I can make sure you get a bath, clean clothes, and a bed. But whether you guys can stay isn’t up to me. It will be a group decision.”
She stood up. “I’ll have Mary come out and help you get baths and a change of clothes. We’ll get you a room and then we can talk about this tomorrow. Wait here. Mary will be out in a couple minutes.”
When she stepped back into the bunkhouse, conversation stopped and all eyes watched her.
“Is everything okay?” It was Megan. She often helped in the kitchen and the garden, but her goal was to become proficient enough with weapons to join the security team. Allison had seen her train. She had no doubt that Megan would be joining the security team soon.
“I think so,” Allison said. She turned to Mary. “Would you mind getting a bath ready? Then go out and bring them in for baths. They’ll also need a change of clothes. And, I’ve said that they can spend the night and we will talk in the morning, so they’ll need one of the empty rooms.”
“Of course!” Mary jumped up and hurried to the stove where she set a pot of water on to heat. Megan rose and joined her. “I’ll help. Tell me what to do.”
Jaden twisted in her chair to speak to Mary. “As soon as I’m done taking notes, I’ll get the dishes done.”
“You’ve done enough for the day,” Allison said. “I’ll do the dishes tonight.”
“I’ll help,” called a voice from the crowd.
“Me too,” called another.
Allison smiled. The rag-tag group from two months ago had morphed into a tight knit, loving family.
She straightened her back and lifted her shoulders. “Okay, then. Where were we?”
“We just talked about training classes,” Jaden said. “The only thing I have left are notes that people handed me during the week they want to discuss.”
“Okay. What notes do we have?”
“One note says that Don is butchering a couple hogs and would like a few extra hands.”
Jaden’s father raised his hand. “Don butchered today. Will and Riley went down to help.”
“Okay. Next?”
Jaden looked down and read. “Chief McCall talked to Don on the HAM radio. He will be out either Wednesday or Thursday. He has some supplies that he wants to trade for garden vegetables and meat from Don’s.”
“Great! Can I get a couple volunteers to meet him with me?”
Several hands went up. She turned to Jaden. “Matt and Melissa will meet him with me.”
“Is that all from last week?”
Jaden nodded.
“Okay. Who do we have on guard duty from midnight to 6 am this week?”
Six men raised their hands.
“Okay. You guys will sleep in the basement of the house. Your cots are set up with clean sheets. There is a wind-up alarm cl
ock on the table between the middle beds. Please make sure you wind it up and set the alarm every night.”
“And who do we have on the 6pm to midnight?”
Four men raised their hands.
Allison scrunched her eyebrows. “We’re supposed to have three 2-man teams. Who are the other two?”
“That would be Will and Riley.”
“I only have one more thing and then we can open this up to comments and suggestions from you guys.” She took a breath. “Kim. The girl that just showed up. And her daughter, Kelly.”
She looked from face to face. The faces looked back at her, curious, but not condemning.
“I’ve told Kim that they can spend tonight here and that we would talk in the morning.” Allison continued. “I will not be assigning her any duties tomorrow. She needs to decompress and she needs to spend some quiet time with her daughter. I don’t know what they went through in the last two months, but Kelly used to be a happy, outgoing kid. She looks scared of her shadow now. Please be gentle with her.”
She shrugged. “That’s all I have. Does anyone have any questions or comments?”
“I have one,” Megan called from the storeroom. She came out carrying towels and washcloths. “Will said that I can go with him and Riley on guard duty this week, and, if it’s okay with you, next week I can be put on the schedule.”
“If that’s what you want, I’m okay with it.”
“Great!” Megan’s smile filled her face. “Oh, I’ve got an extra set of clothes that I can loan Kim. I don’t have anything that will fit the little girl, though.”
“I think we have something that might fit her. I’ll go find something.” Karen, the mother of the eight-year-old twins, jumped up.
“Anything else?” Allison asked the group.
“Who is this Kim?” This came from another mother. Lisa Grant had a ten-year-old girl and an eight-year-old boy. “I don’t recognize her from town. Is she a relative?”
“No,” Allison answered. “She used to live up the road. She moved to Iowa last February. She is a beautiful person. She is a bit eccentric, though. I’ll try to keep her down to earth. I hope you will decide to accept her.”
There were low murmurs of assent and many in the group nodded. “I don’t think we’ll have a problem,” Nelda Jones said.
Chapter 2 Riley
Riley tightened the belt of his holster and picked up the rifle. His brown hair had grown enough in two months to give him a shaggy, sheepdog look. Not quite long enough for a ponytail, he found it bothered him more than he ever thought it would. This evening, he looked up to the sky and shook his head to get all the hair behind his ears, then shoved a ball cap tight on his head. It worked, but he really needed a haircut.
He put a hand-sized walkie talkie into his shirt pocket, ran the wire up and inserted the ear bud into his ear. Then he buttoned his jacket over the top. Nodding at Megan, he pointed towards Will. As they walked, Riley said, “I know we went over all this in the guard training classes, but I’ll go through it all while we are actually doing it. Pretty soon, the team that is on duty will announce a location over the radio. It’ll be something like ‘Team three. Spot two.’ Team three is us. Spot two will be where we should meet. We have three spots in each sector. We don’t want to meet at the same spot every night – or have any sort of routine, so they will tell us where we need to meet in a way that someone who might be listening or watching would have no way of knowing.”
He touched her arm. “They just said that they are at spot one. That’s just inside the cornfield on the gravel road that leads to the highway. It’s the closest spot to the barn. Will meets with whoever is the leader of team three tonight to get any updates he needs. Then he’ll move off thirty feet and start guard, and the team leader he just relieved heads to the barn. The team shadow will move toward spot one and meet us there to give us our updates. Once that’s done, we are on duty.”
