Fight 4 Us (Book 10): Ghosts

by Grenda, Brian

  “I would like to have them if you wouldn’t mind. Unless you want to be tracked by the government,” says Saba.

  “They are all yours. Whenever we see you again, you can have them,” I reply to Saba.

  “When are we going to see you guys again?” asks Phil to Bakari.

  “Great question Phil. We will be in touch, but our next big plan is to get the electricity back on, and we can definitely use your help with that,” answers Bakari.

  “When do you want to do that?” I ask Bakari.

  “I can’t give a definite answer on when, but I will call you guys over the satellite radio phone we gave you,” answers Bakari.

  “Okay, we will plan for a couple days though,” I say to Bakari.

  “If we help you with the electricity, then we are all square with the bullets and items we got from you?” asks Phil.

  “Yeah, everyone will be good with us except Shaun,” answers Bakari.

  “Why? What did I do now?” asks Shaun.

  “You think all those pounds of chicken and vegetables you ate were free?” answers Bakari.

  “I guess not, but I’ll work it off,” answers Shaun.

  Bakari smiles, lets out a little laugh, and says to Shaun, “I’m just messing with you about the food.”

  Shaun gives Bakari a half smile.

  Bakari looks at me and my group and says, “But seriously, my brother and I want to work together with you going forward and I hope that includes all of you that are sitting at this table.”

  “I’m down to help out,” says Phil.

  I look at Shaun, Matt, and Jon and say, “I do not speak for you or anyone in my group, but I think working with Bakari and his Ghosts is something that will be good for all of us.”

  “Then I’m in,” says Jon.

  “Me too,” says Matt.

  I look at Shaun.

  Shaun says to me, “You know I’m in.”

  “That settles it. You and your team have me and my team going forward,” I say to Bakari.

  CHAPTER 18

  TROUBLE

  I place our large bag of orange badges into the back of Bakari’s SUV and say, “There ya go. You have all of our orange badges now.”

  “Thank you, Ryan. I’m glad that it all worked out with us,” replies Bakari to me as I close the back hatch of Bakari’s black SUV.

  “Thank you for everything Bakari. I’m thankful for everything you have done for us and the help you have given us,” I say to Bakari.

  I shake Bakari’s right hand and Bakari says, “I’ll be in touch. Stay safe and strong.”

  “You too. I’m really glad that I had the opportunity to operate on your shoulder,” I say to Bakari.

  “Everything happens for a reason doc. You know initially I was going to be operated on by another surgeon. I had the date set and everything,” replies Bakari.

  “What happened? Why did you come to me?” I ask Bakari.

  “My brother didn’t like the surgeon that the team wanted me to go to, he found you online, and the rest is history,” answers Bakari.

  “Well I’m glad he did. Your brother is a smart guy,” I say to Bakari.

  “He sure is. I can’t wait for you to see what he can do. I’ll be in touch,” replies Bakari.

  Bakari gets into his black SUV.

  Phil, Shaun, Matt, Jon, Lauren, and I watch Bakari and his caravan of black SUV’s as they drive away from Shaun’s house and exit Citrus Oaks.

  “What are you guys going to do today?” I ask.

  “Nothing much, I’m going to spend some time with my mom and Kylie,” answers Matt.

  “How about you Jon?” asks Matt.

  “Just relax and see what Kelly is up to,” answers Jon.

  “How about you?” I ask Phil.

  “Just spend time with Nicole and the babies. They just started trying to crawl recently,” answers Phil.

  “Really. Nicole is starting to crawl. Man that’s nice,” jokes Jon.

  “How about you?” I ask Shaun.

  “I’m going to spend some quality time with Lisa. If ya know what I mean,” answers Shaun.

  “Gross. I’m out of here,” I jokingly reply to Shaun.

  Shaun looks at the bag that Bakari gave me when he first picked us up to take us to meet Isiah, unzips the bag, reaches into the bag, and grabs a mask and an oversized cloth face mask out of the bag.

  “Hey, wait up you two!” shouts Shaun to Lauren and me as Lauren and I walk over to our house.

  Lauren and I look at Shaun.

  Shaun hands me the mask, and he hands Lauren the oversized cloth face mask.

  “What is this?” asks Lauren.

  “It’s a cloth face mask,” answers Shaun.

  I see a note on top of the mask Shaun just handed to me and it says, “To Dr. Briggs. We left it plain white for now, but we can paint it however you want.”

  I look at the outside of the mask and it’s a plain white mask, black coverings over the eyes, and a small black dot under the left eye.

