“She drives it pretty good for someone who just learned,” Gerald said, watching Gavin carry another fish to the lip of the ravine that the creek ran down into the river below and throw the fish into the river. Laughing, Gavin took off to catch another fish and rescue it before the excavator dug out the pool.
“Can’t say I didn’t raise a conservationist,” Nelson chuckled, watching Gavin rescue another fish.
“Hey! The pool is empty enough! Get out of the way so I can get to work!” Bernard shouted at them, leaning out of his cab.
They quickly grabbed the pump and ran out of the almost empty pool as Bernard pulled the excavator down. Watching Bernard work, Nelson was shocked to see how much of the bottom was rock as Bernard dug out the pool and widened it.
Nelson keyed his radio. “Nellie, are you about done with the backhoe?”
“No, I’m sure we need more than three truck loads.”
Gerald scoffed, “The damn dump bed is fifteen feet long. I hope we don’t need much more than that.”
“How many did Bernard say we needed?” Nelson asked Nellie as Ashley pulled into the site and backed up to the pile of rock she had dumped out and stopped.
“He said five, so I’m sending seven. Why, do you need the backhoe?”
Nodding at Nellie’s reasoning, he said, “Yeah, I want to start putting in the small dams up stream.”
“Well, I can go to the farm and bring back the tractor with the front-end loader now that I have the area dug out,” she said. “Stop Ashley so we don’t meet on this little dirt trail my husband calls a road.” Matt took off as Ashley raised the bed of the dump truck, emptying the back.
“Seems Nellie isn’t fond of Bernard’s road-making ability,” Gerald chuckled as Bernard came over the radio.
“Listen, woman, I told you I couldn’t put in a real road because the Forestry Service wouldn’t allow it.”
“Some of this is our land! Those sons of bitches can kiss my ass!” Nellie snapped at him. “The first one that comes out here and says something, I’m planting ‘im under the corn!”
Nelson looked over at Gerald and grinned. “Guess we know where Nellie stands on confrontations with government employees.”
“Not before I send their ass through the wood chipper and use what’s left for chicken feed!” Bernard yelled.
Raising his eyebrows, Gerald said, “Bernard’s method of dealing with them scares me more than Nellie’s.” Nelson nodded in agreement.
When Nellie drove back, Nelson got on the backhoe as Ashley took Nellie back to the farm in the dump truck to get the tractor with the front-end loader. Grabbing some chain, Nelson, Gerald, and Matt hooked one of the smaller barriers using rebar that had been left exposed at the top, forming a loop.
After connecting it to the front-end loader, Nelson slowly lifted the heavy barrier. He knew the loader could pick up over seven thousand pounds, but he was guessing the weight of the barrier was close to six thousand. Feeling the massive machine shift in weight, Nelson figured he wasn’t far off.
He drove back down the dirt tract because taking the backhoe along the creek wasn’t an option. Slowing down on the tract where he saw a metal post driven into the ground, Nelson made sure he was in four-wheel drive and eased off the road, climbing a hill. He, Gerald, and Bernard had been all over this area, and this was the easiest way to get to the site for the water holding area that would feed the powerhouse.
Topping the hill and feeling the barrier starting to swing, Nelson lowered the bucket until the barrier hit the ground. Raising the bucket, Nelson slowly followed faded orange ribbons tied on trees as he weaved around them and ran over smaller trees.
Driving down a small draw that led to the creek, Nelson felt the barrier swing out, shifting the weight of the backhoe. The backhoe jerked forward, and Nelson stomped the brakes and felt the wheels lock up, but the backhoe continued sliding down the draw.
Grabbing the controls for the loader, he dropped them, sending the barrier to the ground, and the backhoe stopped its slide. “Not funny,” he mumbled, trying to get his heart rate back under control.
When he reached the flat area beside the small pool, he lowered the barrier to the ground and climbed out, unhooking it. The “flat” area was barely big enough for the backhoe sitting parallel to the creek. Driving back up the draw, Nelson was convinced four-wheel drive, was one of man’s greatest inventions.
