by P. A. Glaspy
The men looked at each other. It seemed none of them wanted to draw attention to themselves. Finally, one of them spoke in a timid voice.
“N-no … sir. There’s nobody else.” Hutch could see his body trembling. Whether it was from fear or the snow he was kneeling in wearing only jeans, he wasn’t sure — and didn’t really care. He started toward the men, eyes darting in all directions, watching for threats. Darrell proceeded along with him from the other side. When they reached the men, Hutch slung his rifle.
“I’m going to pat them down, Light. Watch them.”
Darrell gave a slight nod and Hutch proceeded to search the men. He found a couple of pocketknives, which he tossed aside into the snow. Finding nothing else that could be used against them, he stepped back and pulled his rifle back around in front of him.
“Okay, you can stand up now.” The men did as they were told. Without taking his eyes off them, he spoke to Darrell. “Light, check the other side of that roadblock. Just in case these fellas weren’t entirely truthful.”
Darrell headed to the cars blocking the road. Keeping one of them in front of him, he scoped out the area behind them. The only person he saw was the dead man, lying in a pool of his own blood. He turned back to Hutch.
“All clear, Cap. Want me to make a hole here?”
“Yes. Get the road opened up so we can get back under way. And gather those weapons they left and throw them over the side of the bridge.”
The men’s eyes grew wide. The one who had answered earlier became animated. “Aw, man! You don’t have to do that. We won’t use them on you, I swear! We need those guns for self-defense. It’s dangerous out here already, and it’s gotta get worse!”
“Especially with ass wipes like you terrorizing folks who are just trying to get by. No, I think you need to get a taste of what you’ve been putting other people through. Maybe it will help you find a different path in this crazy new world we’re in. I just hope you don’t run into anyone like you while you’re searching for it.”
The wannabe road agents flinched every time they heard a splash from their guns hitting the water. With the lack of other noises, the sound carried well. Once he had dispatched the weapons to the river, Darrell climbed in the other Humvee and fired it up. He backed it up and parked it along the safety rail. The opening was more than wide enough for them to drive through. He climbed out and tossed the keys behind the vehicle onto the snow-covered road. He smiled as they landed, sending up a little puff of snow and turned back to his team.
“Good to go, Cap,” he said as he walked back through the opening.
Hutch looked at the men standing before him. “Alright, you guys line up over there.” He indicated the railing to his right. The men didn’t move right away, seeming hesitant to leave the relative safety of the center of the bridge.
“Wh-what are you going to do to us?” the one who had spoken earlier asked in a voice laced with fear and uncertainty.
“Nothing, as long as you stand over there and be quiet,” Hutch snapped at him. He scowled at the men until they complied with his directive.
“What are we going to do with them, Cap?” Darrell said under his breath when he reached Hutch. “We take off so they can start being douches again and terrorizing the people in this area?”
“We don’t have much choice,” Hutch replied. “It’s not like we can take them in, and we can’t shoot unarmed men no matter how much they deserve it.”
“Then what? We just leave them here?”
“No other option.” Hutch turned to the men standing by the railing. “We’re going to be on our way now. If I come back through here and hear one word, one little whisper that you idiots have been bothering people again, I will hunt you down and take every one of you out. You got that?”
With a vigorous nodding of his head, the one who had taken on the role of spokesman replied, “Y-yes, sir. I swear on my mother’s life you won’t hear another thing about us.”
Squinting at the man, Hutch said, “Is your mother alive?”
“Yes. Well … um … she was up until this happened. She lives in upstate New York, so I don’t know.” Hutch’s scrunched up face had the man hurrying on. “B-but I hope she is. I mean, my dad’s there, so yeah … I’m pretty sure they’re okay.”
“Well, maybe you should do something decent for a change. Climb in that Humvee and go find out.”
The man nodded again. “Yeah. Yeah, I can do that.”
