by A. American
Little Tony came running up, seeing his father at the truck, and asked if he could go, Thad told him to stay home with his mother for now, that he would come and get him for a ride later. It wasn’t until he was heading out the door that the bullet fragment in his arm reminded him of its presence. Thad slipped off his coat and his arm was covered in blood. The cuff on the sleeve had kept the blood from running out. Thad went back in and called to Anita. She came out and took a look at it, ordering him to the kitchen table.
Anita had Thad sit at the table while she cleaned the small wound and then probed around for the fragment. Unsuccessful in her search, she wrapped up his elbow and told him to keep it clean and dry. He kissed her and took down his other coat from the hook by the front door and headed out. When he got to Mr. Jackson’s place, everything was just as he left it. The three bodies were still lying in the front yard, the front door was still open and the two trucks were still loaded with plunder from the house.
Thad drove his truck around to the rear of the house, pulled up to the barn and unloaded the planks into the little shop attached to the barn. He went and started up the old Ford tractor in the barn and drove it around to the front of the house. Lowering the bucket, he climbed off and started piling the bodies of the killers into it.
He spent the rest of the day building the coffin and burying the bodies, taking special care with Mr. Jackson. Loading the man and the woman wasn’t too big a deal to him; the girl was something else entirely.
Thad picked up the small body and gently laid it in the bucket. Once she was in the bucket, Thad looked down into her eyes, which were still open, but lifeless and empty. Blood ran across her face and into her hair. Thad slowly reached down and closed her eyes. Standing back up, he looked at her again. The regret washed over him in a wave. He was suddenly ill and had to kneel down, resting an elbow on the bucket. He had killed this young girl who was probably only doing what her parents told her, what they thought they needed to do to survive.
Thad slowly stood up and climbed onto the tractor. Putting it in gear, he headed out through the pasture, having to stop and open two gates to do it. On the far side of the field, where the tree line started, Thad found what he was looking for: a hole that the old man had used as a trash pit. Pulling up, and without any more thought to it, Thad dumped the three bodies into the hole. After a few minutes of work with the bucket, the hole was full and the bodies were gone.
Thad went back to the barn and went straight to work on the coffin; he didn’t want to see the old man’s body until he had to. Having built one before, this box went a little faster, and after about two and a half hours of work it was done. Thad went inside the house and looked at the old man lying on the floor. Mr. Jackson was considerably bigger than his mother, Thad had to lay a blanket out on the floor and roll the old man onto it. Using the blanket, he pulled him out to his truck, where with a little effort he managed to get him into the back.
Out at the barn, Thad laid the coffin on the ground at the rear of the truck. This made the job of lowering the body into the coffin much easier. Thad went back into the house and into the old man’s bedroom. On the dresser was a picture of Mr. and Mrs. Jackson at their wedding. Thad took the picture and a Bible from the nightstand and went out to the coffin where he put them into the box. In the barn Thad found a logging chain and carried it back out to the truck. Thad took the chain and wrapped it around the coffin, then lowered the bucket on the tractor so he could hang the chain over the hooks on the top of the bucket.
Using the tractor, Thad carried Mr. Jackson out to the small plot behind the house, where one headstone already rested. After setting the box off to the side, Thad dug as much as he could with the bucket, then stepped off into the depression and began to shovel out the dirt. When the old man was finally in the ground, Thad took a rake from the barn and dressed up the grave. With all the bodies taken care of, Thad took a few minutes to feed the livestock. In the chicken coop he counted seven eggs and took them home with him.
When he got home, Anita already had dinner ready: northern beans cooked with a smoked hock and some corn bread. Anita sat with her husband while he ate, but they didn’t really talk.
Anita brought Thad another glass of water as he was finishing his last piece of corn bread. After washing it down, he looked up at her and said, “We’re moving tomorrow.”
Anita looked at him with surprise. “Where? Why?”
