by AJ Newman
I looked under flowerpots, found a key to the man doors, and entered the door closest to the home. The charming exterior didn’t extend into the interior. There was dirt on the floor in piles, and there were several folding tables with chairs stacked around them. There weren’t any vehicles in the garage or tools to work on them. I remember thinking this wasn’t much of a garage, and something smelled odd but familiar. I walked to the far end and saw footprints going to a wall where they vanished. I looked around the inside and then opened the overhead door and stepped outside. The inside wall ended a foot past the door. The outside wall went on for another ten feet. Something didn’t add up.
I walked back into the garage, and went straight to the place on the floor where the footprints disappeared and stared at the wall. Then, I noticed a dirty smudge spot on the wall under a shelf. I felt around under the rack and grasped a handle. I pulled on it, and a hidden door tried to open. Apparently, I had released the latch to the secret door, but the electric motor that opened it was dead. I pushed the door inward, and it slowly opened to reveal a staircase and elevator. Now I had what I call the WTF moment. No. Remember, I had fought in three wars, been shot several times, and traveled all over the world but had never been exposed to the kind of business I thought this was. The steps were dusty and hadn’t been used much, I noticed as I cautiously climbed to the next floor. With a flashlight in one hand and my Sig in the other, I peeked above the top step.
“Holy crap! It’s a marijuana grow house!” The ceiling was lined with aluminum foil, which covered the thick insulation. There were dozens of dead bulbs hanging from the ceiling that hadn’t shined their light on these plants for over a week. I saw black plastic piping running all over the place, with hundreds of misters aimed at marijuana seedlings. Each pot was about two feet across and two feet tall. They were large enough to support one full-grown wacky tobacky plant, as my dad used to call them.
Of course, the plants were all dead, and hundreds if not thousands of potheads would be horrified to see this gruesome sight. I guess since law enforcement was a bit lax these days, the stoners could grow their own weed and cut out the expense of the drug dealers.
Tennessee had passed legislation to legalize pot, and the Federal Government made marijuana legal, but only large corporate-owned companies could legally grow and sell pot. After the Feds and states taxed the crap out of marijuana, it was cheaper to purchase it from your favorite drug dealer on the street.
The other end of the vast room intrigued me, since I saw a big window and door. Just outside of the room were several wooden pallets with stacks of bagged fertilizer, potting soil, and other agricultural chemicals. I’m a bit dense at times, but it finally hit me that if this stuff could grow pot, it surely could grow vegetables. My friends always told me I was already too stupid to use marijuana, and they harassed me every time we smoked some weed. I don’t like smoking, so like Clinton I never inhaled. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. I digress a bit here, but it lays the foundation for understanding me. After all, this story is about me, and my exploits after the crap hit the fan.
I had to use my shoulder to knock the door open. I figured Mom wouldn’t mind if I broke into a drug dealer’s place. There was a desk and a couple of chairs on one end of the room and shelves on the other. The shelves contained books on farming pot, and plastic bags full of pot. There was a metal cabinet beside the shelves and it was locked. I went to the desk and found a key ring with several keys. I tried them until one opened the door. I smiled at first, but then frowned when I realized the cabinet had been used to store a dozen rifles and even more pistols, but there weren’t any there now.
I was just about finished searching the room when I heard something outside that scared me. I ran down the steps and across the garage floor to the man door closest to the house. I could hear an engine running. I said to myself, “Damn, the drug dealers have returned.”
With pistol in hand, I looked around the doorsill to see MMax sitting on the deck, watching Karen load food into the bed of an old Ford pickup. She bent over the side to place a box of food onto the bed floor when I walked up behind her. I said, “Where did you …”
She screamed and turned to face me with her pistol pointed at my chest. “Damn your hide! You scared the crap out of me, and I could have shot you!”
“Normally, women tend to like me and don’t point weapons at me. Can I ask where you found the truck?”