With a soft sigh and a shake of his head, Hutch headed for Damon and the rest of his people. He stopped and looked over his shoulder at them. “Stay there until we’re out of sight. Don’t make me order somebody to shoot your dumb asses.”
The men looked like a line of bobblehead dolls with all of their heads bobbing up and down. The one on the end had a big grin on his face and was giving them a thumb’s up. Hutch walked back to their Humvee, with Darrell walking backwards behind him, never taking his eyes off the men. When they got back to the vehicle, Hutch pulled the door open to a cab full of curious faces.
“Well, Captain? What’s the situation now?” Tanner asked after a moment.
“All good, Sir,” Hutch replied. “Let’s move out. Stephens, I’m going to pull Perez off that roof back there. You stay put until we can’t see them anymore.”
“Roger that.” Stephens hadn’t moved through the whole confrontation. He still had the scope to his eye.
Hutch leaned back and called out to his people. “Load up! We’re burning daylight.”
Marco scrambled off the roof as Darrell and Liz climbed back in the camper. Marco nudged her at the doorway.
“Good job, Lizzie! You didn’t get shot that time.”
Liz turned and shot him a look that could freeze water, if it weren’t all frozen already. “Shut up, Perez, before you get shot — by me.”
Marco’s eyebrows shot up as his eyes widened. “Hey now, is that any way to talk to the guy that saved your life?”
Liz rolled her eyes. “You did not save my life. You patched me up. Big difference.”
Marco shrugged. “Pah-tay-to, pah-tah-to. Speaking of potatoes …” He leaned back so that he could see around the door. “Cap, okay if we grab a bite while we’re riding?”
“Yeah, bring seven protein bars and water bottles up here before we head out,” Hutch replied. “That should tide us over until we reach D.C. One bar each. We need to keep rationing until we know what the situation is there.”
Marco groaned as he climbed into the camper. “One protein bar? I can eat three in one sitting.”
Darrell chuckled. “You and me both, brother. I guess we’re going to find our lean bodies again real soon.”
With the bars and water in his hands, Marco stepped out the door. “I wasn’t looking for mine.”
Chapter 23
At the sound of the door opening, the four men in the yard looked up. Their eyebrows raised a bit when they saw two men and a large dog step out of the house.
“Can I help you fellas?” Elliott asked in a calm, firm voice. Ethan kept a tight grip on Lexi’s collar. Lexi stared at the men, seeming to be waiting for something. Her body was tensed like a coiled spring waiting for release.
One of the men back by the pump started to reach inside his jacket. Elliott pulled the shotgun up and pointed it at them as Ethan put his free hand on the pistol at his waist.
“Keep those hands where we can see them!” Elliott said, voice now raised. The man stopped his movement and raised his hands slightly in front of him. The other three men did the same as the one closest to the house smiled and took a slight step forward. Elliott tipped the barrel of the shotgun down and pointed it at him. The man stopped but continued to smile.
“Easy, buddy, no cause for alarm,” the man said. “My friends and I are just checking the area out to see if we might be able to stay around here somewhere. You’ve got a nice setup here. Water, heat, looks like you guys are eating okay. We’d be willing to share the workload and share the wealth, so
to speak. That’s a big house; should be plenty of room for a few more people.”
“We’re full up,” Elliott said, never taking his eyes off the man.
“Well, that ain’t very neighborly of ya,” the man replied, his smile turning to a sneer. “We’ve got more people than this —” he motioned toward the other men, “— and we need places for them. This one looks damn near perfect for our needs. Folks are going to have to help each other out to get through this mess. I mean, it’s almost Christmas. You wouldn’t want ole Santa to leave ya coal in your stocking, now would ya?” His companions snickered behind his back.
In his peripheral vision, Elliott saw the curtains move in the living room window to his left. His eyes darted back to the men in front of him, and he could see that their attention had been drawn to the windows across the front of the house. With a thin-lipped smile, he replied, “We ain’t neighbors. Like I said — we’re full up. Y’all need to move on now. Maybe you’ll find some abandoned homes on down the road, or even down the highway. There’s nothing for you here.”