His second trip wasn’t as scary, and when Nelson had the second barrier on the ground, he turned the backhoe around and planted the feet or horizontal stabilizers and front-end loader. Climbing out, he found Matt, Gerald, and Gavin standing beside the metal post with the hoses tied to it. Looking down in the pool, Nelson could see the bottom. The surface of the water was three feet below the lip of the pool.
Jumping down into the pool, Nelson moved to the end where the water was funneled between two massive boulders, forming the waterfall. Seeing nothing had changed from their original plans, Nelson climbed out and back into the backhoe. He swung the arm out over the pool just behind the boulder on the far bank and dug out a trench. Since he didn’t know just how big the boulders were, he was careful not to hit them. He was using them with the barriers to make his dam.
When he was done digging the trench, Nelson climbed out of the backhoe and called the others to bring over the stuff he needed. On each barrier was a one-foot by one-foot hole two feet from the bottom. On both sides of the barriers, bolts stuck out around the holes. Nelson grabbed a large funnel made out of thick metal that ended in a two-inch pipe. With Matt holding the heavy funnel, Nelson bolted it on.
On the other side, Nelson grabbed a metal bulge of screens and bolted it on, covering the hole that fed into the funnel. Looking in the screens, the others saw five different screens, each smaller than the one before it. When they were done bolting the funnel and screen on the other barrier, Nelson stood and said, “Gerald, you lift them over to us!”
As Matt and Nelson hooked one of the barriers up to the arm, Gerald climbed in the backhoe. Making sure Gavin was out of the way, Nelson jumped back in the pool and motioned for Gavin to jump in but stay well behind them.
Gerald lifted the first barrier up as they used ropes, brute force, and words Gavin shouldn’t hear, they guided it in the trench Nelson had dug. Since the water only had half the area to leave the pool, it would pull them, trying to trap them between the barrier and the boulders.
The second barrier was a lot harder since all the barriers had two-inch tongue and grooves on the sides to fit together tight. When Gerald set the barrier down, the rush of water down the stream stopped as water blasted out the funnels Nelson had made to feed the pipes.
Nelson crawled over the dam with the others. The middle of the barrier dam had a notch on the top for the spillway, three feet wide and two feet deep, just a little bigger than the natural funnel the boulders made. What they could see was the boulders only extended a few feet into the bank, where the barrier formed a twelve-foot-long wall.
Just a foot off the bottom of the old stream bed, the funnels were shooting streams of water several yards out. “Putting the pipes on that is going to be fun,” Matt said, watching the two water jets.
Nelson reached over and patted Matt’s shoulder. “That’s why I’m bringing your big ass to help me.” They watched the water in the pool rise then slowly start to pour over the spillway until the waterfall covered the two jets of water below from the funnels.
“Nelson, bring your little friends back; lunch is here,” Michelle called over the radio. “You can play in the water after you eat.”
Gerald looked over at Nelson. “There are times I’m glad I’m not married.”
Nelson shrugged as he climbed out of the creek. “Don’t know why; the women here give you hell anyway, and you don’t get any of the fringe benefits,” he said then pulled Gavin out.
“Never thought about it like that,” Gerald mumbled as he and Matt walked over to the UTV. Gavin climbed in the backhoe with
his dad. After Nelson drove them out of the draw, he let Gavin drive them back to the work site.
When Gavin pulled into the site, Nelson saw Olivia and Brittney running around and passing out sandwiches with Nancy passing out red cups filled with tea. He looked over to see Gerald holding Devin. “Damn, I have to move fast,” he mumbled as Gavin turned off the backhoe.
Nelson grabbed a few sandwiches and some tea then jumped in his UTV and drove up to where Michelle was. Not feeling rambunctious, Nelson took the long way up to the top of the ridge. He found Michelle sitting on a large rock overlooking the site with Duke sitting beside her.
When Nelson walked over, he looked at the group through the trees about a hundred feet below them. “Nice spot,” he said, handing her a sandwich.
