299 Days: The 17th Irregulars

by Glen Tate

  When they got to the gate, Rich thanked Bennington for the ride. Rich looked at Bennington and said, “I don’t view you as the enemy.”

  “Nor do I,” Bennington said. Rich was getting the vibe that Bennington might be on the same side as him, but it was way too dangerous to ask. “You got a good little thing goin’ on, Rich. Kinda wish I could be out here with you.”

  Rich needed to talk to Grant and Dan about the FCorps guy suspecting that a POI from WAB lived out at Pierce Point. He wanted to tell them about the condition of things in Frederickson and about the new FCards and the school bus that they’d pick up later. They also needed to talk to about changing the name of the paper, and about Snelling or whoever had faxed the newspaper.

  Rich didn’t say anything. Bennington was a good guy, but they didn’t need law enforcement out there, so he stayed quiet at Bennington’s apparent request to be invited out to Pierce Point.

  “But I have things to do in town,” Bennington said, to Rich’s relief. He stared right at Rich and said ominously, “I have something very important to do there. I think you will appreciate it.” When he said that, Bennington’s demeanor went from being a casual to deadly serious.

  “Good to know,” Rich said. That’s all he could think to say. He wondered what Bennington was talking about, but he had a pretty good idea, so he wouldn’t ask for details.

  Bennington and Rich then talked about the arrangements to pick up the bus and the FCards, and how to pay for the diesel from Winters’ Mexican gas station. Rich got out of the car and waved at Bennington, who drove off slowly.

  By this time, Dan had come to the gate. “So? What happened?” he asked Rich.

  “We have a lot of work to do,” Rich said to Dan.

  Chapter 189

  Snitch

  (July 9)

  Rich pulled Dan off to the side so others couldn’t hear. “You and I need to go talk to Grant,” Rich said. “Don’t radio for him to come down here. We need to keep it cool.”

  Dan looked concerned.

  “Nothing urgent now, just a development we need to manage. Grant’s probably up at the Grange. Hop in my rig and we’ll go up there.”

  “Roger that,” Dan said. He told Heidi, the comms chick, that he was going up to the Grange. He found Terry Maler, the second in command of the day shift of guards, and said, “Goin’ to the Grange. You’re in command for a while.” Terry nodded.

  Dan got in Rich’s truck. In the meantime, Rich had checked the place in the volunteer fire station where the “Return to Grange” pile was. This was where people put things that needed to go back to the Grange. No one drove anywhere without seeing if something needed to be hauled somewhere. Everyone with gas and a vehicle was part of the informal parcel delivery service. Rich put the “Return to Grange” things in his truck and got in the cab.

  As they drove by all the guards at Pierce Point, Rich marveled at how much better their guards were than the Blue Ribbon Boys he’d just seen in Frederickson. The Pierce Point guards seemed alert and somewhat glad to be there. They were taking the job seriously. They were organized. None of them were passing a bottle around, of course. There were about three times as many Pierce Point guards as the Blue Ribbon Boys, and that didn’t count the sharpshooters in the woods on the hill, or Sniper Mike across the road. Rich had started the day thinking Pierce Point was vulnerable to the much bigger Frederickson. Now he thought the opposite.

  “Well, some interesting stuff in town,” Rich said as he began to give Dan the short version of what he saw. Dan was stunned at how weak the “legitimate authorities” were.

  Rich and Dan pulled into the Grange and found Grant. “Need you down at the gate,” Dan said to him. They didn’t want anyone to overhear them, and they didn’t want to waste gas driving back down to the gate, so they would just park the truck out of eyesight of the Grange and talk in the truck.

  Grant grabbed his AR and kit thinking that he was going to the gate. They got in the truck and went a little ways to a little road where no one could see them.

  Rich stopped the truck. Grant was wondering what was going on.

  “Got some things to talk about,” Rich said. He proceeded to tell Grant everything. Grant was worried about the POI thing. He had been assuming that the government was too overwhelmed to even keep track of him being out there. But they knew the WAB connection, too. That scared him.