His gaze shifting from Elliott to Ethan to Lexi, the man took a step back and said, “Oh, I think there’s plenty here. I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again, old man. C’mon, boys, let’s go.”
Elliott and Ethan watched the men walk away, talking amongst themselves and turning back to look at the house frequently. When they were out of sight, Elliott finally loosened his grip on the shotgun and let the barrel drop. He turned his head and looked at Ethan.
“Damn it, this is bad. They’ll be back. We need to get these people trained to defend themselves, each other, and this place. We’ve got work to do, son.”
~~~~~
Carly wasn’t good at shooting. At all.
Her fear of the gun was glaringly apparent in the way she held it, as well as her stance and attitude. Her hands shook, and her shoulders were hunched, no matter how many times she was told to stand up straight. When she pulled the trigger, her whole body went rigid and her eyes were closed. The Walther PK380 she was trying to master, which Amanda had shot first and deemed an easy-to-use, accurate pistol after shooting the center out of a target, looked foreign and uncomfortable in Carly’s hands. Having swung the barrel around causing everyone in attendance to duck for the third time, Elliott held his hand out and took the pistol from her.
Sighing, he said, “Okay, Carly girl, we’re going to try something different with you. Amanda, Ethan, y’all continue with the lessons and the practice. Carly, you come with me.”
Carly crossed her arms over her chest and stomped off after Elliott. “I still don’t understand why I have to know how to shoot! If there’s nine people here and eight of them can shoot, that should let me off the hook. I can pass out bullets or something. We’re lucky I didn’t shoot somebody already. I suck at it! And I chipped one of my nails, which I have no way of getting repaired now.”
Elliott rolled his eyes then pasted a smile on his face as he turned to his daughter-in-law. “Honey, think about this. What if, God forbid, you were outside by yourself and those men came back. By the time you could scream for help, if they hadn’t already grabbed you, it’d be too late. You could be dead before anyone could even get to you. You need to know how to protect yourself.”
“I couldn’t shoot a person, Elliott! I mean, I can’t even hit a paper target and you think I could manage to fend off an attacker with that thing? I’d probably shoot myself and save them the trouble. I just won’t go outside by myself. I’ll make sure one of the boys, or Annie Oakley over there, is with me.” She pointed behind her to where Amanda was working with Lauri, who wasn’t much better than Carly. From where they stood, they could see her hands shaking as she pointed the pistol at the target. “Not Mom, though. She’s as bad as me.”
“You just need to get comfortable with it, Carly.” Elliott dropped the magazine out into his hand and stuck it in his coat pocket. He checked to make sure the gun wasn’t loaded and held it out to her. She looked at the pistol then at Elliott.
“What?” she asked in an unveiled attempt to delay the inevitable.
“Take it. It’s not loaded.” He pushed it into her hand. “I want you to carry this with you all the time. If you don’t have something in your right hand, I want to see this pistol there. Inside, outside, lying next to your plate at the dinner table and beside your bed at night. When it’s not in your hand, I want to see it in your back pocket. I want you to get comfortable handling it.”
He positioned all but her index finger on the grip. She immediately placed that finger on the trigger.
“No! I never want to see your finger anywhere near the trigger unless I tell you. Hold it like this.” He pulled his own sidearm out of his pocket and showed her how to hold it. “Keep your index finger laid along the side of gun right above the trigger. Always. Unless you are actually about to shoot, stay away from the trigger!”
She modeled her hold to match his. “Now see? This is okay. This doesn’t scare me. Am I doing it right now?” She started to pull the gun up in Elliott’s direction. His hand shot out and pushed the barrel down toward the ground.
“Carly! Never point the barrel of a gun at anything you don’t plan to shoot!” The exasperation in his voice was quite apparent.
“But you said it’s not loaded,” she replied in a confused tone.