Karen recovered quickly. “I saw a picture of the homeowner standing beside this truck outside of the pole barn behind this garage. You would think he’d keep his prize truck in the fancy garage.”
“Karen, that’s not a garage. It’s a pharmaceutical processing and distribution center,” I joked.
Karen’s face wrinkled up into a weird expression. “Meth or pot?”
“Pot.”
She said, “But pot is legal now. Why have an illegal pot house when you can buy it at any drug store.”
My smile confused her. “The damned taxes are so high illegal pot is cheaper for potheads.”
Karen said, “Oh well, how much pot do we have now? I haven’t smoked a joint since high school. I’ll bet you rolled smoke with some good stuff overseas.”
“Look, Karen, I know you weren’t a pothead back in the day. What’s with the stoner dialog?”
“I was just having fun with you. You’re too straight-laced to have ever had fun.”
I felt insulted. “I’ve had plenty of fun, but never was one to do drugs. We actually smoked a lot of pot over in the Middle East when we were off duty and back on the base. It was easy to get, but it was a bit too strong for me.”
“Jason, I almost forgot to mention there is a nice travel trailer in the pole barn. I want to hitch it up and take it over to your mom’s place.”
“Great idea. I found a bunch of plant food and fertilizer in the pothouse. I’m going to fetch some bags for our garden. There are tons of potting soil and fertilizer in the building. We need to come back for it later.”
Karen was pleased with the garden supplies. “I was afraid we would exhaust the soil. You know, we need some cows and horses to make sure we have a secure supply of fertilizer.”
I replied, “I’m not a farmer, but I think you’re right. Let’s fill the wagon and the truck with everything we can haul and go home. I’ll look for a trailer to pull behind the truck later.”
MMax walked with Karen and me to inspect the trailer. We were almost to the shed when MMax barked and sat down. This was the communication that there was an ambush. Over time, I’d also learned that MMax did this even if the smell was far away. It was up to me to find out how close the danger was. I commanded MMax to search, and he led me to the west side of the house and toward the woods. I took him back around the corner to the house and used my binoculars to scan the woods. I knew MMax thought someone was watching us, but I only knew for sure he had definitely smelled someone in the woods. A few minutes into searching the edge of the woods through my binoculars, I caught a glint of light from the sun off something shiny. MMax was right. Someone was watching us. I patted MMax. “Good Boy!”
***
The scent was from the evilest man MMax had ever encountered. He was the same one whose smell had followed them for days. The odor was so light that MMax hadn’t alerted Jason until today when it blew strong in the wind. The evil man was only a few hundred yards away. MMax was eager to chase the man down and kill him as he had the other evil man, but Jason wouldn’t let him go. MMax hoped Jason would tell him to fetch a rabbit.
***
Ray watched his woman and the stranger walk around the farm from the woods. Ray wanted to take this woman and her girls back to live with him. He had also watched the other home where Billie and Mark stayed. This stranger had both of his new families, and he wanted them back. Ray continued watching through the scope on the .30 .06 Remington Model 700 until he saw that damned dog alert on him. Ray said to himself under his breath. “The mangy dog found me.�
�
Ray slunk back deeper in the woods and then traveled to his hiding place.
☆
Chapter 17
After Ray had escaped, he’d followed Billie north. He had lost track of them, but found several people who had seen them pass by their homes. A couple of people were deceived by Ray’s story, but the others had to be convinced to tell him about them. Ray and his knife could be quite convincing.
Ray had found Billie, Mark, and the older lady the day before Jason had found them. Ray had watched the cabin for the entire day and was ready to pounce when he saw the man and his dog join the group. Ray was mad until he saw Karen and her girls join the growing group. He was delighted because two women were enough for him, and perhaps he could trade the other two for food and ammunition.
He didn’t realize how skilled the dogs were until he tried to sneak up on the cabin a few times. He was thwarted every time by one of the two dogs.
