Tomorrow's Dawn (Book 2): Fractured Paradise

by Wohlrab, Jeff

  Emmy shook her head. “Just pistols.”

  He turned to Abby, still holding her knife in her upturned palm. She simply shook her head. “I’ve never shot a gun.”

  Jensen smiled reassuringly. “No worries. We’ll turn you into a sniper in no time.”

  She smiled back. “Good, I was going to ask if you’d teach me, but I don’t even have a gun.”

  Jensen turned to the table and picked up a pretty Walther Q5 Match with a blue trigger. He dropped the magazine and racked the slide, showing that it was empty, then handed them both to the young lady as he responded, “Now you do. You’ll be shooting like a pro in no time.”

  Dylan, who had gone to his tent to retrieve his shotgun, returned as Brent held up a full-sized Smith & Wesson M&P handgun, which Jensen instantly recognized.

  “M&P9 pro, 17+1, and, yes, I can shoot it,” Brent chimed in. “As for a rifle, I don’t currently have one, but I’ve been hunting plenty.”

  Jensen nodded again, “We’ll get that fixed.”

  Jensen then turned to Marcy, who was holding up a large pistol. “1911,” was all she said.

  Jensen followed up; he hadn’t seen one in all black before—only blued or stainless. “Is that a 9 or a 45?”

  Marcy sounded hurt. “.45. Haven’t you heard? Size matters.”

  From his left, he heard Daniel choke as Jessica called out, “That’s my line!”

  Marcy turned toward Jessica’s voice as the former police officer held up her own .45, a Rock Island Armory 1911. “Rock Island.”

  Marcy held her own 1911 aloft and said, “Kimber Custom.”

  Jessica whistled, “That had to cost a pretty penny.”

  Marcy did some quick math in her head, “About 150,000 pennies if I remember correctly.” She turned to Jensen. “And I can shoot it.”

  That just left Dylan, who was holding a short, black, pump-action shotgun with ghost ring sights. “I’ve never shot a pistol, but I’ve shot this a couple times.”

  Daniel quickly reached out and pushed the barrel toward the ceiling from where Dylan had been holding it horizontally. “Sky or floor kid.”

  Dylan looked abashed and quickly checked the safety, which was located on the top of the shotgun.

  Jensen asked him, “Mossberg?”

  After looking confused for a moment, the young man looked back at his shotgun to confirm before nodding and replying, “Mossberg 500.”

  Jensen assumed that the young man hadn’t been trap shooting with the tactical pump action, but wanted to be sure. Shooting a rifle and a shotgun at a stationary target could be very similar, but things changed when the target was moving. “Trap?”

  Dylan shook his head. “Just paper targets, pumpkins, watermelons, things like that.”

  Jensen nodded, filing away that information. If Dylan’s only experience with the shotgun was at stationary targets, it would be easier to teach him to shoot a rifle.

  Jensen grabbed a handful of M4s that had been recovered from the National Guard Armory in Elberton and handed one to each of the members of the Dahlonega group. “These are your new best friends.” The former military man turned back to the table, where the pile of weapons had diminished considerably in the past hour, and picked up the Glock 17 and holster that had belonged to Todd. He handed it to Dylan. “And here’s a pistol for you.”

  Jensen turned on an LED lantern to help light the dim cabin, and for the next few hours they went over the safe handling of weapons, loading and unloading, cleaning, and malfunctions. In addition to the five from Dahlonega, Sheila was listening intently. Her Adams Arms was very similar to the M4s the new group had, with only a few small variations. One happened to be a piston system instead of the dirty direct impingement system on the military weapons.

  “Well, damn,” Daniel said when they realized that. “Welcome to the piston club!” His own SIG556 was piston operated. That type of system was much cleaner than the other weapons, which blew dirty gasses back into the chamber. It wasn’t any more reliable, but it certainly aided cleaning.

  It was the next morning before Jensen was comfortable enough to take them out shooting, using the clearing as a firing line. He affixed targets to trees on one side of the clearing by using nails looted from the feed store to attach trash from their previous meals. Jensen walked them each through the process of loading their rifles and making them safe in order to refresh the lessons from the previous day.

