by John Grit
Kendell worked the bolt of his rifle, pushing a fresh round into the chamber. “They were running for their lives, scared shitless,” he whispered. “Might be more coming. Be ready.”
Brian looked at his father. “We’re still helping, even here.”
Nate’s eyes locked with Brian’s. “That’s because we’re still alive. Dead people are useless.”
Brian searched the woods. “How long are we going to stay here?”
“Until long after the shooting stops and all of the gang members are dead or have had time to flee the area.”
They sat in silence for two more hours, prepared to kill again if need be. The sun rose in the sky and melted away the sharp bite of the morning chill. More than an hour had passed since they heard the last shots fired. Brian’s eyelids grew heavy. His shoulders slumped. Something collided with a palmetto frond. Instantly alert, Brian straightened up and shouldered his carbine.
Nate and Kendell heard also. The sounds of movement in the brush grew louder, and it was obvious there was more than one person coming. Nate pushed the safety of his rifle off with the back of his trigger finger. Looking through the brush as if it were a picket fence, Nate saw the face of a teenage boy not much older than Brian. He wanted to locate at least one more target before revealing his position, so he did not fire. As they approached, Nate realized there were more than two or three of them. He wanted to warn Kendell and Brian not to shoot until the last moment but did not think there was time. He and the two boys were well hidden in concealment and cover. If those two don’t shoot too soon, we can wait until they are right up on us and kill them all before they can escape. His fear was they would not wait that long before shooting. It was only at times like this that he wished he had a full-auto M-4 carbine in his hands instead of a semi-auto rifle. He reached over and put his left hand on Brian’s shoulder and mouthed the word wait. Brian nodded.
Nate didn’t see the man who shot him. He was watching two young men inch closer, along with the teen Brian’s age, when a blade of fire cut across his back at a forty-five degree angle. Nate swung his rifle and fired twice into the man’s face. He swung back to the left looking for targets and found more than he wanted to. The forest roared with gunfire for nearly a minute, then the firing stopped so fast its echo could be heard fading into the distance.
A man dashed between trees. Nate tried a snapshot and connected, as much by luck as skill. The man doubled over, dropped his shotgun, and fell. He coiled into the fetal position and held his stomach. He and several other men moaned as they lay hidden in the woods. Between moans, Nate could hear Brian and Kendell breathing fast. He slipped his backpack off and pushed it aside.
Brian glanced Nate’s way and saw the blood. His eyes rounded. A bullet cracked within inches of his right ear and went on to ricochet off a rock fifteen feet behind him. He ducked and lay flat on the ground as more rounds flew over only inches above his back.
Kendell fired several rounds, working the rifle’s bolt as fast as possible. Nate fired at anything that looked suspicious. Then he emptied his rifle into the wounded. Brian followed his example and sprayed the woods until his firing pin clicked on an empty chamber. Nate had reloaded and was looking to his left when three men rushed them from the right. Despite the ringing in his ears from all the gunfire, he heard them pushing through brush and turned to fire. A bullet struck his rifle and ricocheted away, screaming through the air. His head jerked to the side for some reason. There was no time to aim, he looked over the Aimpoint sight and fired rapidly. The men fired back and kept firing as they fell. Someone was shooting over his head. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Brian on his knees, firing. Brian stood and stepped over him. Then he charged the men, firing as he ran. Nate yelled, “No!” When he stood to run after Brian, he became lightheaded, stumbled and fell. He pushed himself up from the ground and crawled on his hands and knees. He heard Brian running through the woods, firing. He yelled, “Kendell, bring him back here!” He turned and saw that Kendell was gone. He could hear them both screaming and firing, running through the woods shooting, at what, he did not know. The only gunshots he heard were Brian and Kendell’s. He prayed it would stay that way and forced himself up from the ground. His vision blurred immediately after standing, and he knew he had lost a lot more blood than he originally thought. He stumbled forward, keeping his rifle at the low ready. A man lying on the ground moaned. Nate shot him in the head and kept stumbling forward. Brian and Kendell had worked their way around in a semicircle, and were coming back to Nate. A man, he must’ve been running from the boys, ran across Nate’s vision from right to left. He swung on the man and fired. The man ran faster and disappeared into the woods. He heard the boys coming just as his legs collapsed under him. He fell to his knees and the woods spun around, with him in the center. His head throbbed. He touched it. He pulled his hand away and saw it painted red. He looked past his hand and saw Brian coming, his face white, eyes locked on his. The last thing he saw was Brian running to him.
Chapter 16
Nate opened his eyes. He had no idea where he was, but there was a ceiling and four walls. Ten seconds later, he realized he was in a room, lying on his stomach in a bed. There was a blanket over him and he was warm. He coughed, and a bolt of fire burned across his back. His head hurt. He reached and touched it and felt cloth wrapped around his head. He did not remember being shot there, only his back.
He heard someone cough, but he could not see anyone. He slid closer to the edge of the bed, reawakening the pain that throbbed through his head. He looked down and saw Brian sleeping on the floor, his sleeping bag under him. Voices came from another room. He recognized Ramiro and Chesty. Chesty seemed to be excited and happy. He thanked Ramiro several times.
