A long Lonely Road Box Set 3

by T J Reeder

  And another light bulb lit up. They were going to land in a port they could easily control and there they were gonna build a bridgehead. Someplace behind the first wave was maybe an even bigger fleet waiting for the word to come in. I’d bet the farm on it (and I damn well might be). Whoever was in charge of this wasn’t as stupid as we thought.

  I really believe Col. Chang told us the truth as he knew it to be. I think he was sent in where he was to draw our attention in the wrong direction. I think he was bait and we just happened to find him long before it was assumed we would.

  Him being where he was didn’t make any other sense. And I heard him say as much but didn’t listen. (Usually about this time I’m jumping up and down screaming, “FUCK! SHIT!” but I’m maturing these days).

  I grabbed the 5 watt and yelled into it. I heard Kid yell back, “STOP YELLING!” I said, ”Sorry Kid, I need all the leadership in the communal area right now!” With that I headed out the door followed by the girls each with a baby in their arms. I looked at them and both smiled. Beth shrugged.

  By the time I got there Charley was on a stump eating cookies. OK, war is important but so are cookies! I grabbed several knowing I was gonna lose most of them, and I did- starting with Sandy, then May. Beth took two with a 1000 watt smile that made me hand her a third one. I had one left so I thought I was good to go, then a slim arm came over my shoulder and *poof*, the last one was gone. Kid stepped behind Beth and enjoyed my cookie. I looked over in time to see the last of them disappearing.

  But Charley, dear Charley, bless his heathen soul gave me two! I shoved a whole one in my mouth fast. Both of ‘Them’ came for me so I tossed it to Kid, who laughed and ran back up to the communications shack. It was touchy for a bit; I thought they were gonna chase her down, but I don’t think they could catch her. I enjoyed watching them get some back. May looked over and said, “Yer sorry, yanno that?” I smiled. It was good.

  Joe and Willy were watching it all and enjoying their cookies while fending off ‘them’.

  Charley said, “Let’s let the Chinese capture ‘them’- they will surrender in a week.” “Now that’s an idea” I said. And wished I hadn’t.

  Calling an end to the beating I said, “OK! Brainstorming session!” Sandy said, “Well, this won’t take long”, and all the men booed her.

  I laid it all out as I had thought it was gonna be, then how I had changed my mind as to how it was gonna be, then how I changed back . Knowing me they weren’t confused at all.

  Charley thought about it, looked back at his little war below the border and said, “John, you’re right. Chang fought like a man dedicated to what he was doing. He really believed they were coming thru Mexico, which wasn’t a bad plan in a lot of ways, except they know Texas is stable and didn’t want to face them yet.

  We thought about it, hashed it and still couldn’t come up with a suitable landing area…and we really needed to know where they were landing.

  Willy brought up the C130 from Texas- if we got it to the coast it could scout way the hell out over the water. I liked that idea, but it was using a resource we were gonna need really bad.

  A voice spoke up from the edge of the group and said, “Does it really matter where they land as long as we know as it happens?”

  We all looked around and saw Kid. Blushing, she said to me, “The history book I’m reading has some stuff about coast watchers on the islands during WW2 who were there to warn of Japanese aircraft on the way to bomb, and also to radio information on ships.”

  Well, we all looked at each other and then I think we all slapped our foreheads at the same time. Out of the mouths of babes. I held out my hand and when she got there I hugged her close and said, “Damn, you’re smart!”

  All three of the girls were high fiving her so I said, “Well, OK General- how do we set it up?”

  She said, “Set what up? You already have Charley’s people out there watching- just move them to the coast and send more with supplies for an extended stay.”

  Now I was sitting with my mouth hanging open, looking at a young girl who just laid out a battle plan with very few words and didn’t take 5 minutes to do it. I looked around at the rest of the leadership and said, “OK, I quit. Kid is now the head of this clusterf….uh… mess.”

  That got laughs while Kid turned red again. The girls were beaming with motherly pride as if they had raised her on wolf’s milk and blood. She was now sitting on my knee smiling when all the leadership started applauding. Hell, I was proud as I could be and I had nothing to do with it.

  After it quieted down Charley said he would get word to his people if General Kid would handle the communications for him, so they took off to deal with that.

  He would have them heading straight for the coast and as soon as we looked over the maps he would have them split up and head to their area of interest. I didn’t like splitting them up, but each vehicle had four men and more than enough firepower to handle most anything they might run into. With their supply trailers full they were good to go until we could get supply runs going.

  I had an idea this wasn’t gonna take very long.

  Sandy asked if it was possible to use the skydiver plane in a recon role. It could fly a hundred miles off the coast up as high as it could with a couple of spotters; they could see a long ways and return to land on a highway to refuel. Another good idea I didn’t have. I said as soon as Sam returned we would ask him- if it was possible we would do it. Good people = good thinking = good ideas! Wish I had thought of that.

  Charley returned to say his lads were on their way. Kid had dragged out some good maps they had in the communications shack and he was able to give them some idea of where to look. I told him about Sandy’s idea and he liked it. So much so he said he was going to go with extra scouts in the plane while the rest drove more hummers out there; the new people could set up two man hides and watch with some supplies. I was liking this more and more.