“Thank you.” She smiled, taking the sandwich. “Nancy said Hank called on the radio asking what all the heavy equipment noise was over here.”
“I didn’t hear that.”
“Nellie came up here and told me in case they could hear our radios,” Michelle said, taking a bite. “I think it’s time to break out the real radios.”
Nodding, Nelson sat beside her and said, “Yeah, we’ll get them out tonight.”
“Well, since you’re here, I’m taking a pee break,” Michelle said, getting up.
“You held your pee?”
“I’m being polite about what I held,” Michelle said, walking away.
“I don’t mind telling people I need to take a dump,” Nelson scoffed, throwing half his sandwich to Duke.
After lunch, the group moved the big barriers next to the lip of the ravine where Bernard had dug. When the barriers were fitted together, they formed a thirty-foot-long wall. In the middle of the wall at the very top was a five-foot-wide, one-foot-deep notch, forming a spillway where the creek ran down the ravine to the river. When the dam was up, they spread out sheets of plastic along the bottom.
Then Bernard spread out gravel along the plastic as Gerald grabbed a paint gun and sprayed sealant over the wall where the tongue and groove seams met. With Matt and Gavin helping, Nelson ran the plastic pipes along the bottom of the deep pool to the trench leading to the powerhouse.
Nelson joined the pipes to the two inlet pipes leading into the house. Then he ran outlet pipes from the other side of the house down the ravine. Since the diversion creek was on their side, Nelson had to wait until Bernard was done spreading rocks. The trench he dug was two feet wide and in places was twenty feet deep. Not wanting to see if he could drive the backhoe across, Nelson just waited on Bernard. The excavator had no trouble rolling over the trench with its tracks.
Moving over to the metal culverts, Nelson made sure they were buried at the same level as the spillway. The culverts formed four alternate spillways for the dam. Two were going to be used for corkscrew hydro generators. The other two were just for emergency spillways.
They all had butterfly valves Nelson had made. When he priced twenty-four-inch valves, Nelson almost passed out seeing they cost seven grand apiece. That was almost what they had tied up in the powerhouse alone for one valve.
The most expensive part of this was the heavy wire they had run to the house the year before. That alone was nine grand. They buried it on the tract Bernard had put in, running it to the room they built onto the basement.
After everyone talked about it, it was decided that the power center for the house should be inside. Since they weren’t about to run generators in the basement, they dug out a hole and built a twenty by twenty room next to the basement. Putting exhaust and intake pipes in one end, they sealed it off and made room for a twenty kW generator. The rest of the room was dedicated to batteries and power distribution.
Before Bernard went to work closing the diversionary creek, Nelson stood beside the dam and looked up. The bottom of the spillway was ten feet above his head. He looked back at the deep pool and was pleased but hoped all this work paid off. There was no way they could do this until the shit hit the fan. Just off the top of his head, Nelson knew they were breaking three dozen laws but figured it was ten times that.
As Bernard started filling the diversionary ditch, the water rushed into the pool and started collecting. With Matt and Gerald’s help, Nelson carried over an aluminum ramp that bolted into the spillway notch at the top of the dam. The ramp carried water six feet away, dumping it down the ravine into the river.
Nelson grabbed a shovel and started throwing dirt over the top of the powerhouse. Matt and Gerald came over and started to help. When they had several inches over the top, leaving only the hatch exposed, they carried their shovels over to the UTV. Putting the shovels up, they heard water slowly starting to pour over the spillway.
“We find out if it works tomorrow,” Nelson said. “I’m going to get Michelle and call it a day.”
Gerald looked at his watch. “Shit, it’s almost six; that’s fine by me,” he said, walking away. “I’m tired of being a general contractor; I’m ready to be a military contractor whooping someone’s ass.”
After showering, the group sat in the living room of the main house. Everyone tried to tell Nellie not to worry about supper, but she wouldn’t hear of it. With the rattle of dishes in the kitchen as Nellie worked, the others sat watching TV, waiting on the presidential address.
