I’d almost taken their weapons but decided against it at the last minute, since being caught with them would be an automatic death sentence. I left the woman and her two sons the food in their packs and suggested they move on from the area, or at least change houses.
Now, the Captain was here, and he had more questions. Oh, well, I guess I could always play dumb if he got too curious.
“Don’t sweat it. The old man likes you. And Bar, that guy thinks you’re some kind of covert Special Forces operator or something. I tried to explain that you’re just a kid, but he is convinced that’s your cover.”
I laughed at that and caught Scott flashing a little grin.
“Why would he think that, Sergeant?” Scott asked innocently. At that, I glanced over and did a double take when I examined Conners’ uniform more closely.
“Hey, sorry I didn’t catch that sooner. Congratulations, Sergeant Conners.”
“Thanks. Erlich rammed it through, after what happened. He wants me to take over as assistant squad leader, you know.” Conners paused, as if gathering his thoughts.
“And, Mr. Keller, the reason PFC Barden thinks Luke is some kind of operator is because he held the stairs by himself against a whole mob of attackers. For over half an hour. We counted fourteen dead and three wounded. They just kept coming, probably because we had troops outside and they figured the only way out was to spring their boss upstairs.”
Scott shook his head. Then he looked at the newly minted sergeant.
“Don’t say anything to Amy. If I know Luke, we wouldn’t want to worry her after the fact.”
“Truer words have never been spoken,” I added. “That girl worries, you know. I don’t know why.”
Both men were still laughing as we walked up the back stairs and into the house.
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
Captain Devayne was a tall, narrow faced man in his late twenties who looked older than his years and worn around the edges. He typified the expression, ‘it’s not the years, it’s the miles.’ Clearly, Captain Devayne had been going without enough sleep for so long his eyes had permanent dark circles under them, and his mouth was drawn tight over his teeth. Even when the man smiled, like he did today, it was like he did so over some deeper pain.
“Good to see you again, Luke,” the officer said, rising and holding out a hand. I shook it, and mumbled about how it was good to see him again. He was sitting at the kitchen table with Darwin, Nick, Gene Laretto and a few of the other farmers I knew by sight from the area. At Darwin’s wave, I took an offered chair as Sergeant Conners and Scott wandered off to other chores.
“Luke, good timing. We were just discussing the pulse and what may have caused it.” Captain Devayne said.
“Nick told us about that phone call he got that morning. We already knew about the nuclear power plants overseas going critical but I must admit, this is news to me about our own facilities getting advanced warning.”
I goggled at the captain at his revelation.
“Seriously? You mean, you didn’t get some kind of warning order or heads up beforehand? That’s crazy.” I blurted out.
“You really think so?” the captain asked, and I could tell he was truly curious. “I guess it would have made sense, but even if someone in Homeland Security, the DoD, or the Adjutant General’s office started spreading the word, I was kind of low down on the phone tree. Of course, when I was talking to Colonel Hotchkins at Fort Chaffee about this very thing, he said he’d heard nothing in advance, either. I think that was what fueled the rumors about this being an attack.”
“So you really think it was the sun? One of those solar flares?” Darwin asked, rubbing his chin. He looked at me with a mixture of curiosity and concern. “I’ve read about them but didn’t think they had the power to do this.”
“Yes, sir. And I think not only did the government know about it in advance, I think there was some effort made to prevent the news from leaking.”
“And what are you basing this on?” Captain Devayne asked, not challenging but again, curious.
“Sorry, I don’t mean that in a tinfoil hat sort of way. Let me give you an example. I had an app on my phone that was tied into a series of solar observatories. Every other time, I’ve gotten an alert issued when a flare over a certain magnitude was detected. This time I received no notice, and I would have unless somebody, and I don’t mean some random hacker, took the system offline. If I had to guess, I would say it was to avoid causing a panic. Maybe whoever got the word didn’t realize it would be this destructive.”
“Well, that is something, I guess. I know the federal government has been pretty much MIA since this started. We’ve been acting on a state-wide level to do all we can, and the active duty folks have been pitching in where allowed, but I’ve got to wonder where the President has been in all this. Even as screwed up as the airwaves are right now, the man should have addressed the nation or something.”
Captain Devayne’s words reflected a level of frustration that must have been eating the man alive. I knew from speaking to the captain earlier that he’d lost nearly half of his command to desertion. Men who never reported, or walked off after times got bad. And that wasn’t even counting the soldiers he’d lost to attacks and ambush.
He’d finally resorted to rounding up the families of his men, not as leverage against them, he hastened to add, but at their insistence. Only when they knew their wives and children were safe could his men attempt to do their jobs. He was one of the only units still active in this part of the state and the pressure to do more was enormous.
“Well, somebody screwed the pooch. Now we have to put it back together.” Gene intoned, his practical nature a relief from our pondering.
“I know, and I don’t see how. We lack the materials to get the grid back up any time soon, and the food necessary to feed most of our population. We’ve got maybe 6,000 troops to cover the whole state, about 60% of our pre-pulse manning. I appreciate what you men are doing here, Darwin, all of you gentlemen indeed, but we just can’t feed the people who are depending on us.” Captain Devayne sounded like a man on the ropes. Not defeated, yet, but too battered to make it back to his corner without help.