  He had each of them turn on their red dot sights and place them on the target without pulling the trigger. He stood behind each of them, assessing the cheek weld and noting where they gripped the rifle. More than once, he reached up and removed an overeager finger from inside the trigger guard, instead placing it pointing forward along the magazine well. “Folks, fingers stay out until you’re ready to fire.” Jensen demonstrated once again with his own rifle.

  He was surprised to learn Sheila’s rifle sight was actually a three-power scope rather than the typical unmagnified red dot sight. The small scope was called a Spitfire and had an illuminated reticle with a bullet drop compensator. As he handed the rifle back to Sheila, Jensen told her, “If you don’t like that, let me know and we’ll trade rifles. I want one of those scopes.”

  Sheila grabbed it back, “Nope! You gave it to me, it’s mine now!”

  Jensen shook his head mournfully. He hadn’t thought about upgrading his Bushmaster. It was a rifle he’d bought for himself years ago, and he was used to it. He looked at the lineup in front of him and noted that five of the weapons had select fire capability and the other was a piston-operated rifle with a three-power scope. It was tempting to swap for one, but he knew his rifle and maintained it meticulously, it would be pretty stupid to exchange it for something with an unknown history.

  After Jensen demonstrated, the others took turns firing one at a time at the targets he had on the trees. Though it wasn’t truly necessary, he had them all walk up to the targets after each firer. He didn’t distrust any of them, but walking across an open clearing with a firing line behind him didn’t make him feel exceptionally comfortable. Abby was expectedly coltish, never having fired a rifle before, but the others showed decent potential.

  Jensen had Daniel, Jessica, and Dave fire as well. Daniel and Dave were very accurate, Daniel using his own SIG556 and the others borrowing M4s from the newcomers. Dave still had the bolt action Remington 700 strapped to his back and Jessica hadn’t traded in her police shotgun yet. Dave’s shots were measured and steady, poking holes in a blue aluminized package. Jessica went forward and shot ten rounds so rapidly it almost sounded like one report. All of them hit the target. She smiled and put the safety on before handing the rifle back to Marcy. “I’ve shot these a time or two before.”

  Brent was clearly the best of the Dahlonega group. He hadn’t been lying about shooting rifles before.

  When they were finished, Jensen pulled the older man aside. “Based on this, I think you’d probably be able to shoot expert if we were at a real military range. Very nicely done.”

  Brent smiled, grateful for the compliment from the man barely more than half his age. “Thank you. I’m not sure about expert, but I think I’m comfortable.” He looked over at Jessica, “I think after you, she’s probably our expert!” He kept one hand pressed against his side where his would was clearly causing him some pain.

  After they were done with the rifles, Jensen had them insert a full magazine and click on the safety. “Remember, you still have ONE round in the chamber and another 30 in the magazine. You do not have to rack the charging handle again before you fire, all you have to do is turn off the safety and pull the trigger. Please don’t do that unless you’re shooting at someone.” He paused for a second. “Not me. No shooting at me.”

  Next they switched to pistols. Jensen ended up breaking them into two smaller groups. Five members of the group had hammer fired pistols, while the remaining five had striker fired pistols. The operation was very similar between all of them, but different enough th
at he didn’t want to cause confusion by teaching both groups at the same time.

  In the first group, he had Daniel, Jessica, Dave, Marcy, and Emmy firing handguns with exposed hammers. Jessica was once again the best, quickly shooting her 1911 with the heavy .45 ACP bullets into a small group. Emmy was surprisingly second in that group, shooting almost as rapidly into a similarly sized group using her little Bersa.

  When Jensen looked at her in awe, she told him, “I had a bad experience once. I wasn’t going to let it happen again.” His face grew grim, he was pretty sure he knew what she was saying, but he certainly wasn’t going to force her to tell the group she’d been sexually assaulted. In what had been one of the most advanced nations on the planet, women still had to live in fear of becoming the targets of deranged men. She saw the dark clouds on his face and shrugged, “He’s dead. I made sure of it.”