“We’re going to go to Mr. Jackson’s house. There’s a lot of food there, as well as a fireplace and the log stove. It’s a better place to try and make it than here. And the old man told me it’s what he wanted before he passed,” Thad said.
Anita nodded her head slowly in response.
Thad woke early and slipped out of bed without waking his wife. On the nightstand was a candle. Striking a match, he touched it to the wick to light the room. Thad liked the soft light of a candle, more so than the harsh, bright, artificial light he had lived his whole life with. After dressing, he went down the hall to Tony’s room and sat on his bed. Putting a big hand on the little boy’s shoulder, he gently shook him. “Wake up, little man.”
The little boy rolled over and rubbed his eyes. “Daddy?”
“Yeah, it’s me. I need your help. You wanna come help me today?” Thad asked with a smile.
Little Tony bolted upright. “Yeah, Daddy, I do!”
“Shhh, don’t wake your momma. You get dressed while I get things ready.”
As Thad walked out of the room, he could hear the boy ripping open dresser drawers and shuffling around the room. Thad went into the kitchen and took a pad from a drawer and a pen from a cup on the counter. He wrote Anita a note telling her he and Tony were down at Mr. Jackson’s place and they would be back in a couple of hours. Thad took the note back to his bedroom and laid it on the bed, where he was sure she would see it. Thad met Little Tony in the hall. He was dressed and ready to go. Thad knew if he didn’t get him moving soon he would vibrate through the floor.
“You ready?” Thad asked, already knowing the answer. Tony’s head bobbed up and down quickly. He was wearing a black watch cap on his head pulled down over his ears like the one Thad always wore and a fleece-lined denim jacket, and who knew how many layers under it. Thad put his arm around the little boy and they headed for the door. Outside, Tony started around to the passenger side of the truck, but Thad called to him, “Hey, come on over here.”
The boy walked around to the driver’s side as Thad climbed in. Thad looked at him, then patted his lap and asked, “You wanna drive?” The response was immediate and overwhelming, and Thad thought Tony was going to stomp him to death climbing up into his lap. Thad backed the truck out of the drive and straightened it out on the road and then let go of the wheel. “You take it from here,” he said. Thad worked the gas and brake and let the boy steer the truck in a wobbly path toward the old man’s house.
The two of them fed all the animals and brought in the few eggs laid overnight and then, using a wagon from the shed, they brought all the items the thieves had carried out back into the house. Thad put all the food back in the pantry and placed the guns back in the gun rack. By now Tony was hungry, so Thad went into the kitchen, where he found three biscuits on a plate on the table, covered with cheesecloth. Laying a plate on the table, he took a spoon from the drawer and set a jar of honey out. Little Tony needed no more explanation.
While Tony ate, Thad went through the house. Mr. Jackson had lived there a long, long time. He felt like he was trespassing, that being there was just wrong. Then he thought about what the old man had said to him and that eased his tension a bit. The house was well suited for life without electricity, as it had been built before there was power in the area. In the living room was a big fireplace made from large pieces of stone. In the kitchen was still an old wood stove. There was a gas stove as well, but Thad was certain there wouldn’t be any gas for it. Out back of the house was
a pitcher pump that still worked and a springhouse over a small spring that ran clear, cold water, so water wasn’t going to be an issue.
The more Thad walked around and looked at the house, the better he felt about things. As he was coming down the hall toward the living room, Tony met him, honey on his face and hands. “I need to wash my hands, Daddy,” the boy said, his face shiny with honey and a quick tongue working all the places he could reach. Thad smiled.
He took Tony into the bathroom and grabbed a washcloth, then spotted some cotton balls on a shelf over the toilet. With a big smile on his face he took one and walked back out to the hall and handed the cotton ball to the boy and said, “Here, wipe your hands with this.” Thad had a big evil grin on his face. Tony took the cotton and tried to wipe at the honey. The cotton fibers stuck to the honey and the more he tried to wipe the more fibers separated. Soon his hands were matted in sticky cotton. Tony looked up at his Dad in confusion. Thad broke out and started to laugh, but Tony still didn’t understand. His hands looked like he was the abominable snowman or something.
