by David Nees
“Not while I’m running things.” Joe clenched his fists.
“It’s more than that. I tried to run the idea by them of trading us some of their seed. They wouldn’t go for it.”
“Why’d you do that?”
“It would make us independent of them. We could grow our own crops. Then we could ignore them and not let them into town.”
Joe sat up. “What are you talking about? Can’t we just find seeds of our own…in a warehouse somewhere?”
“They wouldn’t work after one season.”
“Where did you hear that?”
Frank explained the problem.
“Damn seed companies,” Joe muttered. “How the hell do those farmers do it?”
“They’ve got some special seeds. Non-hybrid ones that work year after year.”
“Then maybe we go get them. We raid the valley and take a bunch of seed. Hell, take it all. We grow our own. We got the militia to protect the crops. Screw ‘em. Let them make it on their own.”
“That’s what I was thinking. The more the valley interacts with the town, the more they may become a symbol to use against you. They already have a big reputation here. Bigger than we thought. We don’t want the citizens inspired by some outside characters.”
“So we just raid them.”
Frank’s face reflected a cautious look as he weighed Joe’s declaration. “They wouldn’t give the seed up without a fight,” Frank said slowly.
“So?”
“They’re pretty well armed and good at defending themselves. Plus they have the support of the army here in town.”
“Screw the army. We’ve got more men and more firepower than they have. And it won’t even come to that. We got Roper covering for us.” Joe paused to pull out a cigar. “No, the army won’t interfere.”
“Well, we don’t know where the seeds are kept.”
Joe ignored the comment. “Here’s what we do. You, Charlie, and Leo go to the valley and talk with them. Use some excuse, like you want to see their operation to make sure they can meet our production needs. Maybe they need more workers, we can supply that. Figure out where the seeds are kept and how they’ll be defended. Then we’ll know what we’re up against.”
Frank looked doubtful. “I’m not much for spying. I wouldn’t know what to look for.”
“You don’t have to. Leo can do that. You’re his cover.” Joe stood up. “Just get this ready to go. I don’t want to have that Jason guy around if we can get him out of the picture.”
The six met in an abandoned office building, up on the fourth floor where the windows let in the moonlight that was their only illumination. There were no flashlights, they had no candles, and a fire was out of the question. The risk of someone seeing the flicker of light could bring the authorities. So they sat at a table in the soft light of the night.
Steve Warner was the unelected leader of the group. They were a mixed bag of professionals and technicians—a mechanical engineer, a welder, a mechanic, another electrician like himself, and a chemistry teacher from a local high school. They were meeting because Jim Bishop had been captured. No one could know how much Jim had told them. They all felt threatened. Some of the group had already gone into hiding after learning of militia inquiries about them. They had chosen to live in the dangerous under-culture that still existed in Hillsboro, scrambling for food and shelter, always moving to stay ahead of the militia, and watching out for others in the same situation who would rob or kill for food or weapons. It was a precarious existence, but they had concluded that it was better than torture and death at the hands of Stansky’s thugs.
“We’re not getting anywhere. We’ve agreed not to become a terrorist group and sabotage the development in town. But we’re not getting any reforms,” Steve said.
“Not all the other engineers are supporting us,” Stan, one of the men who worked in the wire shop, said.
“And as we get power and communications back, people will get more comfortable and not want to upset the status quo,” another said.
“We’ve got to get all of the technical community to go on strike. Maybe the medical staff as well. Demand changes or we don’t help rebuild the town,” another said.
“We’ll be labeled as extortionists or terrorists,” Steve replied. “And we’ll never get everyone on board. Some people are happy with how things are run and willing to keep helping with the rebuilding.”
One of the welders spoke up. “The more important someone is, the less they want to buck the authorities. Seems like they just want to be part of the power structure, no matter how the rest are treated.”
“We have to do something dramatic. I don’t care if everyone won’t follow our lead. If things get too much better, no one will buck the system,” one of the mechanics said.
“You want to start a revolution?” Steve asked.
“Maybe. We’re running out of time…and options. you know that. When we get the power restored, you think anyone will want to stand up to Stansky? We’re helping to solidify his authority.”
Steve Warner sighed in frustration. “I know time’s not on our side, but I can’t support a revolt. We don’t know if anyone outside of our small circle will support us,” he said.
“Then we better find out pretty soon,” Stan replied.
Steve knew the meeting was ending with everyone frustrated. As a group they held some of the keys to normalization for the city, but they couldn’t figure out how best to use that leverage.
Chapter 17
___________________________________
L ori Sue knew her effect on men.
Before the EMP, she had enjoyed using it. She loved the country western bars and had frequented them after her shift at the K-Mart was done. She couldn’t remember ever having had to buy a drink. She had even tended bar sometimes when they had needed extra help. It had been fun and, being very popular, she sold a lot of drinks,
Now the taps were all dry and the bars were closed. The K-Mart had been stripped and left empty. Lori Sue had no special skills beyond cashiering, so, when the Hillsboro authorities had thrown together their emergency work details with desperate haste, she had been assigned to manual labor. Young people had been particularly valuable in the frenzied rush to build the town wall. She had helped to pull houses apart, and her dead Honda Civic was now part of the wall’s base, its rear bumper visible on the inner side.