  Whether it was the right thing to do or not, Jensen couldn’t resist holding up his hand for a high five and smiling when she smacked it with her own palm. “Good.”

  Jensen was clearly the best shot in the second group using the striker fired pistols. He had Sheila, Brent, Dylan, and Abby. Abby was much, much more accurate with the pistol. When Jensen asked about the difference, she indicated the side of the slide, which said Q5 Match. “I think it’s just the gun.”

  Jensen shook his head and handed her his Ruger American, indicating that she should fire again. This time she was just as accurate. “I think we’ve found your strength,” the former military man said.

  The young lady blushed with pride.

  Chapter 7

  Jensen checked one more time before nodding to Sheila to get out of the cockpit to hook up the small plow. He quickly closed the hatch in his tub, watching the road to their east. He looked to his west, where Daniel and Emmy were watching for any activity from that direction. Todd’s death was on his mind. He didn’t want a repeat.

  Both of the tubs, or the armored cavalry scout vehicles, were parked near an old barn where they had seen a chisel plow tucked into the dead weeds. If it had been summer, they likely would have never even seen it. Brent had suggested looking for equipment that could be towed by the tubs, and Jensen had an idea for this piece of farm equipment. His only concern was whether they could find a way to put it into use. His tub lacked any sort of hydraulics to raise equipment.

  The plows they’d seen so far, which had angled blades to drop into the earth, all had three-point hitches on them, made for use with farm tractors. They didn’t have one of those. This implement had a number of curved chisels on it, and Jensen thought they could make it work for their needs. Moments later, Sheila was climbing back into the cockpit, smiling.

  “It worked?” Jensen was surprised. It didn’t seem like anything had worked for them the past few weeks. If something could go wrong, it went very wrong. Murphy was clearly was pissed off at them.

  She gave him two thumbs up. “It looks like we’ve got a cultivator.”

  They were only a few miles from home base, and Jensen was excited to head back to try out his new toy. “Black Widow, Canada, RTB. I’ve got lead.”

  In military jargon, RTB simply means return to base. It was one of those shortcuts military people used to keep the airwaves clear, particularly pilots. With nobody else on the frequency, it wasn’t necessary to be so abrupt, but Jensen had spent years utilizing military networks and using the jargon. It didn’t even occur to him to change, and Daniel understood exactly what he had said. The one who didn’t understand was Sheila, who just looked at him.

  After a moment of confusion, he said “Oh, return to base.” Sheila nodded in understanding; it was the first time she’d heard that particular usage. Moments later, Jensen continued, “Devil Dog, did you read that”? Sheila, callsign Hospital, was in the tub with him this time and Dave, the former Marine, was manning the radios.

  “Devil Dog copies, ETA?”

  This time Jensen didn’t even bother to look over. “Estimated time of arrival.”

  Sheila answered back, “I know that one Mr. Smarty Pants.”

  Jensen grunted, “Hey, just making sure.” He focused on the road ahead as he looked for any signs of an ambush. He didn’t expect one, but he hadn’t really expected the recent ones either. In his monitors, he could see the multicam tub following his own.

  The return trip was uneventful, and Jensen quickly jumped down to check out their new toy in a familiar area. He wasn’t really worried about someone taking potshots at him at their own base. He looked over the little cultivator, which had two tires and five curved prongs tipped with V-shaped metal pieces. He could see a depth selector as well, and noted it would only till up to six inches.

  “Hey Brent, would you come over here?” Jensen motioned to the older man and waited patiently as he walked over. “You think we could pull the tires and the two outside chisels off this thing?”

  Brent looked it over carefully. “That would be easy enough, but why?”

  Jensen, still looking at the chisel, told him, “If we can get this to work, I want to break up the ground from the spring to the cabin. If we dig that out, we can get the stream to flow past the cabin and save ourselves a lot of work.”