Putting a big hand on his back, Thad said to him, “Come on, let’s go get you cleaned up.” As Thad walked him out to the old pump, Tony was still trying to get the cotton out from between his fingers. Once Tony was cleaned up, they hopped into Mr. Jackson’s truck, it being in far better shape than the one Thad had been driving, and headed home. Pulling up in front of his house, Thad could see warm light glowing inside and smoke issuing from the chimney. He found Anita inside cooking eggs while sipping a cup of coffee. She set a plate on the table for Tony, and he dove into them without hesitation. Anita looked up from her son and gave Thad a kiss. “Good morning.”
They spent the rest of the day moving the things they needed and wanted from their house to the new house. Anita asked Thad about exactly what happened and he told her everything. Everything except the part about one of the raiders being a young girl and him shooting her in the top of her head as she looked up at him. Thad knew it was a much harder world now and that Anita would ultimately be faced with it, but he loved her enough to spare her what he could while he could.
It was a mutual decision between Thad and Anita to move their bed into the bedroom; they just couldn’t bring themselves to sleep in the old man’s bed. The next few days they spent settling in. Both of them felt like they were trespassing in the house, but as the days wore on they became more comfortable. Little Tony was the only one that took to the new house like a fish to water. He was up every morning helping his Dad feed all the animals, clean up after them and perform the general work of maintaining a farm. For the first week after settling in, they saw no one.
Chapter 8
Sarge and the boys had their orders. Against his wishes, Sarge had been pressed into military service again. He was finally convinced when a full-bird colonel made a trip out to the little cabin to press upon him the gravity of the current situation. The colonel reminded Sarge that he had once taken an oath to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and it was now to put the latter part of that oath to action. The nation was in turmoil, and the federal government was using the opportunity to purge the land of those they saw as unfit. It was like the Soviet purges or the Civil War all over again: family was turning on family, friends on friends and neighbors on neighbors.
Sarge’s new mission was guerrilla warfare, to be conducted on all FEMA and DHS targets of opportunity. In addition to these two target pools was another that actually disturbed the guys, the US postal service. When Mike pressed the colonel as to why they were to target letter carriers, the colonel explained that the postmaster general had been tasked with finding people and assigning them to work brigades. While on the surface this sounded benign, it was in fact an effort to press people into work camps where there was only one way in and one way out. The government touted these camps as “relocation and assistance” facilities, but they were internment camps, closer to Soviet gulags than refugee camps. While most of the population was unaware of the operations being conducted, they were starting to come around. In the early days, people had flocked to these camps, where they were processed according to a myriad of factors.
It was at one of these processing stations that the seeds of the current course of action had taken root. While some of the military went along with the plan, there were others that saw the situation for what it was and decided their loyalty was to the Constitution and the people of the United States of America. This was the problem that Sarge, Ted, Mike and Doc found themselves faced with, and they took it on without hesitation.
With all this in mind, Sarge held a meeting with the guys to discuss the situation. He told them about the truck at his house and that he wanted to go get it.
“You got to be out of your fucking mind, wanting to go back to the house after what we did there,” Doc said.
“I don’t expect to just waltz in there, ya fuckin’ patata head. We’ll go down the river and set an observation post and watch it for a couple of days. If it’s clear, we’ll slip in after dark and get the truck,” Sarge said. “Mike, you’re going with me; pack for three days. Ted, you’ll drop us off and Doc will hold down the fort.”