“What if I was wrong? What if I thought I had cleared it but didn’t? Treat every gun like it’s loaded, even if you unloaded it yourself!”
“But if I know I unloaded it, why would I think it was loaded?”
Elliott blew out a breath with a huff. He seemed to be struggling for the right words. Finally, he blurted out, “Just do what I say! That’s how it is! That’s the rule! Treat every gun like it’s loaded. End of discussion!”
Carly scowled at the older man. “So that’s where it came from.”
“Where what came from?” Elliott asked, exasperation still apparent in his tone.
“End of discussion. Your son used to use that on me all the time, especially when he knew he was wrong and didn’t want to admit it. He’d say, ‘End of discussion’ and walk away.”
With a bit more patience, Elliott replied, “Well, that’s not why I said it, honey. But this subject — this point of contention — is not open for debate. It is the only way to be around guns and not get yourself or someone else hurt. And in our current situation, they are now a necessity of life. Bad people were here today, and I doubt they’ll be the last ones we see. Folks are going to get desperate when their food runs out. We’ll be lucky if we have enough for us to get through the winter. There won’t be any extra to hand out.
“If you assume all guns you handle are loaded, you will always be conscious of how you handle them. I know this is not a life you’re used to. Hell, none of us are ready for this. But we have to do the best we can with what we have to work with, and we have to watch out for each other. We have to be able to defend this place and what we have, or we’ll be the ones out looking for supplies. I’ll do whatever I have to do to keep you and the boys and the rest of your family safe, but I can’t do it by myself. I need help. We all have to help each other; protect each other. Do you understand?”
Carly had been looking down at the pistol in her hands. When she raised her head to look at Elliott, a lone tear ran down her cheek. “I’m scared. This thing terrifies me,” she said softly, indicating the gun with a slight raise of her hand. “But I’m more scared of someone I love getting hurt because I couldn’t do anything to stop it. And that includes you, Elliott.”
Elliott looked at her with an unspoken question on his face. She didn’t wait for him to ask it.
“You said the rest of your family. You should have said the rest of our family. You are as much a part of my family as anyone else here. I’ve known you since I was sixteen years old. I can barely remember a time you weren’t there. We, all of us, are a family.”
With a sheepish grin, Elliott asked, “Even Ethan?”
&nbs
p; Carly raised an eyebrow at him. “Yes, even that one. Although he’s more like a stepchild. You know, like I have to accept him because you two are a package deal.”
With a chuckle, Elliott wrapped an arm around Carly and steered her back toward the rest of the group. “Yep, you can’t pick your relatives, Carly girl. But his time is likely pretty short. I hope you can make peace with him before it’s too late.”
“I’m trying, I really am. At least I’m getting past the feeling of wanting to smash his face in every time I look at him.”
He nodded, smiled, and patted her shoulder. “That’s definitely a start.”
~~~~~
The four men walked down the road to an old van they’d left waiting for them around the bend, close to Highway 14. The one who had done the talking at Elliott’s flipped a cigarette butt to the ground as he reached for the door handle.
“How many people you think they have, Wayne?” he asked the one who had started to reach inside his coat while they were in the yard.
“Two at the windows in the living room, two more at what I’d guess were bedrooms. At least six counting the old man and the other guy on the porch. One of the ones in the living room was a chick, from the long blond hair I saw. Could be more, Cody.” Wayne Mitchell was reaching for the passenger door. “What do you want to do, man? Keep looking for a place?”
“Hell no!” Cody Randolph replied. “That house, the well with the hand pump on it, that whole layout is exactly what we need to get through this mess. That’s the one we’ve been looking for. It’s the golden egg.”
“But if there’s six of them and only four of us, how can we take it from them?” one of the other men asked. “We don’t have no more people like you told that old man, Cody.”
“Well, Dougie, I guess we need to go find some more people,” Cody said in a snide tone. “Wouldn’t want that old geezer to think I was lying, now, would we? Get in the van. You too, Bo.”