Ray tried tying bags full of pepper and cayenne to his clothing, but the dogs still alerted on him. He tried approaching from downwind to no avail. Ray was at his wit’s end when a simple solution popped into his mind.
***
MMax and I rode in the mule-powered wagon on the ride back to the farm with Karen driving the old truck behind us. She had to drive slowly because the trailer required a 2 5/16-inch diameter ball, but the truck’s hitch only had a 1 7/8-inch ball. The truck could pull the trailer, but if the trailer hitch was jarred off the truck’s ball, it could be disastrous at average highway speed. The old truck didn’t have a wiring harness, so there weren’t any trailer brakes.
We pulled into Mom’s driveway, and Tina came running up to meet us. MMax whimpered to run with Tina, so I released him to go fetch a rabbit. I didn’t have a command to tell him to go play with his girlfriend, so fetch was the best I could think of at the time.
I steered the mules to the backside of the house close to the barn. The others saw us and ran up to the wagon in time to see Karen drive up while towing the travel trailer. Mom was the first to greet us. “Jason, what have you done? It looks like you took everything the Shivers had.”
“Mom, the Shivers weren’t who you thought they were. The short story is they were drug pushers growing pot in that huge garage. They didn’t even take their trailer on their camping trip.”
Mom looked startled. “Oh my! In that case, I hope they don’t come back with guns, looking for who stole them blind.”
Karen asked, “Jan, where can we park this trailer? I plan to move the girls and me into it.”
Mom looked over to me. “Jason, please figure that out but make sure there is room for a couple of more trailers. I get the feeling there will be safety in numbers as long as we add the right numbers.”
I chuckled and nodded. “I think you’re right.” Then I lowered my voice. “Nothing against women, but we need some men to help with labor and security.”
Mom slapped me on the back. “When did a Walker man ever complain about having pretty women around?”
I got serious. “Mom, we’ve both read those survival books. There could be some evil men out there, and they will need to be killed if we are to survive. I don’t know if I want to count on these two to kill. It takes training and practice.”
Mom replied. “I never thought you could become a killer, and yet you kill when it’s necessary and become my old Jason when it’s not. Didn’t Karen save your bacon by killing that man at her house? Don’t sell us women short my wayward son.”
Perhaps Mom was right, I thought, but I still felt we needed another couple of men to share the security work.
After Karen gave a tour of the trailer to everyone, we unloaded the wagon and truck into the barn. I made Mark help Chrissy and me build the outhouse. It was a two hole with a divider between the seats. We didn’t have any paint to make it pretty, but it would beat waiting on the one bathroom with crossed legs. I tied some rope to it and used the mules to pull it over the hole I had dug the other day.
I stood back from the outhouse admiring my work, and Karen inspected the inside. “We need to sand the rough spots on the seats.”
Billie said, “What about spiders? I’m afraid of spiders.”
Ignoring Mom’s advice, I answered, “Any spider that bit your boney butt would die in agony.”
Chrissy and Mark laughed aloud, and I had a smirk on my face. Billie gave me the bird and stormed off in a rage. Mom and Karen walked up just as Billie left. Karen had a grin on her face, but Mom frowned. “Jason, exactly what did you do to make her mad?”
“I exist. That’s enough to piss her off and ruin her day.”
Mark tattled on me. “He said that if a spider bit her butt, it would die.”
Karen laughed, and Mom had to stifle herself to keep from laughing. “Jason, that wasn’t nice.”
I quickly changed the topic. “The best place to put the trailer is over there, on the left side of the barn and facing the house. Then we can add another on each end of the trailer. I’m going to dig a big hole for a common septic tank behind this trailer and plumb the next two into the tank.”
Karen looked puzzled. “A septic tank is made from concrete and very heavy. How will you move it when you find it?”