  Lauren puts on the oversized face cloth and pulls it over her nose and positions it on her face.

  I look at Lauren and see the black cloth face mask.

  The oversized black cloth face mask has a skull design on it, with a jaw, teeth, and nasal cavity on the front of the mask.

  “That looks pretty good. It may even help with the smells,” I say to Lauren.

  “I hope so, it smells pretty bad around here at times,” replies Lauren as she pulls down the oversized black cloth face mask off her face.

  Phil, Jon, and Matt walk down the street and head to their homes.

  “See ya guys later,” I say to Matt, Phil, and Jon.

  I look at Lauren and say, “I’ll be home in a second sweetie.”

  “Okay, honey. I’ll see ya inside,” replies Lauren.

  Shaun starts to walk away from me, and I shout, “Hold up Shaun!”

  Shaun turns around and asks, “What’s up Ry?”

  “I just wanted to make sure you were okay after what Bakari said about Dutch and Cage. I know you liked those guys,” I answer Shaun.

  “I don’t know what to believe. If it was Dutch and Cage, then I can’t believe it. I mean they freaking shot up our truck and almost killed us,” says Shaun.

  “Do you think it could be true what Bakari said?” I ask Shaun.

  “I don’t know, but why would he lie about Dutch and Cage? Why did they have our weapons? Why was Cage’s face all tore up?” asks Shaun.

  “I know. They could have killed you guys when you were in that truck,” I answer Shaun.

  “They should have killed us. I don’t know why they didn’t,” replies Shaun.

  “What do you want to do about them?” I ask Shaun.

  “I don’t know, but I do want answers. I want to know what they’ll say to the straight up question of was it you at the shopping center shooting at us,” answers Shaun.

  “I don’t know if it’s a good idea to be around those two anymore, but I’ll go with whatever you want to do,” I say to Shaun.

  “Thanks Ry. I appreciate it,” replies Shaun.

  “You got it man,” I say to Shaun.

  Shaun grabs his stomach and says, “Oh man. I gotta take a mean shit. I don’t think my body knows how to handle actual good food anymore.”

  Shaun runs into his garage and into his house.

  I laugh and shake my head.

  I start walking back to my house and look at the oak tree that is in Bobby G’s front yard.

  The same bird that I have seen several times around the neighborhood and around our graveyard, lands on a branch of the oak tree in Bobby G’s front yard.

  I look at the small bird closely and see that it’s a little guy and he looks to be pretty young.

  I say to myself, “Hope you got to see what happened today dad.”

  I walk into my house and Milo runs over to me.

  I say hello to Milo, Callie, and Fran.

  Fran asks me, “Any ideas on the
headstones for our graveyard?”

  “I was hoping to get some stone to put there, but I think we need to put up wooden crosses for now,” I answer Fran.

  “I think that’s all we need. Just engrave something on each of them,” replies Fran.

  “I’ll look into it tomorrow for sure,” I say to Fran.

  “Thanks Ryan,” replies Fran.

  “Welcome,” I say to Fran.

  I walk into my garage and put the mask that Bakari gave me on a shelf that is next to my large map of Tampa Bay.

  Lauren enters the garage and walks over to me.

  “What cha doing?” asks Lauren.

  “Just checking out the map,” I answer Lauren.

  “What did you think of Bakari’s place?” asks Lauren.

  “It was pretty great, and almost too great,” I answer Lauren.

  “Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Like what are they hiding. Like it was almost too good to be true,” replies Lauren.

  “What does Isiah have?” asks Lauren.

  “I don’t know, but it wasn’t good, whatever he has. He looked so frail,” I answer Lauren.

  “I wonder if he walks, or if he uses that wheelchair all the time?” asks Lauren.

  I look at the map and see that we still have so much of Tampa Bay to check out.

  “I wonder what places and people Bakari has?” I ask as I look at my large map of Tampa Bay.

  “Me too. That food was pretty great they had there, and Saba had all those gadgets,” says Lauren.

  “I do trust them though. I just got a good feeling about Bakari and Isiah,” I say.

  I walk back inside our house with Lauren.

  “Did you make your buggy bag yet?” I joke with Lauren.

  Lauren smiles and answers, “I’m going to make it right now. Any suggestions?”

  “Don’t make it too heavy. I can’t carry it for ya,” I answer Lauren.

  “You mean I actually have to carry the bag that I pack?” jokes Lauren.

  “I know you aren’t used to that concept, but I have spoiled ya I guess with always carrying your heavy ass bags when we travelled,” I reply to Lauren.

  “I might be in trouble then,” jokes Lauren.

