by J. B. Craig
As Gunny approached the community, she saw that things were not good. Several homes were burning, as the attackers, who were riding motorcycles, decided that houses that shot back were easiest dealt with by throwing Molotov cocktails. Once the house was burning, they would take up positions behind trees, and wait for the occupants to come outside, then shoot them, unless the occupant happened to be a younger woman. Those women would be raped, often right there on the front yard.
With all the gunshots going on across the community, Gunny took the opportunity to explode the brains of some of the attackers who made the mistake of not having back-up nearby. She didn’t want to give her position away, or be followed home, but she killed several of the worst offenders, before the lawn rape could begin. Stunned and confused women would run to the wood line where the shots came from, and Gunny would tell them to stay low, and wait for instructions.
By the end of the night, the community was occupied by about 40 bad guys, and all of the inhabitants were either dead, enslaved, or with Gunny. Gunny had an idea on how to get help for these women, and to get a little revenge. She knew where she’d be going in the morning, and she would bring these 3 traumatized ladies with her. Unfortunately, she heard her best friend die screaming in the house fire, rather than leave her house. Revenge would be hers.
– The shower
Being the chief of security, Greg somehow was moved to day watch, as he delegated the shift assignments to Angel. His Security team wanted him resting most nights, and he didn’t really have veto power. He suspected that they thought he had something romantic going with the local “School Marm”, Jennifer, but that was far from the truth. Greg suspected he was getting the worst of both worlds. He had a live-in woman, who gave him almost as much grief as his wife did when he was misbehaving, but he was still sleeping in a separate room, with no romantic involvement. There was a deep growing friendship between them, and he would take that over loneliness and despair. Every day, he decided to head North to get his daughter, or South to get Jared – and at least check on Leigh. Then he argued with himself, and decided to stay one more day, because passing them on the road was a high risk, and he couldn’t bear what would happen if they made it all the way to their family retreat, only to not find him there, especially since they all knew he was staying in Rock Hall on the day the lights went out.
Annie was sleeping in, as usual, when Jennifer knocked on Greg’s door at dawn. “Come in – this better be good.” Grumbled Greg, who peeked out from under his covers. Being the OCD guy that he was, he couldn’t leave the night-shift guys alone, and often spent several hours every night out with the night-shift troops. He’d help them with whatever chore there was, make some jokes, try to learn more Spanish, and otherwise try to lead. He didn’t want to be in a situation where he could anticipate what the day shift would do in an emergency, and not know the night shift at all, although the rotating schedule was integrating the teams nicely. Both 12-hour shifts often just passed at the gate, gave a few-minute briefing, then went to sleep. He wanted to know ALL his sheep dogs, and how they would react when given orders under the stress of combat.
“It’s going to be good – for me.” smiled Jennifer, wearing a skimpy summer robe. It was almost translucent white cotton, hanging just below her behind. She had it knotted around the waist, but the cut of the robe went down below her breasts, so Greg got a view of some very astounding cleavage. She was showing entirely too much of her very shapely legs for Greg to NOT have dirty thoughts.
Greg gulped, and started to respond down below. “Um, Jen, I can’t… Um, what are you doing?”
“Shut up, before you put your OTHER foot in your mouth. I need a favor, and I don’t need you for the kind of favor I can imagine you’re thinking about based on the layout of your sheets down there. Dream on, soldier boy!” She smiled coyly. “I heated up some water from the big rain last night. The smaller cisterns were going to over-flow, so I took advantage of our plentiful water situation. I want – no, I NEED a shower. I need you to be a good boy and keep your eyes closed and pour water over the shower curtain when I tell you to. It’s all ready to go in the bathroom.”
Embarrassed at the first thought that came to his mind, Greg nodded, and then backpedaled. He said “Sorry, you woke me up from a dream of my wife. I’ll be there in a minute.”