Mike suggested that they take a radio with them so if they made contact with unfriendlies the others could act as a reaction force. Sarge agreed, and they set up a frequency to use in case of emergency. Doc and Ted would monitor the radio twenty-four seven. They packed for three days, just in case of an escape and evasion scenario, and they took as much ammo as they could carry. Sarge carried the SPW and a carbine and Mike took the 203 and an AT4, along with a couple of claymores. Don had been sent out onto the deck while the guys had their little meeting and finally stuck his head back in the door at the sound of all the activity, asking, “When’s lunch?”
Sarge gave him a look of disgust and threw an MRE at him. “Here.”
Don looked at the bag, then looked back at Sarge. “What’s wrong with makin’ some taters and onions?”
“We ain’t got time for that shit now; that’s as good as it gets at the moment,” Sarge said.
Don sat down at the table, muttering to himself about eating out of a damn bag, but settled down to his lunch. While Don ate, the rest continued on preparing for the mission. They had the boat loaded by four. Sarge wanted to head out about nine and ordered Mike to get some rack time. Ted and Doc kept watch and Don was kicked out of the cabin, Sarge giving him a fishing rod to keep him busy.
At nine o’clock they eased the boat out of the slough into the Suwannee. They ran the boat blacked out, all three of them wearing night vision goggles. The trip down the river was uneventful. Sarge paid attention to the houses where he saw lights, but they were few. Sarge motioned Ted to the side of the river at a bend. His place was just on the other side and down river about a half mile; the others would walk from there. Sarge reinforced the instructions to monitor the radio, and a rough plan of what to do in the event they made contact with the bad guys. With a quick shaking of hands, Mike and Sarge slipped into the night.
It took the two of them almost two hours to move the half mile or so to a spot they could see Sarge’s house. Even in the dark, Sarge didn’t like what he saw. In the greenish glow of the goggles, all he could see where his house had sat on the bank was a big black spot overlooking the river. Mike eased up to Sarge’s side. “Doesn’t look good, boss,” he whispered.
“About what I expected, but look, the garage is still there; they didn’t burn it,” Sarge said.
The two of them took a few minutes to set up their hide and settle down for a long look. Sarge set the SPW up to cover the river, and Mike tapped him on the shoulder and whispered in his ear that he was going to set up claymores about thirty yards either side of their position. Sarge gave him a nod and Mike picked up his pack and moved off into the darkness once again. Sarge unrolled a foam sleep mat and laid it on the ground, then took up a position behind the Minimi
. Listening to the pitch dark all around him, Sarge could hear Mike moving around faintly to his right.
Mike came back, giving a low hissing whistle so Sarge wouldn’t shoot him, then moved off to Sarge’s left to set up the other mine. It didn’t take him long before he was back in the hide. He was taking up position to watch their six when he tapped Sarge on the shoulder. Sarge looked back at him.
“Hey, what’s this, you getting soft?” Mike said in a breathy whisper, jutting a thumb at the foam mat.
Sarge kicked him in his thigh, then whispered back, “Just wait, dipshit, you’ll get old too. Now keep your damn eyes open.”
Mike laughed inside, thinking back to the days when the old man would make them lie in the rocks, mud and thickets on the range, the whole time screaming about “not having that fucking sissy mat in the real world.” He thought about reminding Sarge of that, but he didn’t want to get kicked again.
The rest of that night went without incident, with one exception. About two thirty in the morning they heard a helo overhead to their south. Even though they scanned the skies with their goggles, they never did see the ship. The only thing worse than hearing a helo working over your head was not knowing where it was or what it was doing. At five in the morning, Sarge told Mike to catch a couple hours of sleep. Mike pulled his sleeping bag over him. He knew not to get into it, as it could easily become a body bag if he needed to move quickly. He was out in under five minutes.
Sarge reached into his pack and pulled out a small stainless thermos of coffee and poured himself a cup. He would stay up and see what the dawn brought. The boat wouldn’t be back for them until tomorrow evening, so he had plenty of time.
• • •
Mark looked at me for a minute. He said, “All right, we’ll go have a look, but me and Rick go in, you stay outside.”
“Fine by me, boss,” I answered.