Band of Preppers (Book 2): Life is Hope

by Chad Evercroft

  There. It’s like he was never here, Megan thought.

  Megan couldn’t help but think how strange it was to be standing over Lewis’ grave, a grave she had dug herself, when she had left Blake’s body to rot in an abandoned house. Would someone have found him before he was just bones and taken the time to bury him? Or would they have just taken what they could find and torched the house? Megan leaned against the shovel, one foot on the shoulder of the blade.

  “You were an asshole, Lewis,” Megan said aloud. “Leaving your brother like that. I don’t know if I’m surprised though. Most of us aren’t heroes. I’m not a hero. We all do what we have to do. I did you a favor, really. Shooting you. You weren’t going to make it. And I couldn’t risk the village for you.”

  Megan slung the shovel across her shoulders like she was carrying an old-fashioned yoke. She picked up her shirt and sweatshirt on her way back to the path. She felt warm, and the occasional cool breeze refreshed her. The smell of blood and vomit had been replaced by the scent of freshly-dug dirt and sweat.

  Megan didn’t tell Amy what had happened. She didn’t plan on telling anyone. Luckily, no one was out to see Megan returning from the woods, dirty, with a shovel and wearing a surgical mask. Megan returned the shovel to its place in the cellar and incinerated the mask. She stood out by Buckle’s garden, remembering what they had planted just a few days ago, and thought about what she had just done.

  Am I sorry?

  She really wasn’t. She was surprisingly not even that disturbed. Seeing Lewis lying face down and not moving was such a relief from hearing him scream and seeing him claw at his own face. It really felt like she had helped him, in the only way she could. Firing the actual shot had felt surreal. Megan had shot animals before, so her hands and fingers were familiar with the motions, but then the target was so different. Such a little thing...a small handgun and bullet. Such destruction. Maybe she would feel more about it as time went on. Megan wasn’t used to this absence of feeling. Was she becoming hardened? Or heartless? Megan wasn’t sure if there was a difference between the two or not. She hoped there was.

  11.

  The tractor had something wrong with the engine and the cooling parts. After examining it, Buckle seemed to have a good idea of what to do and got to work. It was pretty much a one-man job, so while he worked outside the barn getting grease all over his clothes, the others helped Randall with his usual farm chores. There were chickens - Derek had not imagined it - so Adam fed them and checked in their beds for eggs. He had not seen farm eggs before and was marveled at the assortment of colors: peach, dark brown, pale mint, and white. Some were even speckled or looked like they had veins.

  “I wonder if they taste any different,” Adam wondered aloud to Derek, who was trying to figure out a way to arrange a trade for a chicken or two.

  “Probably. Probably really fresh.”

  “Hmm. I could go for an egg right now. An egg sandwich. With sausage.”

  Adam tossed a handful of chicken feed and watched the hens scatter, pecking and clucking furiously. Derek could see Fred and Pat emerge from the farmhouse. Pat was carrying a covered plate. They waved.

  “Hey! We brought you guys some food!”

  When they reached the fence, Pat lifted up the dishcloth covering the plate, revealing hot, gooey cinnamon rolls. Derek’s mouth instantly began to water and it was all he could do to not just bury his face into the pillowy sweetness. Adam’s mouth fell open.

  “Oh my gosh,” he breathed. “Sooo good.”

  “Help yourselves!” Fred said. “We ate ours inside.”

  Derek and Adam ignored the hot frosting sticking to their fingers and ate, their eyes rolling back in their heads. There were no thoughts in Derek’s head, just explosions of pure happiness. It was amazing what food could do to the body and soul. Fred grinned.

  “Good, right? Candy made two pans just for us. Good people, Randall and Candy.”

  “Did they tell you anything about themselves? How they’ve kept the farm going? I’m surprised people haven’t stolen the animals.”

  “They’re pretty private about that. It’s a little weird. Randall just said they’ve been lucky, but I don’t buy that.”

  “Do you think there are other people around here? Who would pop out if we tried to make trouble?”

  Fred shrugged. He glanced around the farm as if searching for snipers in the trees or hiding in the grass.

  “It would make sense,” Pat agreed.

  They suddenly all felt like they were being watched. Adam held half a cinnamon roll in his hand and kept it held out in front of his mouth for a brief moment, as if someone had hit “Pause.” Then he popped it into his mouth.

  “Well, good thing we aren’t looking to make trouble,” he said confidently, dipping his arm back into the chicken feed bucket.

  After they had finished gathering the eggs and changing the chicken water, Adam went to the house to drop off their collection while Derek, Fred, and Pat went to the stables. Jacob and Zeke had been in charge of cleaning the stalls. The horses were still running in the field and ignored Derek’s whistle for them to come over. The twins had made fast progress and had piled the manure into wheelbarrows for fertilizer, as Randall had instructed them. They eagerly accepted Fred’s offer of cinnamon rolls and ate greedily after removing their soiled work gloves.

  “See anything weird around here?” Zeke asked, his mouth full.

  “What do you mean by weird?”