I had given this some thought. “The dirt above the limestone is very thick here. We can dig a hole big enough to hold four of those plastic barrels in the back shed. I’ll drill a few hundred holes in them and join them together in the big hole. We won’t have laterals, but it should be large enough to handle five to six people’s sanitation needs. Bacteria will eat the solids, and the liquid will leach out into the soil. We can’t use anything but toilet paper. Newspaper, corncobs, and leaves will clog it up because they won’t deteriorate fast enough.”
“We need to go on a scavenging trip and get all the TP and sanitary supplies before someone else does. I’m not using leaves,” Karen said.
“Well, it beats wiping with your hand and cleaning your hand by rubbing it in the sand like the Iranians did out in the field,” I replied.
Both women gave me that ‘go to hell look’ and left me talking to myself. Chrissy came over. “They might not want to hear the truth, but you need to keep reminding everyone this shit is going to get real any day now.”
“Your mom wouldn’t like the cuss word.”
Chrissy laughed, and then snorted like her mom. “When she gets poop on her hands, she’ll cuss a lot more than I ever do.”
“Now that’s funny, girl.”
I sorted through the stuff we’d brought back from the Shivers, and thought about making short and long-term plans for survival. It was okay to go day to day for a short while, but we needed to start planning to survive long term. I was deep in thought when I heard a gunshot in the distance. That’s when I realized MMax hadn’t returned yet.
Everyone heard the shot and came running to me with their weapons ready. “Ladies, I need Karen to come with me, but the rest of you need to find a hiding spot so you can watch for intruders. Don’t let anyone come up to the house. Tell them to stay away until I come back. Shoot them if they keep advancing. Karen, come with me.”
The shot had come from the direction of the Shiver’s place, so I took Karen to the front of the house so we could slip into the woods unnoticed. I took my two Sigs and a 10/22 rifle while Karen had her 20-gauge and a 9-mm pistol. Even though I feared the worst for MMax, I knew not to rush into an ambush. We took it slow through the woods and brush until we covered about three hundred yards. At that point, we began to head east toward where I thought the gunfire had originated.
***
MMax and Tina romped through the woods, enjoying each other’s company. Tina was hunting rabbits, but MMax kept pushing her past the rabbits they jumped. The smell of the evil one was intense behind the farm east of the Shiver’s place. They came to the top of a ridge, and MMax scanned the valley below. There was an old cabin and a small wooden barn just above a lake on the floor of the valley. The wind blew across the valley and b
rought the scent of the evil one to MMax.
MMax began working from tree to tree, as he tried to stay hidden on his way down. Tina didn’t understand and kept jumping at MMax to get him to play. The grass was tall and thick, which helped hide them from view. He smelled a wisp of smoke laced with bacon and rabbit. They were only fifty yards from the cabin when MMax saw a slight movement from behind the cabin. He growled a warning to Tina and he ducked just in time. He heard the blast from the shotgun at the same time he felt a sting. The pellet hit him on the right front shoulder. His instincts and quick reaction had saved his life.
MMax turned to see Tina lying on the ground whimpering. Two of the #4 pellets had struck her. One grazed her back, and the other hit her right hip. MMax saw the man running toward them, so he pulled at Tina’s collar to get her up. She stood on shaky legs, but started walking slowly. MMax got her to look back, and she took off in a run when she saw the man charging at them.
MMax knew the man would catch up to Tina if he didn’t do something to distract the man. The evil one dropped to his knee to shoot again, but the two dogs ran over the crest of the ridge and out of sight. The evil one got up and ran after them. Tina ran on toward home, but MMax darted away from Tina and waited in the brush, licking his wound. MMax saw the man pass him about twenty feet away and began to follow behind him.
The man dropped to his knee again to take a shot at Tina. MMax hit him in the back, knocking him down as the shotgun blasted the trees above them. MMax rolled across the ground, rose to his feet, and launched himself at the man who now had a pistol in his hand. The gun barked and shot fire past MMax’s head, but MMax clamped his teeth into the man’s wrist, making him drop the gun.