The bedroom door slowly opened, and Kendell stuck his head in. His eyes lit up when he saw Nate. He spoke to those in the other room. “He’s awake.”
The door swung open further and Ramiro and Chesty walked in. “My friend,” Ramiro said, “you will be well soon.”
“That’s what Doctor Brant tells us,” Chesty said.
Awakened by the voices, Brian jumped to his feet. Hours of worry had left him looking much older. “The fight is over, and Kendell and I are okay. So relax. The bullet that hit your rifle also grazed your head. That’s why you passed out. You bled a lot from your back, but it was the head wound that made you pass out.”
Nate touched the bandage on his head. “I did not feel a thing when it happened, only my back.” He began to relive the events that occurred just before he blacked out. “You should not have charged them like that. Never leave cover and expose yourself for no reason. You saw what happened to them when they tried to charge us.”
“You’re right,” Brian said, “but at least wait until you’re better before jumping on me about it. I saw your back covered with blood and you get hit in the head. I expected you to be dead or at least out soon. It looked like we were about to be overrun on your side, so I reacted.”
“You should be proud of your son,” Ramiro said. “He and his friend did well. They bandaged your wounds and dragged you out of the woods on Kendell’s rug. Then they took you to a nearby house. The house we are now in. The owners died in the plague.”
Nate looked up at Brian. “The house we saw earlier?”
“Yes.”
Nate rolled onto his side. The pain forced him to roll back onto his stomach. “I can’t understand why so many of those bastards happened to run our way when they fled. I chose that spot to get away from them.”
Brian laughed. “It was bad luck. We killed a lot of them because of it, though.”
Nate doubled the pillow over to make it thicker, in an effort to get more comfortable. “I get the feeling there is more to it than bad luck.”
Chesty explained. “This afternoon, we learned the gang was using a house a mile down the road. We learned of this while we were sweeping the area to hunt down the rest of them.” He looked away. “Mostly, it was used as a place
to take rape victims. The ones you tangled with must have planned to retreat to the house. They had ammunition stored there; maybe that’s what they were after. It was just your bad luck to choose that spot.”
Atticus walked in. He had been listening through the open door. He held up a pump shotgun. “Got this off of the bastard that shot my boy.”
“I hope he didn’t kill him,” Nate said.
Atticus shook his head. “Nah, Tyrone’s fine. You’re hurt worse than he is. It still made me mad. I gave the asshole both barrels.”
Nate looked confused. “You call Tyrone your boy?”
Everyone in the room laughed.
Chesty spoke up. “Atticus raised Tyrone.”
Atticus corrected Chesty. “My late wife Irene and I raised him. He’s our son, legally adopted. We couldn’t have any kids of our own, and his parents died in a house fire, so we took him in when he was six.”
“I see,” Nate said. “Now I know it wasn’t just respect for the elderly that stopped him from kicking your ass when you dressed him down in the church that time.”
“He knew he was in the wrong,” Atticus said. “He wouldn’t hit an old man anyway; I raised him better than that.”
Chesty cleared his throat. “I have to say I’m proud of our townspeople. Everyone has done their part. The whole town’s had enough and was on the warpath today. We pretty much cleaned that gang out. There is one more job: take that warehouse.”
Atticus waved Chesty off. “Can’t be many left of those gangbangers. That warehouse will be easy.”
“I’m not ready for that until we have a real plan.” Chesty gave Nate a serious look. “As soon as you’re up to it, I wish you would advise us on how to best go about it. None of us but Atticus have any military combat experience.”
Brian broke in. “Right now Dad needs to rest.”
“He’s right,” Ramiro said. “We should leave him now. Perhaps tomorrow he will be stronger.”
Nate’s mind went back to the fight. “Did you see to it Carlos received a decent burial? He was a good man.”
“Yes,” Chesty said. “We buried him on the same day we buried several others who died in the fight. They’re all in the cemetery.”
Ramiro nodded. “Carlos was a good man. We were all at the funeral.”
“Good.” Nate’s eyes locked on Ramiro. “Thank you for giving me one of your best men. It made a difference out there.”
Ramiro lowered his head. “I only wish it did not cost him his life.”
“I know.” Nate’s eyes flashed to Brian for a second. “It could have been any of us.”
Everyone but Brian left the room. “Do you feel like eating? We have freeze-dried stuff or freeze-dried stuff. For drink, we have water.”
Nate shook his head. “How secure is this house? Do they have guards posted?”
“There are probably fifty people staying in other houses in the neighborhood. They have two guards outside also.” He sat in a chair. “Don’t worry. There might be a few of those gangbangers still alive, but not many.”
“Where’s my pack? I should have some water left in my canteen.”
Brian opened a closet door and brought Nate a canteen of water.
After he drank, Nate said, “Anything happens, wake me. Don’t leave this house while I’m asleep.”