  “My name is on that damned list,” Grant said. “Anyone here could get that list and find out my name. I use my real name out here. It’s only a matter of time before Snelling tries to turn me in.”

  Rich explained how it seemed that the authorities didn’t have the resources to track down all the leads they had and, besides, Pierce Point’s guards could repel an assault by any force other than a professional military unit.

  “Hey,” Dan said, trying to be positive, “no one out here knows how you spell your last name. How about going with the Norwegian spelling of ‘Matsen’? Maybe we say that your first name is something like Herman and you go by your middle name of Grant.” These weren’t bad ideas, but they also weren’t enough to make Grant feel totally safe.

  “Snelling,” Rich said. “That’s your problem.”

  All three men nodded. They were thinking the same thing, but they didn’t want to say it.

  Finally, Grant spoke up. “Is it treason to do what he’s doing, if he’s the one snitching on me?” Just saying that out loud answered the question.

  Of course it wasn’t “treason.” Grant could not figure out a way to put Snelling in their makeshift jail. Besides, doing so would violate every constitutional principle Grant was supposedly all in favor of.

  “Wait, guys,” Rich said. “We don’t know if Snelling is the one. Let’s find that out first.” They all nodded.

  “I have an idea,” Rich said.

  Chapter 190

  “Lima Down”

  (July 12)

  Todd Snelling was enjoying lunch. Well, not “enjoying.” He was having lunch. That was more correct. He missed all the normal foods he used to eat; all the organic and foreign foods. The high-end stuff, not the hillbilly food he had out at Pierce Point. Cornbread? Seriously? Might as well have a chicken fried steak at a truck stop. What he would have done for some fresh feta cheese and Belgian endive.

  The internet was back up and he wanted to get online before it went off again. He was on the FCorps website getting updates. It looked like things were going well. The authorities were rounding up terrorists in big numbers. There were big raids in Denver and Boise. Not even redneck Idaho was a sanctuary for these teabaggers. Things were going well in Chicago. There were lots of stories about people there being thankful for all that the government was doing, like feeding people and protecting them. So much for those Neanderthals who thought all government was bad. Those limited-government types were so stupid. Everyone knew that there needed to be enough government to take care of all the hopeless people. That’s what government does. Look at all the happy people on the internet who were so glad to be taken care of.

  Snelling was startled by a knock at the door. No one ever came to his cabin, except Abbott, and that wasn’t his knock. It was someone else. What could they want, he wondered as he walked to the door.

  “Who is it?” he asked.

  “Rich Gentry.” It sounded like him.

  “Coming,” Snelling said. He unlocked the door and saw Rich. “What can I do for you?” Snelling asked, truly having no idea why Rich was there.

  “I want to talk to you about Pierce Point.”

  The teabaggers were coming to their senses, Snelling thought. They finally realized that his way was the right way.

  Snelling let Rich in.

  “What about Pierce Point?” He said, not even waiting to make small talk. Snelling was so excited to be having this conversation.

  “I think you have some good ideas, Todd,” Rich said. “I don’t think you’re being listened to and I want to see if I can get a better dialogue going.�
��

  “Dialogue?” That was a magic word. It meant that this was going to be done like things were done in Seattle: With dialogue, not guns. Snelling could barely contain his glee that the world was not upside down. There would be dialogue even out in hillbillyville.

  “I can’t get a word in edgewise with that Grant Matson,” Snelling said and rolled his eyes. “He’s such a bully. Shutting me down all the time. I had pretty much given up. I wasn’t even going to bother going to the meetings anymore.”

  “Oh, you should,” Rich said. “Mind if I sit down?”

  “Of course,” Snelling said. He was going to enjoy this. Rich, the apparent teabagger, was coming with his hat in hand, ready to call a truce. Or maybe better. Maybe he was ready to let Snelling run things out there.

  “Would you like something to drink?” Snelling asked.

  “Water is fine,” Rich said. As Snelling was bringing the water, Rich looked around the cabin. It was amazing, and must have cost a mint. Snelling even had some art. Weird art, but it was art. Foofy Seattle art. No one else had art at Pierce Point.

