Outside the Fire

by Boyd Craven

  “There’s not going to be any accidents,” Steve said, his voice almost a snarl. “I recognize you two. You’re lucky I didn’t have an angle on you at the farm.”

  One of them looked to the other man and whispered something. Steve had closed the gap to within fifty feet and saw that the group had stopped in front of the cookfire that Jeff and others had been getting the supplies ready and the water was starting to boil.

  “You?” the man asked, looking Steve over.

  “Me,” Steve answered, and saw the volunteer watch were almost all accounted for and had fanned out into a semi-circle.

  Community members were moving out of the watch’s way and people started crowding the sidewalk leading up to the building, all bunched up. Steve wanted to tell them that they were making themselves easy targets if the shooting started, but he couldn’t take his focus off the front sights and the nearly fourteen men and women that had walked in.

  “The farmer shot at us first,” one man offered, the one who had whispered before.

  “Why didn’t you leave when you set off the alarms then?” Steve asked, moving the safety off.

  “We didn’t know what—”

  “They want us to share out what little food we have,” Jeff yelled.

  A dozen figures in camo turned to look at him and the large bags of rice and beans on one of the folding tables, ready to go into the water.

  “What about you people?” Steve asked, walking closer towards that group, though his gun remained on the twitchy men dressed in all-too-familiar black ripstop BDUs.

  “We’re from another community. We came to ask for assistance. We’re here to help carry anything, and those men were supposed to protect us from roaming gangs and raiders,” a feminine voice said.

  Steve couldn’t tell if it was a feminine sounding young man, or a woman who was so thin she was all but indistinguishable by gender. As Steve’s gaze found theirs, several put their hands up showing they were unarmed.

  “These two are responsible for shooting Dwight,” Steve said, jerking his gun at the men dressed in black, “so you hanging out with them and asking for assistance kinda sounds fishy to me.”

  “If they just wanted a bowl to fill their stomachs, there wouldn’t have been a disagreement,” Jeff called to Dwight.

  “You seem well supplied, we were hoping you could be encouraged to share,” the man in black BDUs said, the one who’d first spoken to Steve.

  “Encouraged? Forced? How many of your people have been kicking in doors around here lately?” Steve’s voice thundered.

  Several of the men and women in the camos looked at each other, one of the men in black looked down at his boots for a moment. It wasn’t lost on Steve nor Matthew who yelled next.

  “If you came here to encourage us to share, why come in with demands?”

  “You folks have so much more than we do!” the same feminine voice in the camos screamed back, making one of the men in black look at her.

  “This is it!” Jeff screamed at them from the side.

  One of the men’s self-control slipped and his hand reached for the stock of the carbine that was slung over one shoulder. Steve had the man’s center mass already in his sights. He hesitated half a heartbeat and several people in front of him screamed and flattened. Steve fired and watched as the man’s legs buckled and he fell backwards on his butt.

  People screamed in response, but Steve started stalking forward when a movement behind the man in black who was still standing made him move his gun off him. He was half a breath away from pulling the trigger when Lucy ghosted behind the man and leveled her service pistol.

  “Keep your hands where we can see them,” Lucy said softly.

  “You killed him—”

  “No, I didn’t,” Steve said walking up and kicking the dropped rifle away from the still twitching and convulsing body.

  The man cursed, his breathing wheezy and Matthew walked up, holstering his gun and pulled the man on his back. The shouting from the other man cut off as Lucy held him and the group in camo watched as Matthew slapped the man’s hands away and undid the Velcro straps on one shoulder and the side and pulled the vest off. He stuck his finger in the hole made from Steve’s round and then looked at the inside, showing everyone it hadn’t penetrated.

  “I hit him in the ceramic plate with a hollow point,” Steve said loudly. “Even though you two opened fire on my people once, I’m not going to murder you in cold blood.”