“Don’t worry. I’m worn out myself. As soon as I eat, I’m hitting the sack again. You might wake before I do.”
~~~~
Doctor Brant checked Nate’s pulse while he held a thermometer in his mouth. “Too early to tell if your wounds will become inflamed. I cleaned them with a weak solution of carbolic acid when I first treated you several days ago.” She stopped talking for a second and gave Nate a thin-lipped smile that stretched across her face. “I took your advice and had someone hunt up a few bottles of carbolic acid. We have those antibiotics you found, but I will not allow them to be used except as a last resort. They spent too much time stored in less than favorable conditions.”
“You didn’t stitch my back up yet, did you?” Nate asked.
She glanced up from reading the thermometer. “No. If there is no sign of inflammation tomorrow, I will close it. It’s actually two wounds, since the bullet skipped over the small of your back, missing your spine by a fraction of an inch.”
Chesty walked into the room.
Brian got up from his chair. “He’s not ready to be bothered with planning the raid on the warehouse yet.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Chesty put his right hand out so he could lean against a wall. He casually lifted his hat off his head and hung it on the back of a chair. “We sent a recon mission out to the warehouse. I just got a radio report from them.” He smiled at everyone in the room. “Whatever was left of that gang has packed up and left. Atticus said it looks like they loaded a few trucks up with food and left town. We have setup schedules to keep twenty-four/seven security going out there.”
“So it’s over?” Brian asked.
“The gang is kaput,” Chesty said, “but we’re not on Easy Street by a long shot. We still have a lot of work to do around here. Some of us have been thinking we should abandon the downtown area and set up shop closer to farmland. We’ve wasted a whole year waiting around for the government to come in and provide for us. I think now the people have finally got it through their heads that isn’t going to happen anytime soon, if ever. And the warehouse food’s not going to last many more months. We have people scouting for a good place. It looks like it might be the south end of town. There are plenty of empty homes, and it’s not far from good farmland.”
“Don’t forget water,” Nate said.”
“Yeah, that’s at the top of the list of things we’re looking for. There are plenty of deep wells on the south end, and we got a few men working on steam engines to power the pumps.”
Nate cleared his throat. “You need surface water, like a big lake, in case your steam engines don’t pan out. You can dig irrigation ditches with gates to control the water level.”
Chesty nodded. “There’s a chain of lakes, with rivers and canals connecting them. We thought that could come in handy for transportation. Who knows? We might be hearing the whistle of steamboats again for the first time in way over a hundred years.”
Doctor Brant smiled. “I hope to rejoin the twenty-first century, not the nineteenth.”
Chesty tilted his head and shrugged. “Well Doctor, we just might have to go backwards a little more before we can go forward.” He looked at Nate. “Now, when you get better, I would like to hear more about those waterwheel generators you were speaking of a while back.”
Nate smiled. “Sure. But first I want someone to tell me Ramiro found a pickup that starts every time. I’m tired of hearing him cuss in Spanish.”
Brian laughed. “His men found one days ago.”
Characters in books 1 & 2 that are either in book 3 or may be mentioned in book 3 by other characters.
Nate Williams: Main character, a farmer and ex-Army Ranger struggling to give his son a chance to survive the chaos and lawlessness long enough for society to rebuild.
Brian; Nate’s thirteen-year-old son. He turns fourteen in book 3.
Susan: Nate's wife, died in the plague in book 1.
Beth: Nate’s daughter, died in the plague in book 1.
Deni Heath: A twenty-four-year-old woman who befriends Nate and Brian. A soldier on leave who was trying to get to her fiancé when the plague and the resulting chaos hit. In book 2, she is wounded and taken to a military hospital by the National Guard.
Mel: Neighbor, avid survivalist, called to duty by Army National Guard. He has a survivalist retreat that Nate and Brian use when forced to abandon their farm because of roving gangs of looters.
Chuck Shingle: A prison escapee and old nemesis of Nate’s who dies in the first book.
Caroline: A woman who was captured by sadists and rescued by Nate. She is wounded and taken to a military hospital in book 2 at the same time Deni is.
Carrie: A teen who was captured by the same sadists as Caroline and rescued by Nate at the same time.
Ben Neely: A construction worker before the plague. Killed in a shootout in book 2.
Martha Neely: Ben’s wife.
Cindy: Ben and Martha’s teen daughter.
Tommy: Ben and Martha’s little boy.
Sam Boonbeck: An auto mechanic who is killed in a shootout in book 2.
Synthia: A little girl rescued by Nate and taken into the survival group. Her parents were murdered.
Colonel Joe Greene: Comes into the story late in book 2. A colonel in the National Guard that Mel serves under.
Also by John Grit
Feathers on the Wings of Love and Hate:
Let the Gun Speak
(Volume 1 in the series)
Feathers on the Wings of Love and Hate 2:
Call Me Timucua
(Volume 2 in the series)
Apocalypse Law
(Volume 1 in the series)
Apocalypse Law 2
(Volume 2 in the series)
Table of Contents
From the Author
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Table of Contents
From the Author
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15