Megan smiled. “Never whisper. A whisper noise is louder than a murmur. Always tap your partner, then lean in and talk softly in his ear.”
“Yup.” Riley grinned.
They watched as Will disappeared into the corn field between the farm and the highway. Megan tapped Riley on the arm and then leaned in and spoke softly in his ear. “Never get closer than thirty feet to your partner unless he has engaged with a raider, then only get as close as you need to take the raider out.”
Riley grinned again.
A few minutes later, the man Will was relieving stepped out of the corn field. He lifted his hand as he passed them on his way to the bunkhouse. Riley spotted Will crossing the gravel road and tapped Megan on the shoulder. “Let’s go.”
They moved into the cornfield where Rolly, the former owner of the lumber yard, waited. He smiled at Megan. “So happy you finally made it to the team. You are going to be an asset.” He bent his arm, buried his face into the crook of his elbow and coughed. “Sure hope I’m not coming down with something. These old bones of mine are working hard enough to keep up. Don’t need something to slow this old man down.”
He turned to Riley. “We haven’t seen anything. There was a car out on the highway earlier. It went by just after that woman with a kid came looking for Allison. Who was she, by the way?”
Riley shook his head. “Someone who used to live down the road. Knew Allison and thought this would be a good place to stay.”
“Did you see the get-up she was wearing? I don’t think she’d fit in with our little community. What did Allison tell her?”
“Nothing definite yet. She’s going to spend the night and talk in the morning.”
“I ain’t one to pass judgement, but I hope Allison doesn’t let an old friendship get in the way of a right decision.”
“She won’t. Allison has a good head on her shoulders. What did the car look like?”
“Car?”
Riley sighed. “The car you saw go by after the girl came in.”
“Oh, yeah! It was a tan two-door. It had duct tape covering the right headlight. The front right quarter panel was smashed pretty good. There were two guys in the front seat. I think I saw one in the back seat too.”
“Thanks. Anything else we should know?”
“Nope. It’s been quiet.”
“Have a good night.”
“You too.” Rolly moved off towards the barn.
Megan tapped Riley’s arm and said, “Never take a step without looking down first. Take your step, then pause to look around. Then look down and take another step.”
“Great,” Riley said. “I know that when I’m workin with Will, ten steps is what it takes to keep the right spacing between us. For you, it may be twelve or thirteen. When you are in the lead spot, I might only take seven or eight steps to keep the distance. You’ll learn all this as you go. You’ll do fine.”
Megan grinned. “So now you are going to press the talk button one time to let Will know that we are ready to move out. He’s got earbuds so his radio won’t make a sound. He’ll start moving. When he’s gone ten steps, he’ll press his talk button to let us know to start moving in his direction. While he is waiting for us to signal that he should move ahead, he will be looking around.”
“Right. He will stand still and look all around. He’ll look up, down and behind him. The same thing that we do while we wait for him to move. People don’t realize how much more their eyes will see when they are standing still. Let’s go.”
Several hours later, Riley tapped Megan and leaned in close to her ear. “We should be near spot one in a few minutes. You can go on back to the bunkhouse and we’ll do this again tomorrow. Is it as hard to do as we promised?”
Megan shook her head and leaned in to speak in his ear. “Much harder. I never knew that moving so slowly could exhaust you so quickly.”
Just then, Riley jerked away. His hand went to his ear. He reached in his shirt pocket and brought the walkie talkie to his lips. “Gotcha. We’re ready.”
He raised the rifle and checked the
safety before leaning in to talk in Megan’s ear. “Will said that a car with a dented front fender and duct tape over the right headlight just pulled off the highway with it’s lights out. It is just sitting on the gravel road about 100 feet west of spot one. He’s gonna work his way so that he comes out near spot one. We are going to shadow that and will stay back while he sees what they want.”
Megan drew in her breath. “Duct tape and dented front end. It’s the same car that Rolly said they saw. This isn’t an accident, is it? Aren’t you going to go to channel three and alert the bunkhouse so they can send backup?”
“Yes. First I need to let Will know that we are going to channel three.” He switched channels on the radio and softly said, “Team three. Spot one. Car like the one seen by team six. Pulled off highway. Team three going to meet now. Please stand by.”
He turned to Megan. “Since they haven’t seen Will yet, he will be able to switch to channel three and we’ll all be on the same channel. If they’d already seen him, I would be switching back and forth between our channel and channel three. Come on. Slow and silent.”
They were about twenty-five feet west of Will, hunkered down in the ditch, when Will stepped out onto the road. “Can I help you?” he called.
The driver’s door opened and a thin man stepped out. “You must be James. We’re here to collect Kim.”
“Who are you?” Will asked.
“I’m Kim’s brother. She got mad yesterday and took off. Mom’s really worried about her. I need to bring her home.”
Riley quickly relayed the information to the bunkhouse. A moment later, the voice in his ear told him that Kim said she didn’t have a brother.
“This is going to get real,” he said to Megan. “Kim doesn’t have a brother.”
“Shouldn’t you let Will know?”
“He’s on channel three. He knows. Now, I wonder how he’s going to play this.”
Will didn’t keep them waiting. Instead of playing dumb and letting the guy think he might get away with his story, Will took a step forward. “Kim doesn’t have a brother.”
“Well, yeah. But she’s still coming with me. You can keep the brat. She’s just in the way. Now, bring her out. Unless you want option two. We’ll just kill you and take over your place. Kim says that Allison is a sweetheart. She can cook and make medicine. We’d make sure her nights were full of excitement.” He paused. “Actually, that sounds like the best option.”