  “Anything that might explain why this farm is untouched,” Zeke elaborated. “Electric fence, booby traps…”

  Fred shook his head. Everyone was wondering the same thing and the longer it went unexplained, the stranger it felt.

  “I would take a better look around, but that would probably look suspicious,” Jacob said, leaning against the handle of his shovel.

  Everyone nodded. Adam came into the stables from his errand. He stood next to Derek.

  “Uncle Buckle said he should be done with the tractor in a few hours.”

  “Did he get food?”

  “Yup, I brought him a plate.”

  Derek patted Adam on the back.

  “Hey, so when I was in the house, I overheard some stuff.”

  Everyone looked at Adam, their interest piqued.

  “Mrs. Fisher was real nervous about something. She was talking to Mr. Fisher really fast, saying something about this being a bad idea, but he was trying to calm her down. Said something about “they” not having to know about it.”

  “They? Who is they?” Pat asked, looking around as if the other men would have an answer.

  “They stopped talking when I came in,” Adam said. “I acted like I hadn’t heard anything. They both looked nervous after that.”

  Derek began to feel nervous, too. Were they being taken for a ride? The Fishers hadn’t seemed like those kind of people, especially since pulling one over a group of armed men was a really stupid idea. But maybe there were others around, hiding in the woods, watching them. Whatever was going on, Derek didn’t feel like sticking around long enough to find out what it was.

  “I’ll tell Buckle to hurry up,” Derek said. “We should get gone as soon as we can. Get our supplies and go.”

  “What if he won’t pay up?” Zeke asked, catching Derek’s arm.

  “Then I guess we wasted our time.”

  Zeke frowned, unsatisfied with that possibility, but didn’t say anything. Derek rounded the barn corner to where Buckle was. He was tinkering inside the engine, a slash of grease across his forehead. He didn’t look up when Derek approached him.

  “Hi there.”

  “Hi,” Buckle replied briskly, holding up an engine piece to the sky to see it better. “What’s up?”

  “We’re all kind of fidgety about this place.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Fisher is being real vague about how he’s managed to keep this farm safe. And then Adam heard him and his wife all nervous about something, saying that �
�they” didn’t have to know about us.”

  Buckle paused in his work and leaned on the tractor to look at Derek.

  “They?”

  “We’re thinking there might be others around here somewhere. Watching us. It sounds kind of weird, but…”

  “It isn’t that weird,” Buckle said. “Someone’s got to be protecting this farm, and I’m pretty sure it isn’t just old man Fisher and his single-barrel shotgun.”

  Those words did not comfort Derek. He pulled at his sideburns, wincing.

  “So why are we still here? Shouldn’t we make ourselves scarce?”

  Buckle bent back down to his work. Derek heard the sound of something metal squeaking and Buckle muttering something to himself.

  “Well?” Derek pressed.

  “If we don’t make trouble, we won’t get trouble,” Buckle said, not standing up. “I’ll be done soon, you guys did the chores, and we’ll get what we asked for and be on our way. Besides, what’s the other option? We just leave empty-handed? Risk pissing off Fisher and whoever is lurking around? I don’t think so, bro.”

  It made sense when Buckle explained it. Derek knew he should feel better and probably a little dumb for buying into his fear, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off. He tried to distract himself by chasing down a horse for Adam, but the horses were coy and enjoyed tormenting him by trotting slowly and then taking off in a whirlwind of hooves and tail. Derek was relieved when he heard the sound of the tractor running and a triumphant whoop from Buckle.

  Finally, he thought, eager to get what they came for and leave.

  In the farmhouse, they reached a deal with Buckle’s work on the tractor and the farm chores for $50 worth of canned goods (mostly meat), the eggs Adam had gathered, and bag lunches for all the men for the days it took to get there.

  “We really appreciate it,” Buckle said, smiling and shaking Randall’s hand.

  He offered a hug to Candy, who accepted it happily. Derek watched them for signs of anxiety, but they both seemed relatively calm and cheerful.

  “Is there anything ya’ll need here?” Buckle asked. “We’d really like to make this a regular thing, if you’d have us.”

  Randall’s smile faded. He looked at his wife, who quickly lowered her eyes and pretended to be busy examining the bag lunches, which she had lined up on the porch steps. Buckle noticed the change and frowned.

  “Everything ok?”

  “Uh, Uncle Buckle?”

  Buckle looked where Adam was pointing. At the edge of the forest, a group was fast approaching them on horseback. Randall gasped.

  “Get out of here!” he shouted. “Get to the barn!”

  “What the hell…?”

  “Just go!”

  The men took off. Derek grabbed Adam by the collar and ran alongside him, looking back. The horseman were coming towards the farmhouse. When they got closer, he could see they had guns pointed up in the air. They looked like cowboys from an old Western.

  “They’re armed!” Derek shouted to the others.

  “Damn it!” Zeke cried. “I knew something was up!”

  When they got to the barn, they huddled together, trying to make a plan. Adam was upset.

  “Why’d we just leave them there!” he asked angrily. “They’re gonna get killed!”

  “I think the Fishers know who those guys are, Adam,” Buckle said softly. “They’re going to be ok. We didn’t hear any gunshots.”