Jen was a VERY decent looking woman. She had curves in all the right places. She had a small waist and breasts just a little too large for what one would expect on her frame – not that he was complaining! Watching her walk away in that robe gave Greg dirty thoughts that he needed to push down, but her hips flared out to a very nice behind, and as she turned the corner, he could at least see the bottom of her ass cheeks. He’d always appreciated a good ass and was even told on more than one occasion he had a “Fine Scottish Ass”.
That said, it was time to be a grown-up, and help a friend, not have fantasies about her. So, with his libido suppressed, he hoped, Greg took a shot out of the flask he kept by his bed for wake-up. He was rationing the booze that he salvaged to 2 shots per day. One in the morning, and one at night.
Greg turned the corner just in time to see Jennifer’s fantastic ass go into the shower curtain that she closed behind her. “OK, you can come in now!” she yelled.
Embarrassed, but a little excited to have fouled up his orders, Greg paused a second, then said “I’m here. I see the water. I see you lowered the shower curtain – good plan.”
“I wanted you to be able to dump water over – but keep your eyes to yourself, Mister!” The vixen actually giggled, knowing that she was torturing him. “Go ahead and pour about half the water over the shower.
Greg leaned forward and poured a few gallons of water over the middle of the shower curtain. She was anticipating it towards the front, where water usually comes from, but he poured it over the center of the shower curtain. She moved quickly over to the middle, rubbing Greg accidentally with her very nice breasts through the curtain in the process. “Sorry” she said, and sounded like she meant it. “Hold off while I wash my hair and soap up.” Greg set the heavy bucket on the lid of the tub, pushing in the shower curtain inward a bit with the top of the bucket. Between the closeness of the curtain and the suds Jennifer were rubbing all over her hair and body, the curtain stuck to her a little more than Greg was comfortable with, yet he didn’t move the bucket. He didn’t peek around the curtain, even though he was tempted, knowing that her eyes were probably closed, but the thought occurred to him. He did, however, keep his eyes open as different parts of her body were sticking to the translucent, but not transparent shower curtain with soapy bubbles.
“I may need a shower after this, too – a cold one!” He mumbled to himself.
“I’ll pour the water for you next!” she laughed. He was embarrassed that he heard her.
“I said that out loud? Sorry!” He admitted in embarrassment.
“No worries. I have urges too – I’m just not as, um, Male about them as you are. I’m sorry to ask you to do this, but I was getting pretty ripe, and this is heaven! I’m ready to be rinsed off, please pour slowly – there are suds everywhere.”
“I know.” Greg said in his head ONLY this time. He poured slowly, trying to get as much water in the shower as possible, but water did run down the bucket and down his arms. “I guess I’m getting my shower right now, too. We need to rig a better system. At least a half-gallon is on me!”
“Let’s do that”, said Jennifer. “I don’t want to torture you like this again. You can leave now, Mister. I’m done with you.” Greg walked back to his room and pulled on his jeans, which were a little easier to pull on most days - with his new apocalypse diet. He was down about 30 lbs already. Today, though, they were a little more difficult to pull on, for other reasons. He was glad SHE couldn’t see him sticking to the curtain through the gym shorts he slept in – he hoped.
As he percolated a cup of ever-diminishing salvaged coffee on the ever-diminishing salvaged propane for the gri
ll burner in the back yard, he heard voices in the front yard. He thought again about taking an off-shift on a scavenging run tonight – outside of the barricade and mines. They needed to stock up while there might still be salvage out there.
On one hand, it was good having a team that cared enough for him to keep him on daytime hours. Morning coffee was a pleasure, but also missed the night shift. He liked going to bed at 6am after a night of watching the stars. Unfortunately, the security team wanted him awake during daylight hours, when the residents were up and about, so he could be political. By now, just about everyone but Greg acknowledged that Angel really ran the show. Greg was evolving into the equivalent of a military officer, even though he had no desire to do so.
“Hey Jefe!”, yelled Manuel, “You got visitor! She says her name is Gunny!”