Lori Sue had lived with her mother before the attack. Her parents had divorced when she was six. She was often left on her own as her mother went out to the honky-tonks with a string of boyfriends. When her mother was home she drank a lot and Lori Sue had to keep their small house in order. Shortly after the attack, Lori Sue’s mother ran off with a man who had a gun and some food and promised to take care of her. Lori Sue never saw her again.
The hard work and poor diet meant that the workers on the wall were constantly being worn down and used up. After a year on the wall, Lori Sue knew she needed another way of surviving. She had to get out of that job.
It hadn’t been simple. Every able-bodied person in Hillsboro got a ration card every month to use at the food centers. There were occasionally cases where people had no current work assignment, and could pick up their ration cards at City Hall, but those cases were rare and extremely brief. If you could work, you were given work. Your team boss gave you your ration cards. If you quit working, the cards stopped.
Quitting meant starvation.
Lori Sue had three days left on her ration card when she quit the wall. She thought about what she could do to survive for two days. On the third day she washed up, changed clothes, put on what makeup she had left, and headed downtown to the militia headquarters.
The militia offered possibilities. They had their own separate rations, and they seemed to have a little more of everything. Joe Stansky’s gang, headquartered downtown, near the militia also seemed to have extra resources, but they had a reputation for being dangerous. Lori Sue avoided the gang’s territory. She w
ould pin her future on working around the militia’s block of office buildings.
Lori Sue was quite thin from working on the wall, but she still exuded a sexy cuteness. She had dishwater-blonde hair which now hung naturally, without benefit of styling gels. She had full lips, an upturned nose and green eyes that flashed when she smiled. It was the smile that got them. Once, a hopeful young man who had been buying her drinks had told her he was going to write a country song about her. Lori Sue had appreciated the compliment, but she had never gotten to hear the song. The attack had occurred instead.
That third night, she had begun to loiter outside the main entrance of one of the militia buildings. When the guards had looked at her inquiringly, she had smiled at them.
That had been the beginning.
Exchanging sex for ration cards, and other goods was a whole lot easier than slaving away at the wall. She had never gone back to her work site after that evening. She had immediately moved into an unused apartment in another neighborhood in case anyone official came looking for her.
Now she was twenty-one. Her figure had filled out. She was one of only a few women in the business. With a no-money economy and only the ration cards and work assignments, few saw any advantages in pursuing it.
Fulfilling men’s desires worked well for Lori Sue. Along with the ration cards, she traded for clothing, shoes, wine and liquor, and jewelry. She would collect anything she thought could help ensure her survival. There were still gaps between meals sometimes, but nowhere near as often as she had feared. As her clientele grew, she could be selective; she turned down many more men than she accepted. Sometimes she would turn down a man even if it did mean skipping a meal. The militia was a rough bunch; she sometimes thought there wasn’t much difference between them and Joe’s group of thugs.
As time went on, she was amassing a cache of supplies—storable food and medicine, bandages, and even a weapon. In a drunken, debauched evening with a militia supply clerk, she had secured a 9mm Glock, with fifty rounds of ammunition to go with it. Afterwards the clerk had been terrified that she would let it be known how she came to have the weapon. Lori Sue had assured him that if he looked out for her she would keep their secret safe. This leverage only helped to improve her income. She kept the gun hidden in the heating duct of her apartment. Citizens were not allowed to possess weapons, but Lori Sue was not going to be caught defenseless again by any further catastrophe.
The militia had gotten used to her, and she enjoyed the run of most of the buildings. There was always harassment from the men, which she was adept at deflecting; her style was to never be intimidated and to give back just as much crap as was dished out. It generally resulted in a good laugh all around.
On one of her forays downtown she noticed a new face on the street. The woman was thirtyish, attractive with a refined but sad-looking face. Her blonde hair and blue eyes stood out. She wore an elegant housecoat with seemingly not much on underneath. It looked odd to Lori Sue. The woman didn’t look like she belonged with the coarse sort of men found in the militia.
She was walking toward Lori Sue. Lori Sue stared at her, but the woman wouldn’t meet her eyes as they passed each other.
She puzzled over the woman. It would not have shocked her to meet another female in the compound; she knew most of the others who worked the militia and politicians, and she didn’t believe this woman fit that mold. And yet here she was, dressed oddly, walking alone by the cluster of militia buildings.
With no downtown office economy in existence, why else would she be here? There was simply no reason why anyone would willingly be within blocks and blocks of here unless they were connected with the militia, or with the politicians who ran the city…or worse, with the gang that Stansky had assembled. This was the domain of those who ran the city and those who enforced obedience from everyone else. Joe Stansky had his office and headquarters here, the politicians had their offices here, and the militia was housed here, with Stansky’s gang located close by. This woman just didn’t fit. She wasn’t dressed for any role Lori Sue could imagine, and she had looked too nice, cultured perhaps, for any roles that fit a single woman in this neighborhood.
