by Steven Kagey
Brian and Sean brought their hands out and then noticed that along with the deputies there was a group of national guardsmen all aiming weapons at them. The deputies and guardsmen rushed in and started handcuffing everyone and then taking their weapons over to a Hummer and an older model pickup with a red bubble light on top and a sheriff’s department emblem on the doors. The group was herded to the front of the house, and there they noticed two other vehicles, a military M35 deuce and a half cargo truck and an older model truck with sheriff’s emblems. The two vehicles were set up in a “V” formation down at the gate with four more national guardsmen and three more deputies with weapons aimed up at them.
A hundred things were going through Brian’s mind. First was if his daughter and wife were safe. He looked around and saw Evelyn, who was visibly shaken. She looked at him as if to ask what was going on.
“Everything will be okay,” he mouthed.
Avery was right behind her. Although she looked upset, Brian didn’t see any signs of injury.
Next his mind shifted to, How did these guys get up to us without us hearing them? Hummers are loud. We heard a rumble, but that was Craig’s truck. Oh shit! That’s why we didn’t hear them approach.
Brian immediately placed the blame on Craig’s stupid loud truck, even though his own truck was just as loud.
Then Brian wondered why Brandon didn’t warn them.
Oh shit, where’s Brandon?
Brian’s heart was already beating out of his chest, and it beat a little faster at the thought of Sean’s son having been killed because he was up in the window on lookout with a rifle. Brian looked around at the window of the workshop and didn’t see Brandon. He scanned the area and saw Brandon’s rifle on the picnic table and then he saw Brandon being handcuffed with zip ties and noticed his hands were dirty.
Son of a bitch. He must have come down to help push the trailer. NO, dammit, we told him that his post was important. Why did he come down?
Brian shifted the blame immediately to Brandon for these guys getting the jump on them.
Why are these deputies here, what are they doing… Oh shit, that stupid security guard at the school!
Brian thought for a moment that they were there to arrest him. He needed to calm this situation down before his wife, daughter, or friends got hurt. He spoke up to the nearest deputy, “I am Brian Stewart. I’m the one you want.”
“Shut up, no one is speaking to you,” said the deputy.
Confused, Brian said, “Then why the hell are you all here? You must have the wrong place!”
The deputy pointed his rifle at Brian’s face. “I told you to shut the fuck up.”
An uncontrollable rage filled Brian from having the weapon pointed at him like that and when the deputy turned and lowered his rifle, Brian, whose hands were cuffed behind his back, dropped his shoulder, bent over at the waist, and rushed the deputy, shoulder checking him to the ground. As the deputy tumbled over on the ground, Brian regained his footing and began kicking the deputy in the face. A sharp blow to the back of the head took Brian to his knees. He could see a guardsman’s legs next to him, and it took all of his strength to keep from blacking out from the blow. He could feel a small amount of blood come trickling down his neck.
An authoritative voice bellowed out behind him, “That’s enough, PFC! There is no need to hit a man in restraints when you could have simply grabbed his arms and jerked him to the ground. Remember, these men and women are not the enemy, they are US citizens like you and me.”
Brian could the feel the wooziness setting in. The edges of his vision were becoming gray like he was looking down a dark tunnel. He fought hard to maintain consciousness and overheard the voice say, “Medic, when you are done tending to the deputy, please look at Mr. Stewart here.”
Brian thought it was funny because it almost sounded like the teacher from Charlie Brown was speaking.
“Roger that, Captain,” said another voice. Another set of legs knelt down next to Brian, and he felt someone applying pressure to his head.
After a few minutes, Brian’s head felt clearer. An Army specialist shined a light in his eyes and then told him that he would be okay and that he probably had a mild concussion.
He overheard Sean talking to one of the deputies asking, “Does Sheriff Perry know you are doing this?”
The deputy replied, “Perry resigned last night.”
“What? Then who is sheriff?”