  Now I needed to get some other people moving. I contacted the fort and told them to break out ammo- lots of ammo, for everything we had that went’ bang’ and get it loaded on trucks. I wanted fuel tankers full and ready to roll.

  We had a lot of stuff here but I had no idea just what we would need (or I should say how much we would need).

  Beth asked me if we could spot the likely landing area could we warn the people living there and get them clear? I sure intended to if we could. With the plane way out scouting we could have a pretty good warning, but we needed to visit all the ports and tell them what was coming…maybe…and to make evacuation plans.

  So much to do and no idea when or where it was gonna be needed. I sure wanted those damn Blackhawks! This day was ending, so we all went home. Charley and Old Woman had headed out wanting to get home to get started on his part.

  We had dinner and settled in for the night. It was a quiet evening and I spent it laying on the floor being an obstacle for the babies to crawl over. They were getting good at it.

  Kid joined me and between us we kept them entertained until time for their evening feeding so mommy joined us and took over. Kid was fascinated with it- Hell, I was too. I never got tired of watching them going at it.

  The girls always stopped whatever evil they were plotting to watch and smile. Talk about a family event! When they were full they were off to bed with all four of the ladies involved in it.

  Walker always gets his nose out of joint because he’s kicked out for a bit, but Molly just lays down and goes to sleep. She’s older and wiser and knows soon enough it will be time to go in and sleep under the crib.

  Kid came back and curled up on the couch by me and snuggled over so I put an arm around her and within seconds she was sound asleep.

  The girls came back and smiled at her so I eased up and carried her to her bed and they tucked her in. May laid down with her and I swear Kid was purring. May was doing baby duty night so the three of us headed to bed knowing May would move into the babies’ room and sometime in the night Kid wou
ld too. It was our new routine.

  Why Kid didn’t just start off in the babies’ room is beyond me. Sandy said, “Because she loves her room and wants to be there, but also wants to be near the babies.” I looked at her and shook my head because I hadn’t said a word. Witches. I don’t wanna know. “Yes you do.” Get out of my head! “HAHAHAHA…”

  Three days later Kid used the 5 watt to tell me the big bird was heading in for landing, I jumped up and headed out the door, followed by the girls.

  We got to the dirt strip just as the plane was touching down. After the roll out and the turnaround they headed back to where we stood in the parking area. Bear was the first one off the plane

  From the look on his face I knew he didn’t like flying. Harry and Sam came out next. Harry slapped Bear on the back and asked if he thought greasy pork chops for dinner sounded good. Bear ran around the plane making loud sounds like one of his namesakes was there; poor Bear and nasty Harry.

  The girls were making ‘eww’ sounds, but I knew Bear wasn’t gonna get any sympathy out of them and was in for a rough time for a while.

  Harry and Sam came over, shook hands and said, “Let’s go have a beer and sit for a bit.” Sandy said they were gonna stay and watch Bear decorate the sand and sagebrush…See? No mercy- not an ounce between them.

  We headed for the saloon (as it was called) and found MA in there wiping down the bar with the juke box blaring out some CCR. When he saw us come in he turned it down and asked our pleasure. He really turned the dump into a great place to relax. After we had our drinks we headed for a table where MA joined us with a cup of coffee. I have to admit the coffee looked and smelled better than the beer.

  Bear came thru the door being pestered by ‘them’. They were asking what the red stuff was, poor Bear. I handed him my beer and MA got me a cup of coffee. The girls were rummaging behind the bar which worried MA, but they didn’t break or spill anything and joined us quietly. Now, I was worried!

  Harry said they had met with the Texas National Guard, spelled out the coming threat and found they had managed to get around 20 Blackhawks running as well as a lot of other aircraft. Sam was smiling so big I thought his jaw was gonna crack, so I looked at him and he blurted out that one of the planes they had was an A-10 Warthog- the baddest dog on the block- Hell, in the whole world!

  The Warthog was a flying death and destruction aircraft that was built to take on armor. If I remembered my facts right, it had the firepower to take out an entire Russian armored company…or was it battalion?

  Anyway, one Warthog could likely handle whatever the Chinese were bringing, but it best have a crew to keep it running, which Sam says they have.

  We will need to find and set up an airport close to the area where the A10 will be operating- I figure that’s the easy part. Getting the ground crew and their equipment will have to happen first, so we need to locate the enemy, and then figure out where they will land.

  The only thing (and the main thing) we need to do right now is get rolling west to be as close as possible so we can get into place rapidly.

  Sam said the Republic of Texas State Guard was working on getting their end of the chain up and running. They were going to pull the wings and load the whole thing on a truck instead of flying it to wherever. I hoped they know what they are doing because the idea of popping off the wings like off a fly scares the crap out of me- I wouldn’t fly it.

  Sandy asked if it was a two place plane and could she run the guns! I sighed, Bear laughed May said, “Shut up, Pukie.”