“Outstanding!” Greg yelled. He walked out to the porch, his t-shirt and gym shorts still wet from the shower. Jennifer stepped out behind him, in her robe, drying her hair and looking inquisitively at Greg, Manuel and Gunny.
“Ahoy, Gunny! Glad to see you! I’m glad you finally took me up on the invitation. What’s up?” asked Greg. “This is Jennifer. Jennifer, Gunny runs Rock Hall Mall.”
“Ran it. It’s burned to the ground now. I see the apocalypse isn’t treating you too terribly.” smiled Gunny knowingly, while looking at Jennifer. “Y’all got running water.”
“Nice to meet you, Gunny.” Said Jennifer. “Well, we rigged up a one-Greg-power shower system. It’s not working as well as I hoped, but he’ll do.”
“Gunny, we’re not, like… um.” Greg sputtered.
“No time, Greg. Not my circus, not my monkeys. Things are going to shit out on the road into Rock Harbor. You have less than a week to be ready for about 40 bad dudes, unless someone drops a bomb on them. They’re savaging the communities one at a time from Beasley Point and around the Nomini River coast. They’re sticking to the waterfront neighborhoods. More money means better loot, and better-looking trophy wives, I guess. They took the one next to me last night. They’re killing the men and using the women until they’re done with them. I can’t even talk about what happens to the poor kids.”
“What did you Recon, Gunny?”
“The local biker gang with various bullshit pistols and shotguns, but their leader won’t let them retreat. He kills them if they move backwards. I got there too late last night. I saw the leader shoot a “deserter” in the gut, and he laughed while he bled out. You need at least 20 fighters in foxholes, and as many things that go boom as you can. I’d suggest pulling them into your kill zone, then doing what a kill zone is best for. You built a pretty good one out there, for a Soldier.” She smiled as the usual inter-service jibe was exchanged.
I also brought 3 women from the community by me. They are traumatized, as they all lost their men, and are being taken care of by your corpsmen, Doc and, um, Kim?
Greg sighed, then said “Those are my medics, Gunny. Unfortunately, I have maybe 12 women and old guys in addition to these Hondurans and 4 of our local firefighters. Some of the Hondurans fought in Guerilla wars in Central America, so they’re good fighters. Now, the rest of our folks are smart, and can shoot, but only a few others have been in combat – in VIETNAM. I’d love to have stuff that blows up, because most of my security team will tell you that I’m a lousy shot, but I can blow shit up, given the right chemicals and incentive.” We already have toe poppers throughout logical flanking areas.
Gunny smiled, and said “Well, you might like what I have in the wagon back in the wood line.”
“Oh, you brought presents?!?! Do they go BOOM?” Greg smiled.
“Well, they need your ‘special touch’, but I think I have everything you need to make things go boom. I’ve got fertilizer from the farm store, and enough Diesel to make it happen. I also brought some hydrogen peroxide and other chemicals in case you can do some crazy shit with that.”
“Damn, shit’s going south fast, isn’t it Gunny?” Please feel free to join the community – pick a house – more than one if you need, for your refugees. I suggest one between Les, who fled Beasley Point when their community got shot up, and the Honduran’s places over there. This circle is the end of the peninsula, or our Alamo, if necessary. We are facing what they did on Tarawa, is what you’re saying, then, right?” asked Greg.
“Is that like TEOTWAWKI, IED and FUBAR?” asked Jennifer.
Greg smiled, and Jennifer returned her 1,000-watt smile. He replied. “I know I have a lot of military acronyms, but that’s not one. It’s an island chain in the Pacific where, in WWII, the US and our Allies hit our first serious Japanese defense. The Japanese lost the battle, but fought to the last man. They were trapped and determined. Most of the 4,500 Japanese died, because surrender was never an option for them. But several thousand allies died taking them out.”
“Manuel, take Gunny to, um, el Primo casa that’s not occupado.” Greg tried in his best Spanish pidgin.