“Maybe not, but I’ll bet if you go looking you will find a lot of little farms out there just begging for some help getting their tractors going, or for enough manpower to harvest their crops. Why don’t you have some of your men see about setting up more enclaves like we have here?”
Darwin’s reasonable tone sounded soothing after hearing the raw pain in the officer’s voice.
“I guess I could, or I could appoint someone to do that for me. Someone like you, Mr. Keller.”
The silence that followed after the offer made everyone at the table look around, and then we risked a glance at Darwin Keller. The man looked poleaxed for a moment, and then he shook his head. Not in denial, just in a clearing motion.
“If you are serious, Captain, let me talk to my family and think on it. Honestly, I want to help and if this will take the pressure off you, then how could I refuse?”
“Alright. I guess I’ve caused enough trouble here today for you, Mr. Keller. If you will excuse me I’d like to speak in private with Mr…Luke, what is your last name? I don’t think you’ve ever said, have you?”
“Just call me Luke, sir. And we can speak outside if you like.”
“Alright Luke. I’ll follow you.”
As we stepped outside, I saw all of the men at the table watching us, as if half afraid I was going to do something, or if something bad was going to happen to me. Once we were out on the front porch, the captain gestured to a glider swing hanging and I took a seat, followed by Devayne.
“First of all, I want you to know I took some of your concerns about the behavior of Guard units in Illinois and Missouri and went to Colonel Hotchkins. There’s been a lot of shifting around in the Guard but he’s the commanding officer of my brigade. What’s left of it, anyway. He’s now headquartered at Fort Chaffee, outside Fort Smith.
>
“There’s nothing we can do, officially, about what these officers are doing. But, behind the scenes he is passing the word on to other interested parties. Like I said inside, the Regular Army is hamstrung right now and we haven’t been told why. Posse Comitatus is the current best guess, but the President has gotten around that in the past. No, the regular forces are on lock down for the most part, except for securing key civilian facilities but we don’t expect that to last. I’ve also heard through the grapevine that the Army has also expanded the umbrella of protection to include off-base housing. I imagine the Marines are doing the same. Trying to keep the troops happy for the moment.”
I sat there and digested what the captain had shared with me. Not much, really, but it did offer a glimpse into what was really happening out there.
“Luke, the colonel would like to talk to you, if you are willing. He wants to pick your brain about what all you saw in your travels. Maybe some things that happened, some things you may have witnessed, where you are reluctant to share with me.”
“Not interested, captain.” I replied in a subdued tone. I still had secrets I would probably take to the grave. Killing those guardsmen, no matter how justified, would likely just be one of them.
“We could provide secure transport to Fort Smith. I know you are anxious to get home and check on your family back in Texas.”
“Fort Smith is still a long ways from home, Captain Devayne. Still not interested.”
“What about Oklahoma?”
I sighed. “Where in Oklahoma? If I want to go to Colcord, that’s about a 45 minute walk down Highway 12.”
“No, I was thinking further south. Like McAlester. Seems we have all these young ladies from there and no way to get in touch with their families. The Colonel has been in contact with his counterpart over in the Oklahoma National Guard. The Oklahoma National Guard has agreed to take them back, and provide transportation, if their families can be located.”
“So, if I go to see Colonel Hotchkins, I get military transport to Fort Smith, and then I can catch a ride with the Oklahoma Guard from there? Correct?”
Captain Devayne nodded and I could see a hint of a smile on his otherwise hard features.
“You can, once we work out the details. In the interim, Darwin will host the girls here. For any of them we can locate family in Oklahoma, the OK Guard will pick them up from Fort Chaffee and transport back to McAlester.”
“Armed escorts? Up-armored Hummers with machine guns, at least?”
“Yes, we would have to insist. Can’t expect those poor girls to make the run without protection.”
“Alright. I’ll do it. But you’ll need to make sure there’s room for two. If I can get a protected ride all the way to McAlester, I think I may be changing some plans.”
“And what about Mr. Rufus? I understand you had some plans for him, too. Something Sergeant Conners mentioned, I believe?”
“Is he going to hang for his crimes? And Jimenez, too?”
“They all will. The ones that live that long. I swear, I thought I’ve seen bad shit in my life, but until I got to that hellhole in Rogers, I’d never imagined it happening here. Yes, they will all hang.”
That gave me an idea, and I requested one more favor from the captain. Under the circumstances, I knew he could not refuse.
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
Larry Rufus died on a Saturday afternoon, two weeks after my meeting with Captain Devayne. The delay was in part due to the necessity of building a large enough public gallows in Fayetteville to handle the two dozen men sentenced to swing. Most of the crimes may have taken place in Benton County, but the National Guard still had a larger presence in Washington County. With that in mind, Fayetteville was where the executions would take place. Most were related to the Rufus/Jimenez network, but some regular, everyday sort of animals were disposed of that day as well.