  Johnathon let out a low whistle as Matthew picked up the downed man with one arm and ignoring the squeaks as he wrapped a big arm around his neck for a grip. Then he patted the man down as Lucy started doing the same with her captive, relieving them of a pistol apiece and both ARs.

  “Damn, that hurts,” the man gasped, rubbing his chest, tears running down his face.

  Steve finally lowered his rifle and finished closing the distance.

  “Johnathon, Justina, can you keep an eye on these green camo mall ninjas for us?”

  “On it,” Justina answered.

  Steve saw she had her gun out and Johnathon was drawing his. They seemed to have everything under control.

  “You two are in a world of shit,” Lucy said. “You have the right to remain silent, anything you say or do will be used against—”

  “Oh shit, she’s a cop,” the one she had disarmed cried.

  “—in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney—”

  “We’re under martial law, there are no courts,” he interrupted again as she roughly pulled his arm behind him as if to cuff him.

  “Well then, I won’t get in trouble for this, will I?”

  “In trouble for—”

  The man dropped when her boot connected with his lower extremities and he started gagging. Matthew hunkered down next to the man Steve shot and looked at him.

  “Who sent you?” Matthew asked.

  “Nobody sent us,” the man gasped, rubbing his chest.

  “You don’t just show up out of the blue and start demanding food, no matter how nicely you were asking. Where are you from, and don’t make me ask again.”

  “The subdivision,” one of the people in camo yelled.

  “And you two?” Steve asked, holding his AR at the low and ready.

  “We’re from around,” the man holding his balls said.

  “You got anything to add to that, or should I give you a kick to get your memory working?” Matthew asked the man Steve had shot.

  He sat up and took several deep breaths, his hands rubbing his sternum.

  “I swear, we’re from around here. We sorta banded together. We’ve been helping others, you know, for the community.”

  “Not our community apparently,” Steve said. “You’ve been leading raids on locals. It’s more than the farm, isn’t it?”

  Both shut up, but in his mind, he already knew the answer.

  “I don’t know what you think you were going to do with that gun,” Jeff said, “but I think Steve over there is right; you didn’t have good intentions. My god man, you were going to shoot one of us. I don’t know how Steve knew you’d live—”

  “Because we killed four of his buddies when he tried to assassinate Dwight,” Steve interrupted.

  Several of their people blanched. It was one thing to hear about attempted crimes, but now they had seen what almost happened to them.

  “What do you think we should do with them?” Lucy asked.

  “Shoot these two,” Steve said, pointing with his muzzle, “they were for sure at…” Steve’s words trailed off as several people around them started shaking their head at Steve’s words.

  “We just wanted food, we’re all hungry,” one of the folks in camo begged.

  “We can share out a little bit wider, but we cannot give up everything we have here,” Jeff asserted.

  Matthew roughly pulled the man who’d been shot to his feet. He still rubbed his chest, and when his gaze met Steve’s, it was full of a
nger and pain. The other man was roughly pulled to his feet by judicial use of an arm behind his back and cursing by Lucy.

  “These two,” Lucy said. “You sure?”

  “You were there Lucy,” Steve told her. “Recognize these two as the ones shooting from by the truck?”

  She nodded. “We can’t just kill them,” she said softly. “That’s not right. I might not be wearing my badge right now, but I can’t condone just gunning them down.”

  “Yeah, you should listen to the lady, man. I have rights.” The man she’d forced up started sputtering when Steve took a few steps forward and butt stroked him.

  He slumped to the ground, and Lucy cursed.

  “I don’t care what you do with this trash,” Steve said, anger in his voice, “just remember, I was at home when somebody came and got me. Last time these assholes opened the dance, I was the first one to respond and held back to let you two come along—”

  “I’m on your side,” Lucy interrupted. “I just can’t. There’s still a constitution to uphold and these two deserve to be judged by a jury of their peers. I took an oath.”

  Steve swore again softly. “Then you figure it out,” he whispered back to her hoarsely and started walking.