  Lauren kisses me and says, “I love you.”

  “I love you too, go make your bug out bag,” I say to Lauren.

  Lauren walks towards Fran’s room and asks, “You ready to make your buggy bag mom?”

  I look out my sliding glass door and see a rabbit trying to get into one of our raised vegetable gardens.

  I grab Lauren’s bow and arrows and go out my front door.

  I quickly walk around my house and slowly open my white privacy fence gate.

  I try not to make a sound as I enter my backyard.

  I quietly close my white privacy fence gate and see if the rabbit is still near our raised vegetable gardens.

  I stand still near my white privacy fence and I see the rabbit standing next to one of our raised vegetable gardens.

  I whisper to myself, “You are in trouble now bunny boy.”

  The rabbit tries to jump up onto one of our raised vegetable gardens, but he does not jump high enough to make it up onto the wooden frame of the vegetable garden.

  I load an arrow into Lauren’s bow.

  Lauren’s bow is a little small for me, but it will hopefully get the job done.

  I stop walking and aim Lauren’s bow and arrow at the rabbit.

  The rabbit doesn’t see me, and he tries to jump up onto the raised vegetable garden one more time.

  The rabbit jumps and makes it up onto the raised vegetable garden this time.

  I try to control my breathing as I see the rabbit trying to get into our vegetable garden.

  I adjust Lauren’s bow and arrow and aim the arrow onto the rabbit.

  BANG!

  A gunshot goes off at our main entrance.

  The gunshot startles me, and I release the arrow.

  SCHHWAFF!

  My arrow hits the side of the vegetable garden and misses the rabbit.

  I see the rabbit run away from the vegetable garden and towards our back fence.

  BANG!

  Another gunshot goes off from around our main entrance gate.

  “Shoot it down!” shouts someone at our main entrance gate.

  I can’t believe I missed the rabbit with my arrow.

  I run over to the vegetable garden, grab the arrow that is in the piece of wood that makes the side border of the vegetable garden, and pull the arrow out of the piece of wood.

  “It just dropped something!” shouts someone from around the main entrance street of our neighborhood.

  I become intrigued by the voices who are shouting around our main entrance.

  I run to my white privacy fence gate and hear someone shout, “Careful Brody!”

  I open my white privacy fence gate and run to the front of my house.

  I drop Lauren’s bow and arrows next to the side of my house and run towards Bobby G’s house.

  I make it to Bobby G’s oak tree and see Shaun looking down our main entrance street through a pair of binoculars as he stands in his open front doorway.

  “What’s going on Shaun?” I shout.

  “A small drone flew over the neighborhood and dropped something!” answers Shaun.

  I look down the street towards the main entrance of our neighborhood and see Brody holding something in his hands.

  “What is it Brody?” I shout.

  “It looks to be a present sir!” answers Brody.

  “What? Are you fucking with me?” I shout.

  “No, it’s wrapped and looks like it has a tag on it!” answers Brody.

  “I’m coming to check it out!” I shout.

  I run over to Brody, who is standing in the middle of the street and holding a small wrapped object in his hands.

  Brody looks at me and says, “It’s for you.”

  Brody hands me the wrapped object.

  I look at the wrapped object, and I read what’s written on the tag,” TO: RYAN, FROM: DK.”

  I look at Brody and Brody nervously looks at me.

  “How did this get here?” I ask Brody.

  Brody answers, “A small drone flew over the neighborhood and dropped it here.”

  Shaun runs over to Brody and me.

  “That’s what the shooting was?” I ask Brody.

  “Yeah, those two missed the drone completely,” answers Shaun.

  “That drone was super-fast and kept flying side to side to avoid our shots,” replies Brody.

  I look at Shaun and ask, “Should I open it?”

  “What’s the worst that could happen?” asks Shaun.

  I slowly unwrap the object, and I find a small box.

  I open the box and find a folded piece of paper that is sitting on top of an object that is heavily bubble wrapped.

  I open the folded piece of paper, while Shaun unwraps the heavily bubble wrapped object that is in the box.

  I read what is written on the piece of paper and it says, “Ryan. I hope you are still alive, and I hope this package makes it to you in one piece. I want to talk with you privately. This walkie talkie is set to the channel that I will call you at tomorrow at 1100. DK.”

  Shaun takes out the object that was heavily bubble wrapped, and it’s a walkie talkie.

  Shaun shows me the walkie-talkie and asks, “What’s this all about?”

  I look at Shaun and answer, “I don’t know, but I’m sure it’s trouble.”

  TO BE CONTINUED…

 

 

 
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