  When Snelling came back, Rich pointed to a copy of Architectural Digest on the coffee table. “I always wanted to be an architect,” Rich said. “What’s it like being one?”

  Snelling’s eyes lit up. He talked for about fifteen minutes about being an architect and his work. He was so happy Rich asked him about it.

  By now, Rich got up and was slowly walking and looking at all of the fancy art as Snelling was talking. He wandered from room to room looking at things and occasionally saying to Snelling, “Uh, huh. That sounds great.”

  Pretty soon, Rich had inspected the whole cabin, and went into Snellings’ office.

  Then he saw it. An old fax machine. It looked so odd—a 1990s fax machine there in the ultra-modern office. A copy of the newspaper with the picture of the hanging was next to the machine.

  Suddenly Snelling appeared to get nervous.

  “Let’s go back to the living room,” he said, realizing how defensive he looked.

  Rich nodded and motioned for Snelling to lead the way.

  “After you,” Snelling said. “You are my guest.” It was pretty obvious that Snelling didn’t want Rich walking around the cabin unescorted.

  “Thank you,” Rich said. “You were saying that architect school was particularly grueling...”

  Snelling started right back up where had left off. Something about how he loved to “express himself” in the buildings he designed, which was weird, Rich thought, because Snelling drew up the plans for a lot of post offices. There was not a lot of “expression” in those.

  This was the oldest trick in the book, Rich kept thinking as Snelling continued to yammer about architecture. Get a suspect talking about themselves, walk around, and look at things. All in plain view. No warrant required. It worked like a charm.

  Using this technique, Rich had now established that Snelling was the snitch.

  Snelling's wife came up to the cabin, returning from some yoga on the beach.

  “Well, I gotta go,” Rich said. “I just wanted to encourage you to come to the next meeting and tell us your thoughts. I promise you that your opinion will be respected.” Rich hated lying to a guy, but this guy was trying to get Grant killed, and probably Rich, too. All is fair in love and war.

  “Oh, I will be there tonight,” he said with a smile.

  Rich thanked Snelling and his wife for the water and headed back to the Grange.

  The five-minute ride back to the Grange was unsettling as Rich thought some terrible things. He was making a terrible decision. He couldn’t believe he was actually thinking these thoughts.

  When Rich arrived at the Grange, he motioned for Grant and Dan to get into the truck.

  “It’s Snelling,” Rich said, once they were in the cab, away from the listening ears of other people. He started driving in the general direction of the gate. “I saw the fax machine and the newspaper by it. He got nervous and shooed me out of the room.”

  Grant had been quiet the whole time. He didn’t know what to do. He knew Snelling was basically trying to kill him. Now Grant was calmly debating with himself whether he should give his OK to kill Snelling. Grant kept thinking about what kind of example that would set: Mr. Constitution urging a political killing. Treason required two witnesses and a jury trial under the Constitution. There was nothing in that document that allowed offing a guy because he had a fax machine.

  Then again, as Ted and the others pointed out earlier, this was war. The rules were different. The Constitution contemplated war and some extreme measures. Besides, they were in a survival situation. Snelling could kill them as easily as untreated water, lack of food, or lack of shelter could. A person is perfectly justified to overcome those kinds of threats. They would treat the water, gather the food, and build the shelter. However, overcoming those threats didn’t involve killing another human being.

  Rich stopped the truck at the clearing near the Grange where they were doing all this discussing.

  “Well?” Rich asked. They had all been waiting for someone to kick off the discussion. No one was too eager to start this conversation. It was still silent.

  “Well?” Rich asked again. “What do we do about Snelling?”

  “Something,” Dan said. “We can’t let him call the cops again. From what you described, Rich, we are stronger than the idiots in Frederickson, but…I don’t want to bury one of the kids at my gate unless I have to.”

  More silence.

  “I can see it both ways,” Grant said, realizing how weak he was being. “Can we think about it more? Give it more time? This is a huge decision.”