  “You know she’s right,” Dwight said to Steve who was still fuming.

  “Things have changed. I mean, these were two guys who shot at you, probably one of them was the guy who winged you.”

  “I know, but it’s one thing to shoot a guy when you’re in the heat of battle. To execute somebody when you’re not…it isn’t that easy.”

  “What do you know about it?” Steve asked, trying to keep the anger out of his voice.

  “Two tours.”

  “Oh, sorry. I didn’t—”

  “Don’t be sorry, I’m just saying. To those who took an oath, it isn’t that simple. Why didn’t you splatter that guy’s head when you knew he was wearing a vest and you weren’t gonna kill him with a shot to the plate in his vest?”

  “I…” Steve’s words trailed off as he thought about that. Why had he not followed up with it? He could have easily kept firing and then gone on to the next target.

  “See, it isn’t that easy, even when your blood is running hot.”

  “Well, shit,” he muttered.

  “Daddy,” Amy complained.

  They had set up in Steve’s back yard. Dwight had brought over some cured ham, enough slices to make a single serving for each of them, and Steve had done what he could with some of his own pantry items to make it a full meal. Potato pearls into mashed potatoes, rice, green beans, and a glass of warm lemonade. The power had stayed out for a long time now, and everybody was worried that it was finally out for good.

  “Sorry, baby.”

  “Don’t get worked up,” Angela said. “You told Lucy they could figure it out. Let them.”

  “Well, they certainly don’t need my permission. The only thing I was good for was startling them when it looked like they had the drop on most of the community.”

  “Lucy would have probably had them,” Amber said. “She’s a badass.”

  “Amber!” Steve and Angela chorused, while Amy and Dwight started laughing.

  “As far as role models go, she isn’t a bad one,” Dwight said around his laughs.

  “Neither is your mother,” Steve said, shooting him a look, but Dwight ignored it and playfully swiped at Steve.

  “So what else is needed around the farm?” Steve asked him.

  “Nothing really. I wouldn’t mind knowing where those guys came from though,” Dwight said, “The only other community in the area, concentration wise, is the subdivision half a mile north of us, on the other side of the golf course.”

  “You think they came from there?” Steve asked.

  “Who knows. I’m surprised things have held together for so long now, to be honest.”

  “What do you mean?” Angela asked him, swatting lazily at a fly that was trying to land on her shoulder.

  “We live outside of a big city. You’d think they’d either have things together already, or the golden horde heading for the countryside, looking for more food.”

  “Well, maybe they have? I mean, we’re still in the Macon limits, but we’re in the outskirts.”

  “Yeah, this isn’t really right in the middle, is it? You know what scares me though? What happens if, say, a hundred people show up at the farm all at once, wanting food? Who stays? Who goes? That might wipe me out completely, but I can’t defend against that. Not with you and the handful of others who help keep an eye and ear to help me.”

  “Yeah, I hope you never have to make that kind of decision. To be honest, I’m surprised that there haven’t been more people trying… stuff.” Steve said his gaze briefly resting on his daughters before turning back to Dwight.

  “It’s always hard to tell, especially when civilized society isn’t quite so civil,” Dwight said and finished off the last of his food.

  Steve chewed on that for a few moments. “Who’s watching the farm?”

  “Matt Junior is out there with some of the volunteers. I’ve been paying them in grain and cured pork.”

  “Any chance you can teach me how to cure it?” Steve asked.

  “Well sure,” Dwight said. “Just come over on a butchering day, and I’ll get you started on the whole process. Why? What are you thinking?”

  “All the local game seems to be hunted out now. We’ve got the winter migration of ducks and geese, but that isn’t for a while and—”

  “You can’t salt cure everything safely,” Dwight said. “Some of it, you have to smoke it also.”

  “Yeah, I thought so,” Steve said with a grin, “but we’re not really doing any trapping around here. I thought the area was lousy with feral hogs too?”