  Adam was quiet, seeing Buckle’s point. Everyone had their guns out now and had piled their bags under a pile of straw.

  “So this could get ugly,” Fred said. “Adam should get under some straw or something. There might be a lot of bullets flying around.”

  Adam did not argue. He chose one of the horse stalls and stood up against the back wall. Derek handed him a gun.

  “If someone comes at you, shoot,” he instructed him.

  Adam nodded gravely. He knew the drill. Jacob peered out one of the windows.

  “They’re coming this way,” he said. “They look ready for a fight.”

  Derek crept low to the ground to the chicken coop part of the barn and out to the yard. Bracing himself against the wall, Derek quickly looked around the corner. He could just see the tail end of the group. They were heading for the front.

  “In front!” Derek hissed, looking back into the stables.

  Jacob shouldered his gun and pointed the barrel out the window.

  “Hey!” he shouted. “Stop!”

  “Relax, friend!” a male voice called back. “We just wanna talk.”

  “Do your guns do the talking?” Jacob asked back sarcastically.

  “We’ll put them down, don’t worry.”

  There was a pause. The men must have been obeying who Derek could only assume was their leader. Derek moved out a little further into the chicken yard, so he could see what was happening. There were seven of them, all men, facing Jacob’s window with their hands up. From where he was, Derek saw them in profile. He kept himself close to the side of the barn so he could dart back out of sight if any one of them happened to look over. The leader was in front, an AK-47 on the ground in front of him. He wore frayed black jeans and a jean jacket. He looked tough, like he had been in a motorcycle gang.

  “What do you want?” Derek heard Jacob yell.

  “There’s been a misunderstanding,” the man said. “Me and the boys here have a deal with the Fishers. We protect their farm, they let us use some of their horses. We also get whatever supplies we want. The problem is, they’re not supposed to give supplies to anyone else, ‘cause we might need them. You see the problem here?”

  “Not our fault,” Jacob said. “We didn’t know about the deal.”

  “Right, right, which is why we don’t want trouble. You just hand over the supplies and everything is square.”

  There was a moment of silence; Derek thought he could hear talking from inside the barn. It sounded a little like there was a disagreement. After a few minutes, Jacob spoke again.

  “We did the work, we get the supplies. But just this time. We won’t come back. It’s just a few canned goods and some eggs, man. We got people to feed.”

  The leader turned towards his group. Derek ducked back behind the barn so he wouldn’t be seen. He could hear the men talking.

  “I don’t like these guys,” one of the other men said. “They think they can just slink in and slink out, like we’ll just give them some stuff. Those are ours. We do the work around here.”

  “So what do you boys want to do?” the leader asked.

  Derek peered around the corner again. He saw that the leader was standing in front a man, blocking Jacob’s view, and that man had a handgun in his holster. When he reached for it, Derek shouted.

  “Hey! He’s going for his gun!”

  Everything happened very quickly. Jacob was startled. Hearing Derek’s voice, the man with the handgun drew and took off towards Derek. Derek ran back into the barn, shouting, and everyone had their guns ready. Jacob shot towards the running man, missing, and sending the others scattering. Some started taking off towards their horses.

  “What do I do?” shouted Jacob. “Do I shoot?”

  “Shoot!” Buckle called. “If they get away, they could come after us! Or the Fishers!”

  Jacob opened fire. He didn’t miss this time. Two men fell, shot in the back. The leader ducked behind an old truck that was sitting in the middle of the field. Three ran forward, against the barn wall, where Jacob couldn’t reach them without getting himself shot in the head. The last man - the one who ran after Derek - was outside in the chicken yard.

  “There’s three down below me!” Jacob shouted back into the barn. “I got the guy behind the truck!”

  Derek watched Buckle, Fred, Pat, and Zeke make a hasty plan for the three outside.

  Guess it’s up to me to get this guy, Derek thought, tightening his grip on his gun.

  Frightened by the sound of gunfire, the chickens had huddled in
one corner of their yard and were cackling uneasily. They looked like one large mass of feathers sticking up in every direction. Unsure about where his enemy was, Derek tried to find some sort of shield he could protect himself with. All he could see was straw. It could be useful. Armed with a handful, Derek crept forward a little and threw the straw, shouting. The man swore, startled, alerting Derek to his whereabouts. He was on Derek’s right. Derek climbed on top of the piled squares of hay that filled that half of the barn, and peered out and down around the edge of the open door. The man was pressed up against the wall, holding his gun in both hands. He looked unsure about what to do. There were shots and shouts from outside. The man looked in their direction, but didn’t move. Derek turned his back to the door and took a deep breath. He didn’t really know how to prepare himself. When he had shot the others in the woods, he had only done it before they could shoot him. This felt different. Sneakier. The man peered quickly around the corner without seeing Derek and began to inch his way in. Derek had to act. He couldn’t let him find Adam. The bullet went straight down into the top of the man’s head, carving a bloody hole. He fell like a marionette, legs crumpling up first beneath him before his torso fell forward, face hitting the straw-strewn floor. Jacob, who had been focusing out the window, glanced back at hearing the sound.