  Rich said, “I guess, but we need to act soon. What if he finds out you’re a POI? He was trying to get on the internet when I came over. He could find out and then fax that in, as well. A confirmed sighting of a POI. Think about that. You want to go to prison or get shot just to give Snelling another few hours on earth?”

  Right then, Mark’s truck with the Team went by. They saw Rich’s truck and turned around to join them.

  “What’s up, guys?” Bobby asked. He was driving. Mark wasn’t in the truck; he must have loaned it to the Team.

  Rich, Grant, and Dan looked at each other. Might as well tell the Team. They were part of this, too. They had to be trusted. Rich explained Snelling’s fax machine. Everyone was quiet. They all knew what decision they were making. It was one thing to get ready to kill people trying to crash your gate. But to murder someone? Over politics? Even someone who wanted to have you killed? This was hard.

  Finally, Bobby said, “I wonder what Ted would think.”

  “Oh, he was pretty clear,” Ryan said. “‘Kill him’ is what he said about Snelling.”

  “What about his wife?” Pow asked. “She hasn’t done anything. And there’s that Abbott jack off. What about him? How far does this go?”

  More hard questions. This guerilla shit ain’t easy, Grant thought.

  “We should get back,” Wes said. “Clean up before the Grange meeting.” Everyone agreed, not so much about cleaning up for the meeting, but wanting to have more time to think about this huge decision. Grant got in Mark’s truck and they went back.

  Everyone was quiet on the ride to Over Road. These young gung-ho ass kickers were mature enough to realize the significance and severity of the decision they were making. There was no going back. They could justify forming an armed guard and even hanging child rapists. If the Collapse ended today, they could explain what they did and why, and probably not be charged with anything.

  But the planned killing of a guy? That was not something that could be explained away if things went back to normal. Grant thought he had completely worked through the mental process of casting his lot with the Patriots when he agreed to join up with Ted. Now he was realizing that he hadn’t fully committed. Killing Snelling would be a full commitment. There would be no going back.

  When they got back to the cabins, everyone went off on the
ir own. They weren’t talking, just quietly cleaning their gear. Grant went to his cabin to see his kids. He heard a moped take off. It was Wes. Probably going to Kellie’s. Is that all that guy thought about?

  Grant was quiet around his kids. He cleaned up. He hadn’t showered in three or four days. It felt amazingly good to be clean. He looked in the mirror. His beard was getting pretty full. His hair was getting long; he’d get a haircut. but the beard was staying. Shaving everyday seemed stupid, and wasteful.

  Grant chatted with the kids and Eileen. He wasn’t fully present for the conversation, though; his thoughts were elsewhere.

  “Time to go to the Grange,” Grant said to them. “I’ll eat dinner there,” he said to Eileen. “No offense to what you’re eating here, but being there and talking to people is part of my job.”

  “No offense taken,” Eileen said. “It means more food for the rest of us,” she said with a smile.

  Grant went out to round up the Team and pile into Mark’s truck. Wes was coming back on the moped. He had a weird look on his face, as if he had aged ten years.

  The Team quietly got into the truck without the usual “This never gets old” thing; the mood was too serious for that.

  Wes was the last to get into the truck. He had something in a towel. He looked around and opened up the towel to show the Team Scotty’s silenced .22.

  “Lima down,” Wes said.

  Chapter 191

  Pierce Point Truth

  (July 12)

  Everyone was shocked. This was so final. Wes had killed another human being. Snuck up on him and killed him. This wasn’t self-defense.

  No one talked much on the ride to the Grange. What little they said, they whispered to prevent Mark from hearing. Only the Team members would know about this. Grant wondered how Rich and Dan would react. Oh well. There was no way to undo this now, anyway.

  Grant felt even closer to the Team than before, and that was saying something. They had gone all the way and there was no turning back. They had already killed together as a team before this when Pow shot that guy in the raid. They had hung those two child rapists, but this was different. It was planned. This wasn’t reacting to a crime. It was committing one.