“I am the senior ranking deputy, so DHS appointed me sheriff,” said the man.
“You? Where is Deputy Collins or Deputy Anderson?”
“They resigned along with Perry,” the deputy said with a smirk.
Brian pulled himself up with the help of the specialist, who told him that he should sit down. He shrugged the suggestion off. He noticed the other guardsmen and deputies pulling stuff out of the travel trailers.
He stumbled over to Sean and asked, “What the hell is going on?”
Sean looked over with a concerned scowl on his face. “Apparently there was a presidential order to confiscate civilian weapons and seize food stockpiles.”
“What? That’s not what the president said. He meant grocery stores, distribution warehouses, and gun stores before they got looted. You all must be stupid or something.” Brian looked over at Deputy Gill. “What the hell are y’all doing?”
Shaking his head, Gill said, “Yeah, we heard the president’s message, and we are following it and DHS directives now.”
“Unbelievable! What, are we the first ones y’all hit?
“You happen to be the fifth house.”
“How did we get to be so lucky?”
“We decided to start on the outskirts of the county, then we saw your man over there drive by pulling his trailer and thought you all must be set up pretty well for him to be relocating out here. We just followed him here.”
Craig lowered his head, silently placing all the blame on himself.
Acting Sheriff Gill walked over to one of the trailers. “Start loading everything in the deuce and a half.”
Brian saw one of the deputies and two guardsmen enter and start clearing the house, and his heart sank. He looked over at the sawhorses next to the house which still had the uncompleted door meant to hide the storage room sitting on them. Panic rushed back in and Brian scanned the entire area. There was no way to fight back or resist. They were helpless to stop this from happening. All their food, supplies, and weapons which they had spent countless money, time, and effort on were going to be taken in one fell swoop.
A bubble of emotion formed in his throat, and he could barely breathe. As he thought of all their preps being found and taken, he was forced to hold back tears. A thirty-five-year-old man, a father, a husband, a Marine, and the only thing that he could do was lower his head, hold back tears and try to regain his composure.
Brian wiped his face on his shoulder and looked at Sean. “Do you know any of these deputies?”
Sean shook his head. “I only recognize one of them.” He motioned with his head towards acting Sheriff Gill. “I don’t think the others are actual deputies. He’s the only one I know, and he has always been a shit bag. He was always assigned the shit duties to keep him away from the public and keep him from fucking shit up. Behind his back, he was referred to as Deputy Doofus. Figures he would be the only one in the department to go along with this bullshit.”
Brian looked at all the men that were going through and loading up all of their things, and he noticed the National Guard captain with a clipboard writing down everything that was being loaded into the truck. He moved over towards him. “Captain, you should be ashamed of yourself. You took an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States and yet you’re out here stealing from citizens.”
The captain looked up, and Brian could see the remorse in his eyes. “Mr. Stewart, I can assure you I regret what is going on here more than you know.”
“Regret? It is your duty as an officer in the United States milita
ry not to follow orders which you know to be unlawful or unconstitutional.”
The captain looked around to see who was in earshot and in a hushed tone said, “I know what my duty is, sir, I do not need you to tell me. I tried to stand up against this before it started and I was outnumbered. I could have resigned and left, or I can go along with it and try to fight it from the inside. At least being here I can try to make sure that no innocent civilians get hurt.”
“What do you mean you were outnumbered?”
“A group of men from Homeland Security came in last night, and the main guy in charge said he was the regional leader for this area. The commanding officer of our unit and the local government of this area fell right in line with them. The main DHS guy said that we need to go out and confiscate weapons and food to help feed the town and prevent any further uprising. The sheriff said he would not do it, and they told him he could do it or resign, so he left and all but one deputy refused to comply, so they were all told to leave as well. The city police went the other way. Most of them except a few agreed with it and those few officers left. Most of the city officers do not have any long-term food supplies for their families, so they see this as a way to get food for them and care for their families. As well as most of the men in the guard unit, of the ones that reported for duty they are doing this so they can get food and give it to their families and friends.”