  Harry was laughing, so Sandy asked what was so funny. He said, “Have you got any idea what kind of firepower a Warthog has?” She said no, but she would very soon. She used the 5 watt to call Kid and asked if she knew what an A-10 Warthog was. Kid said, “Sure, everybody does.” Now I was laughing. Sandy told her to get the weapons facts together and run them down to the saloon.

  Now, I was curious about how the Kid would know this kind of stuff. Sandy said Kid had a huge library in the communications shack to keep her learning curve up while waiting for me to beller.

  I have a lot to learn….”Well, duh Hahaha!” and for once I never reacted. I smiled real big…and got slugged from both sides.

  Harry and Sam went back to talking about their trip. They had the RTNG 105’s rolling already plus plenty of ammo. May sat up and said, “Ammo?” Now she was interested. I know they haven’t shot up all they stole from Barstow during our LA war. Or at least I don’t think so? No! Even I can’t sleep thru that. Could I? “Hahahahaha.”

  So, we had the big guns coming and the air power soon to follow. Charley was getting his scouts heading west and soon a bunch would be flying west when a landing area was cleared. I knew we could roll out in just hours once the word went out.

  Kid ran in the door and handed Sandy a sheet of paper, grabbed Sam’s beer, took a drink, spit it out on the floor and said, “Gah! Why do y’all drink that dog piss?”

  Sam asked how she knew what dog piss tasted like. Sitting down put him eye to eye with her and she leaned over and said, “You know I’m growing stronger and bigger every day, while you’re growing older and weaker, right?”

  Sandy and May did their high five thing and said, “You go, girl!” I said, “Yeah, girl…GO! You’re too young to hang with this crowd in a saloon.” She smiled at me, grabbed a hug and headed for the door. MA called out, “Hey Kid!”

  She turned in time to catch a bag that when she looked, had cookies in it! She ate one staring me in the eye but was smart enough to notice ‘them’ about to mug her so she split…only to pop back in and say, “Hey Pop! Charley’s an hour out” and she was gone.

  Pop? I’m getting called Pop by a Sandy/May clone? Shit. “Hahaha…”

  Harry said he and Bear weren’t sitting this one out, no more home guard shit. Bear just grunted. The girls made grunting sounds causing him to shake a ham-sized fist at them. It didn’t work, and they were laughing. Poor Bear. I told them to stop tormenting the animals which got me the finger.

  Life in the saloon. Why did we allow women to come into the place? “WHAT? May! Did you hear that?”

  “Yep, and guess who’s in deep shit!”

  “Yeah, and who’s gonna be sleeping alone?” “Sandy? Uh, let’s don’t go too far with this, OK?”

  I smiled. Any small bit of power was good.

  I for one was tired of the saloon, and I had smelled something when Kid opened the door. I said, “Lets head to the cooking area”, which we did and where we found a big pot of stew and hot bread waiting. The girls trotted up the trail to get Beth. We set down at one of the picnic tables after getting our food. The cook took two loaves of bread out of the oven and put them and a knife and butter on the table.

  I saw Beth coming, so I got her a bowl and made room for her. She slid into the bench seat, kissed me and said, “Thanks, Pop!” I raised a brow at that. She laughed and said the word spread.

  I looked at ‘Them’ coming along with my babies “John! We talked about this ‘MY’ shit!” I yelled out, “I’m sorry!” the guys looked at me and Beth laughed.

  The stew was awesome! Rabbit- the boys had been at it again; seems the hunting around the gardens was good. The rabbits were breeding faster than the boys could kill them which was fine- rabbits gotta eat too. And we didn’t have rabbit stew every day.

  The girls got their food and sat down. I watched them feeding the kids, and before I could say anything Beth touched my arm and smiled while shaking her head. She whispered, “It’s OK.” Really? I know less about my …OUR! babies than I do Warthogs, which is damn little. But the way they were eating it I guess they liked it. Well, the juice anyway. I don’t think they can chew solids.

  We were still eating when Charley walked into the area. He took a bowl and joined us. We need bigger tables! Or smaller Bears.

  We didn’t talk business at the table. The girls were forced to pass the kids around and of course JC tossed his cookies all over Bear, which set the girls off. How th
ey work that shit out is beyond me, but Bear was glaring at them.

  Kid came bouncing up, took JC and tossed Bear a wet hand towel. Sandy called her a spoilsport until Kid said, “Well, you didn’t see what I got it wet with.” Poor Bear.

  We moved away to let others come eat. The girls stayed behind to help out. Kid was sitting on the ground showing the babies how to throw

  dirt …wonderful. I simply can’t wait for her to grow up. Two Sandys- more than the damaged country can handle.

  After we settled in the Rock Pile living room, Charley briefed us all on how his part of the plan was coming along. He had about 100 scouts gathered and getting up to speed with how to operate with us. A lot were young men just coming of age and ready to take their place as men.

  He asked Sam how many the big plane could haul in one load. Sam said if they were skinny and went in light- just weapons and a few days’ worth of supplies- he could get 15 on board, but it was a load and he would need to land on a real strip.