Lori Sue came to a stop and turned to stare after the receding figure. Could she be the wife of one of the political types? She hadn’t met any and as far as she could tell, the militia was shy on wives.
It was still mid-afternoon, too early for showtime. Lori Sue decided to follow the woman.
After two blocks, the woman crossed the street and turned into the entrance of the Hillsboro Inn. Lori Sue grew even more intrigued. She knew the hotel, in its current incarnation. It was used as occasional housing for high-ranking militia and top-level members of Joe’s gang. She had been escorted to some of the unused rooms in it, both times by militiamen of medium rank, and always surreptitiously, as if they had not been completely certain of their right to be there. Mostly the place was for bigwigs. Lori Sue quickened her pace and followed the woman through the glass doors into the dim lobby.
The woman headed toward the right-hand wing. Past the unused elevators, she went to the stairwell, picking a tallow candle out of a basket by the door and lighting it from a wall sconce before entering. Lori Sue trailed after her, waiting ten seconds before going through the stairwell door. She didn’t take a candle but navigated the dark stairs by touch and memory.
On the fourth floor the woman exited. Lori Sue rushed up the stairs and caught the door just as it was about to close. The woman had stopped two doors down the hall. She sighed as she turned the knob, and Lori Sue saw her whole body slump for a moment. Then she went in.
Lori Sue eased the stairwell door shut and hurried down the stairs. This was Leo Stupak’s territory! It wouldn’t be good to be caught here.
Later, talking with the men in the former offices that had become the militia dormitories, she learned that the woman’s name was Donna. According to some, she was Leo’s new woman. He had brought her in after her husband had been arrested. She cautiously mentioned that the woman had gone into the Hillsboro Inn, and one of the men nodded and said he had heard that was where Leo kept the women he collected.
Lori Sue kept up the friendly banter as she gathered information. Information was like other resources; she gathered and stored it for possible future use. She didn’t know when, or if, she might need it, but it was better to know more about what was going on than to be in the dark.
Over the next few days Lori Sue shifted her schedule and made a point of being in the area of the militia block where she had first seen Donna. There was a bar set up on the street level in one of the buildings housing the militia, with a window on the street. Only small quantities of alcohol were served, including harsh homemade whiskey, random beers, and even more random bottled liquors, depending on the day. Militiamen got drink allowances with special ration cards, with higher ranking men getting the better choices of alcohol. Lori hung out there, hoping to get a chance to learn more about the woman she saw. She had a new reason now. If this Donna had Leo’s ear, she could be helpful to Lori Sue; connections never hurt. She wanted to move up in the hierarchy and not have to whore around with the grunts for survival.
On the third day, Lori Sue was rewarded when she saw the woman emerge from the hotel and come down the street. She was dressed just as oddly as before. She walked past the window where Lori Sue was watching and then surprised her by opening the door and entering. She walked up to the bar and gave the bartender a slip of paper. He immediately told a militia corporal to watch the bar and disappeared into a back room.
“What kinda note did you hand him to make him run like that?” Lori Sue asked as she went over to Donna.
Donna glanced up. Lori Sue smiled her best and friendliest smile, but the woman turned back to the counter.
“I’m just trying to be friendly. It’s hard to find a female to talk to. Your name’s Donna, right?”
Donna turned back to Lori Sue, her face draped in sadness. “I’m not interested in talking
.”
“Are you okay? You don’t look so good.”
Lori Sue was astonished at the long, trembling look Donna gave her. The woman’s eyes did not seem to fully focus, and her clenched hands shook on the bar. After a long moment, she seemed to get control of herself. “I’m fine.” She turned away again.
Lori Sue took a chance and touched her arm. “Please, don’t blow me off. I need to talk with someone. I’m on my own and could use a friend.”
Again Donna turned back to stare at her, more sharply this time. “Why do you hang around here?” she said in a harsh whisper. “This is not a good place. Get out.”
Lori Sue was taken aback by the sudden change. “I got to survive,” she said simply. She leaned forward. “But I could use a friend. We need to help each other out, you know?”
The bartender came back with two cardboard boxes in his arms, one on top of the other, and passed them to Donna. “Here ya go. Don’t drop ‘em,” he said with a smirk on his face.
Donna lowered her eyes and turned to go.
“What’re you staring at?” the bartender said to Lori Sue. “Get lost and don’t go hitting people up for free drinks.”
“Shove it up your ass,” Lori Sue said and followed Donna to the door. Outside, she reached up and took the top cardboard box. “Let me help you.”
Donna almost stumbled at this intrusion. “What are you doing? What do you want?”
“Like I said, I could use a friend and you look like you could too.”
“I can’t help you. I don’t think I can be friends with you. You don’t know what’s going on with me. You should get away…far away from here.”
“I’m stuck here, like all of us. I’m just trying to survive. I know you’re connected to Leo, so I figure you might be able to help me.”
Donna went rigid and stared at Lori Sue. Now her eyes flashed with a barely suppressed fury, and she spoke through clenched teeth. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her voice came harsh and low. “He only lets me out to do errands like this. I can’t help you and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll get out of here now. Give me that box and go away!”