Nelson had his AR and 1911 broken down on the coffee table and was cleaning them. Gavin was sitting beside him with his AR and pistol broken down, watching his dad. “Nelson, you going to hook up the juice as we put in the other dams?” Gerald asked, watching Gavin.
“Yeah, I want to make sure we are good as soon as I can,” Nelson said, putting his AR together.
“The President of the United States,” the TV announced, and everyone sat up and became quiet as the familiar face of the president filled the screen.
“My fellow Americans, I come to you tonight with a heavy heart. I can’t believe so many of our citizens would rise up against the government. The government that is helping and listening to the people. It goes against everything that America stands for,” he said with a solemn face.
“We are the elected officials and know what to do in your best interest, so with a heavy heart, I’m declaring martial law. All aspects of private companies are now under federal control. I’m sure many of you have heard several states have stated they are breaking away from the Union,” he said and slammed his fist down on his desk, “even though the Supreme Court has ruled they can’t break away. This will be settled by the courts unless the states of Texas, Montana, Louisiana, Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, North Dakota, and New Mexico choose to rejoin the union and turn over all property seized from the federal government. The governors of Missouri and Ohio were going to join them, but private citizens stormed their capitals and killed them. I can understand these citizens’ actions, but they will still be caught and tried in a court of law for their actions.”
Nelson scoffed, “Yeah, just look at one of the alphabet agencies to find them.”
“By executive order 12222, all private property has been seized until the end of this crisis. All persons are to report to the nearest FEMA camp. If you live in a city with a population over one hundred thousand, you may be sent back to your home. If you don’t, you will be relocated to a new residence. I have signed an executive order that cuts all power transmission outside of metropolitan areas. We can’t have waste when everyone is supposed to be in a FEMA camp. This is for your own good and the good of the nation.” The president smiled.
“If you wish this to end so we can go back to our way of life, I strongly urge you to turn over those fighting and causing disruption of our society. The FBI has a hotline for all tips, and any tip that ends in an arrest, a reward will be given,” the president said as an eight hundred number rolled across the bottom of the screen.
“Now, I want to say to the governors of New Mexico and Texas, you will stop shooting at people crossing the border, and I demand you cease your assaults on the Army of Mexico. They are our neighbors and will be treated as s
uch until the UN court orders you to rejoin the union next week.”
Michelle sat down in Nelson’s lap. “I like how he already knows how the court is going to rule,” she whispered.
“Many members of the UN have sent troops here to help us in this trying time,” the president said, narrowing his eyes at the camera. “Your elected officials have their support to stop the foolish actions of a few. Congress has passed legislation that any act against a member or an employee of the government is an act of treason and punishable by death.”
“He needs to grow a small mustache like Hitler,” Gerald mumbled.
“Under the orders of martial law, every citizen now reports to the federal government. Any that don’t will be seen as traitors. Homeland is working with local law enforcement to facilitate the transfer of citizens to metropolitan areas. Only government-sanctioned farms and businesses are allowed to operate outside these areas. I, as your president, will lead you out of these trying times, and when we are once again united, our country will be that much stronger. Thank you, and good night.”
“Well, it’s about to run into high gear now,” Gerald said, getting up and picking Devin up off the floor.
Chapter Four
Two days later after breakfast, Nelson, Matt, and Gerald were working on placing more dams in the creek. Nelson had wired up the powerhouse and turned four of the turbines on, generating forty thousand watts. The two corkscrew turbines were generating five thousand watts each. Nelson cut their power from the grid since it was about to be turned off anyway. All in all, everyone was really happy.
The group was placing the last of the barriers just several hundred yards from the bridge that the road went over that led to the farm. When they shut off the backhoe after dropping the last barrier in, Nelson looked around. “You hear something?” he asked.
“Sounds like a car,” Gerald said, grabbing his AR off the ground.
“We have a car coming down the road; it’s almost at the bridge,” Nancy called out over the radio.
Forgotten Forbidden America:: Patriots Reborn Page 5