I was in the crowd along with almost all the girls and women rescued from the school or their house of horrors out in the country. I stood holding Amy’s hand, and she in turn was holding on to Shay and Delilah. Though Shay was only a few years younger than Amy, she was barely five feet tall and fit in Amy’s arms like she was meant to be there. I think Amy liked the idea of being a big sister to these children.
Both girls were well on their way to healing from the physical wounds, but no one knew if they would ever get over the other injuries done to them. This was their first time away from the farm since their rescue. Until we reached the newly designated town square, their mother was right there to offer them comfort.
At the specified time, uniformed guardsmen marched the condemned men out of the converted store serving as a temporary courtroom and up the wooden steps. They were shackled at the ankle, wrist and neck, and most of them looked much the worse for their time incarcerated. Some of that was from being shot, others for getting the crap kicked out of them by guards and other prisoners.
When I looked up on the platform, I saw Captain Devayne standing at attention, and a man I recognized as the judge who presided over the majority of these men’s cases. I’d never been in court before except on a field trip in seventh grade so I hadn’t known what to expect. The abbreviated hearings took less than half a day and resulted in all the accused being found guilty and sentenced to hanging. Since the trial came a week after Captain Devayne assured me all of them would hang, I figured the fix was in but didn’t say anything.
Standing next to the judge was the slender, conservatively dressed woman I had gotten to know so well these last few weeks. Courage comes in many forms, my father taught me that. Seeing her there reinforced the lesson as Sarah Trimble stood unafraid on that wooden stage with one of the main instigators of her husband’s death. And the man who had raped her ten year old daughter.
When all of the condemned were lined up, the judge read the charges for each man, and that process alone took nearly twenty minutes. By the time all the charges were read, though, the crowd, which by this time had grown to several thousand, was ready to see these men swing. Even for a populous scrambling for every meal and jaded by the death they saw every day, these child raping bastards received no sympathy.
Sarah’s role was simple. She went up to each of the condemned, said a few words, and carefully snugged the noose around their necks. Some men tried to fight, and were quickly subdued by the guards. Sarah didn’t seem to notice. Rufus, by design, was last. Finally, Sarah spoke loud enough that those of us on the front row could hear her words.
“When you see your boy Randall in hell, you be sure and tell him who sent you,” she declared, her voice hard as flint, “because you, Mr. Rufus, have about ten seconds before you make that trip.”
Then she looked over at us and nodded. As she’d prearranged, Amy and I each took one of her daughters (Shay for me, Delilah for Amy) and hugged them tight and hid their faces. Sarah Trimble jerked the lever, dropping the trapdoor. Most of the men died quickly, their necks broken.
I watched with a little smile on my face as Larry Rufus died slowly, strangled to death by an improperly tied hangman’s noose. I should know. I did the job myself.
After it was all over, I gathered up Amy and gave her a kiss before walking back over to one of the big school buses Stan and his gearhead cohorts finally got running. By the time our little group reached the accordion doors of the bus, Sarah had retrieved her weapons and rejoined us.
I noticed I was one of the few males in the sea of ladies but every one of us was armed. Most with pistols but a few of the more advanced students also carried a slung rifle as well. I carried my CETME again, and all the way back to the Keller farm I never stopped scanning the trees and fence rows for threats. When I glanced over, I saw Amy doing the same thing.
We would be heading out the next day for Fort Chaffee. Together.
I didn’t have a crystal ball and I couldn’t read the future, but it would be my steadfast intention to spend the rest of my days together with Amy. Heck, maybe on the way to McAlester I could scaven
ge up a ring for her. Or trade one of my pistols. I now had plenty to spare.
THE END
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Here’s a Sneak Peek at Hard Rain Falling, Book Three in the Walking in the Rain series.
*****
The Colonel wasn’t what I was expecting. From the way Captain Devayne spoke of the man, of how he managed to hold the brigade together through tough times and hard circumstances, I expected him to be a larger-than-life character, maybe a real, live Captain America. Costume and all.
Instead, I found a flesh and blood mortal man, dressed in a clean but obviously work rumpled uniform, and I wondered he managed to mess up his clothes this early in the day. Either he got up really early, or he was still working from the night before.
He had salt and pepper hair and dark brown eyes that regarded me with a sharp intellect. Seated, I couldn’t tell his height but he had the greyhound lean features of a distance runner and the smooth mannerisms I’d seen in some martial arts practitioners. As I was sizing him up, the colonel was likewise giving me a careful once-over.
“You’re a little bigger than I was expecting,” Colonel Hotchkins finally said, gesturing me to one of the guest chairs in front of his desk.
“Reading Captain Devayne’s report, I pictured you as a half starved street urchin. Maybe something out of Dickens.”
He added that last little bit with a good natured chuckle and I nodded, since it was just true. In the last few weeks I’d actually managed to put on enough weight so that I no longer resembled a scarecrow.
“No sir. I’ve managed to claw my way back up to skinny, instead of skin and bones.”
“That’s some feat, given current conditions, Mr.…I’m sorry, couldn’t seem to find a mention of your last name anywhere in this report,” said Colonel Hotchkins.
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