  “It is sometimes, but I have a feeling that we’re not the only ones that have been hunting. I’m sure everyone with a gun has been hunting to put food on the table.”

  “Think we’ve missed the boat on some things?” Steve asked him.

  “Why would we?” Angela asked her husband. “We’ve been ready for these kinds of things. I might have argued with you about this at first, but I feel like we’re in far better shape than most. It’s not our fault that we’ve survived in better shape than some.”

  “Yeah Mom, but shouldn’t we be helping people more?” Amy asked.

  Everyone went silent and chewed on that. A shout from somewhere went up, but it was so far off, the words were lost. Everyone waited to see if a whistle blew, a signal for help from one of the volunteer neighborhood watch, but none went up. Another shout, this one closer, asking if somebody had seen somebody else, the names lost to the light breeze and the coming twilight.

  “We can help more,” Amber answered for her mom, “but then we won’t have as much. If we gave the community center all of our food,” she was whispering now, “it would only last them a week or two, then we’d be starving too.”

  “There’s just too many people to feed?” Amy asked.

  “Yes,” Angela said. “We can’t help everyone. We just don’t have enough.”

  “This sucks,” Amy said. “It seems like they should have been ready, like Daddy and Uncle Dewey were, for this kind of stuff.”

  “Not everybody believed that hard times were coming,” Steve told her softly.

  “But they always do,” Dwight told her. “History always repeats itself one way or another, little one.”

  Amy let out a sigh and wiped at her eyes. She was the sensitive one in the bunch, but she was also the most accepting, especially when Steve was prepping for an unknown disaster.

  “With that, I’m going to get started on the dishes,” Angela said.

  “I’ll help,” Steve told her rising.

  “No, you and Dwight take a seat. I’ve got two helpers if I need them,” she said, looking at the girls.

  They piled plates and the three ladies headed into the kitchen. Amber came back out a moment later with a holstered pistol on h
er jean shorts.

  “Expecting trouble?” Dwight asked her.

  “No, sir,” Amber said truthfully, “but it’s like you said, ‘hard times are coming and history repeats itself.’”

  Steve looked at his daughter and realized how much she had grown and matured in the last year.

  “I hope I’m wrong about that,” Dwight told her, “but it doesn’t hurt to be ready, for anything.”

  CHAPTER 26

  A thumping noise awoke Steve. He lay in the dark, trying to figure out what it was that had startled him awake. It hadn’t been the first time that a night noise, or an animal had scared the crap out of him. Angela rolled over, still breathing slowly and wrapped an arm around his chest. Had he heard her roll over, letting her arm thump against the—

  Above him he heard a startled exclamation and a shout by Amy.

  “Wha…” Angela slurred as he pushed his wife’s hand off him and reached for his holster on the bedside table.

  Something had awakened Amy. It wasn’t her sister’s snoring, Amber always snored, and murmured in her sleep. Usually about Matt and lots of lovey-dovey stuff. If Matt knew the kinds of things that flew out of her sister’s mouth in her sleep, she’d be so embarrassed that she’d… there was the sound again. They kept the windows upstairs open and the rest of the house locked while they slept. Her dad had explained that heat rose, so the room she shared with her sister was always warmer than the rest of the house.

  That’s why they kept the screen in place but left the two big windows open. They were large tall windows that cranked out to the side, and if Amy angled them just right, they helped scoop fresh air into the hot room. When it was too hot, they took their blankets into the laundry room where it was always darker and cooler, but her parents were always being gross and she didn’t want to hear that, so they suffered the heat on those nights.

  She sat up slowly, her hand reaching onto the nightstand to try to find the LED flashlight her dad had given her when a dark shape seemingly stepped through the window. Something crunched as the figure took another step and Amy made a choking sound. The dark figure moved towards her just as she flicked the flashlight on, and a large hand covered her mouth and face. A hoarse voice whispered for her to be quiet.