Manuel looked a little confused, and Gunny surprised everyone by popping off with perfect Spanish, explaining the plan. Manuel smiled enthusiastically and started to lead the way. Gunny followed and said to the group over her shoulder “I’ll pick out a hooch or 2, then we can go gather the toys I brought. I don’t want to blow it up in your minefield – which I can’t wait to see, by the way! We’ve got a lot of work to do!”
The Rock army of sheep dogs just got another Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) to help run it.
Building the defenses.
Greg rolled a wheelbarrow full of supplies from his house out to the checkpoint. He had several coffee cans full of rusty nails, courtesy of Pop and his depression-era mentality of “save everything – you never know when you need it.” In it, he also had two of Grandma’s old pressure cookers, some lengths of copper and iron pipe, and a bag of fireworks that Greg found, presumably left over from a July 4th party when the family popped them off at the end of the dock. Finally, he had various wires and lightbulbs in a small box, along with the Red cross radio. Greg had some very deadly toys to teach the team how to build.
Jennifer followed behind with a fabric grocery bag in each hand that had most of the ingredients that were used in the movie Terminator, when Kyle Reese improvised pipe bombs with fuses out of corn syrup, plumbing pipe and other household ingredients. Greg gathered up Ethyl and some of her helpers, as he figured they’d be best at following his “recipes”. They set up in the kitchen in the clubhouse.
While Greg and the kitchen crew very gently cooked up some improvised explosive devices (IED’s), Manuel escorted Gunny back to the security team, and introductions were made all around. With Gunny’s command of Spanish, she was able to tell the story of what she saw to both the English and Spanish speakers. The looks on her audience’s faces was enough that Greg understood her to be getting the story out.
Gunny, Manuel and Angel walked over to Greg, who could free himself up with Ethyl running the show. Ethel said she got the chemistry of it and would not need him until it was time to talk about fuses or other ways of detonating the IED’s. They had Gunny’s cart of explosives, retrieved from the other side of the wood line, and rolled through the concealed “safe” path in. The path through the woods was marked only with various stones, known only to the security team.
Gunny said “I see where your minefield Markers start. Excellent use of the landscape features to funnel our soon-to-be victims into a kill zone. I wouldn’t advertise it, but I understand your concern for civilian casualties. We need to think about what happens when some of them get through – they’ve got the numbers to break through this.” She then translated her words to the guys. Les, Nellie, Jennifer and Chet all joined the group, as did all of the security team that was not at the forward observation point or in the tree stand.
Tripp also ambled up and hung out on the periphery of the group. It was one of his first appearances in about a week. He would occasionally show up for one of the community meetings, eating as much as he could, and staring d
aggers at Greg. Today, he wasn’t causing a scene, and it seemed, to Greg, that like all able-bodied men fighters would be needed.
“Tripp, do you have a gun you can shoot?” asked Greg. “We’re going to need everyone we can to repel some bad guys in a few days.”
“Well, duh, I wouldn’t have spent $5,500 on my skeet & trap gun if I couldn’t shoot it.” Retorted Tripp.
“Great, buddy” Said Greg. “What do you have, a 12 or 20 gauge? 2 shots? That’ll be helpful.”
“20 gauge – the bullets are cheaper. And yes, 2 shots, it’s an over-under gun Holland and Holland – outstanding for blowing up clay pigeons. Not like you’d know that.”
Greg laughed inside at the thought of spending $5,500 on a “Gucci gun”, and then skimping on the ammunition. 20 Gauge shells, although the number is bigger, are really a smaller, less powerful round than the more popular hunting round of 12 gauge. 12 Gauge is the diameter of a gun that will hold a lead sphere weighing 1/12th of a pound. 20 Gauge is a smaller diameter cylinder that can hold a lead sphere weighing 1/20th of a pound. While shot guns don’t shoot perfect spheres of lead any longer, the labeling of the cylinders still describes the diameter.