  Realization dawned on the man’s face and he said, “Wait here,” as he headed off toward his red Prius CUV. As a construction foreman, he had a variety of tools stashed in the back, unwilling to leave them behind as his group had escaped Dahlonega. He returned with some large wrenches and set to work, quickly removing the bolts for the outside chisels and pulling the blades off. “Do you want to get it in place before we pull the wheels?”

  Recognizing the benefit to that suggestion, Jensen nodded and climbed back into the tub. He pulled the piece of equipment behind the cabin, near where Montana’s body had rested until they decided to bury him with the others at Brent’s request. Jensen was only a few feet from the cabin and slightly uphill when he stopped. “How about here?”

  Brent told him, “That’s as good of a place as any,” before he set to work pulling the wheels off. That took only slightly longer. The man certainly had an aptitude for mechanical devices.

  Jensen set off tentatively, but the blades barely sunk into the earth. He watched one of the rear cameras in his monitor before he stopped. “This isn’t working.”

  The construction man shook his head. “I think we just need more weight. Have you got anything that we can put on top of it?”

  Daniel, who had been watching the process, stepped in. “We’ve got concrete mix in the covered trailer, a few hundred pounds, I think. That should do the trick.” He set off for the white trailer which was still parked up the hill by the shed. He returned a few minutes later with two of the 50-pound bags over his shoulders and loaded them onto the metal implement. “Try it now.”

  Daniel jumped up and sat on the tool as well, adding his considerable weight to that of the concrete mix. All told, there was more than 350 additional pounds pushing the metal into the ground. This time, when Jensen started forward, they dug in quite a bit more. Happy with his success, he continued forward slowly, tracing a line diagonally up the hill toward the source of the stream. It wasn’t until he was well into the tree line that they began to run into difficulties.

  Jensen had to engage all four wheels to continue to pull the device forward against tree roots and rocks. Daniel jumped off, concerned that one of the blades might sheer off and injure him. He was right to do so, because only 20 feet further on, the rightmost blade snapped off. The chisel jerked to the left and both bags of concrete mix fell to the ground. They broke open and poured across the wet leaves.

  Jensen continued forward with only two blades remaining. The tines, now dug into the ground, jumped a little bit here and there, but stayed over a foot into the ground. They lasted until he had to stop the tub short of the stream, where he unhooked the device and drove back through the trees to the cabin. The slim military man hopped down from his tub. “I think that just saved us a few days work.” His eyes trave
led up the path of the torn earth. “Probably more.”

  It was good that it did, because digging out the trench, even with the assistance of the chisel and several shovels, took them over a week. By the time they were finished, they were all blistered and worn. Jensen had the honor of breaking through to the stream. The look on his face when most of the water continued down the original path of the stream, while only a small amount went down the new channel, was comedic.

  They had to place logs and rocks in the original streambed to alter the flow enough to make the steam seek a new direction. When it did, the resulting flow of water was as much mud and sludge as it was water. It wasn’t remotely usable without extensive filtering, and the new direction of the stream meant they had to travel even further to get clean water. Instead of simply going horizontally across the mountain, they now had to travel upstream.

  Jensen was frustrated. It wasn’t the crystal stream burbling past their homey little cabin that he’d pictured in his head; it was quite the opposite. Daniel noticed his anger and put his huge paw on the smaller man’s shoulder, “Dude, give it a few more days. It still has to wash all that loose sediment away. It might take a while. If not, we just reopen the normal stream. In that case, we’ve lost a few days. It’s not the end of the world.” Daniel stopped, “No, wait, it might be the end of the world, but not because of that.”

  The former Army Captain put his hand on the older man’s hand. “Aww, it’s nice to know you care.”

  Daniel laughed. “You don’t want to play gay chicken with me. I’ve never lost.” He licked his lips and leaned in uncomfortably close before whispering, “Ever.”

  Jensen shied away. “You’ve got issues.”

  The big black man looked down at him. “It’s such a long list, but at the very top is that I’m … just … too … sexy.” He fluttered his long eyelashes to accentuate his remark.