One of the deputies came out of the front door and exclaimed, “We hit the jackpot with this place. Go look in the basement!”
Brian’s previous feelings of despair immediately resurfaced; he suppressed them with rage. Normally anger clouds a person’s mind and judgment, but thoughts of payback were clear and a plan began to form in his mind.
“Captain,” Brian said softly, “when these fellas come back out here, you make sure you or any of your good people are not with them, because no one is walking away alive.”
The captain’s eyebrows rose. “Why would they be coming back out here? They aren’t going to leave anything here for you.”
“Because, you are going to send them back out here in three days,” Brian said matter-of-factly. “I don’t care how you do it. Tell them they need to come back and gather any remaining supplies, or you found out we have more food or something.”
The captain stared at Brian, measuring him. “If you’re sure you know what you’re doing, you better be ready for them. I will not be here to protect you or your family.”
“Trust me, they’ll be the ones needing protection.”
The fifty-five-gallon drums of rice and beans weighed over 400 pounds apiece, and the deputies and guardsmen were unable to lift them. Luckily for them Brian had divided and sealed everything in the drums in separate five gallon Mylar bags, it cost more to do, but it allowed for the drums to be opening without compromising the entire contents. And apparently, it made it easier for your stuff to be stolen too. Each barrel contained ten Mylar packages, and the deputies formed a line up from the basement passing the bags up one at a time until the deuce and a half was becoming pretty well loaded. The empty barrels were left littering the basement. All of the cases of MREs and buckets of freeze dried camping food were brought up along with all the canned goods from the basement. They proceeded to confiscate all the ammunition they could find and searched the rest of the house for weapons and food.
Brian could hear Beast barking as they entered the master bedroom.
If they kill my dog, so help me God, we are all going to die right here and now.
Luckily Beast had been put in his kennel because of all the traffic and activity that was happening today at the homestead. All of Sean’s weapons were in the dining room and were taken along with the food they had brought and all the food from the kitchen pantry.
They had already emptied all the travel trailers, simply throwing everything they didn't take on the ground. Lillian’s precious designer clothes were getting trampled on. They went through all the vehicles and took everything they could find, including all of Craig’s and Doc’s weapons in their vehicles.
To add insult to injury, they said that they were going to confiscate any vehicle that was running for official government use as well. They unhooked Craig’s truck and pulled Daniel and Carol’s Falcon up front. They were unable to unhook Doc’s car from the trailer, so they simply shoved a knife in all four tires. The group’s emotional state dropped even more.
Once it appeared they were almost done clearing out the homestead and trailers, the deuce and a half was loaded with over 9000 pounds stolen from the Stewart homestead. Ninety percent of that was rice and beans from the barrels, but the thieves were very happy with their score.
Captain Wilkerson walked over to the back of the truck and grabbed four bags of Mylar packaged food, two of rice, and two of beans, and set them on the front porch. Then he took a case of home canned food and set it on the porch.
Gill walked up and grabbed two of the Mylar packages and took them back the truck. “They don’t need that much. They can keep the canned food because it looks like shit anyway.”
“There are almost twenty of them,” Captain Wilkerson protested. “They still need to eat.”
“Yeah, and the FEMA camp at the high school will be set up soon. They can get their food fed back to them there.”
The captain looked over at Brian gave him a look. Brian interpreted the look to mean, I’m sorry and good luck when I send them back out here. They deserve whatever comes to them.
They unhandcuffed everyone and began loading in their vehicles.
“What are we supposed to do for food?” Evelyn shouted at them.
“FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security will be setting a food distribution camp at the high school,” Gill said. “Everyone in the county is to report to the camp within the next forty-eight hours.”
Christina shouted, “How are we supposed to get there if you are taking our vehicles?”
“Walk,” Gill said flatly. “I don’t care how you get there, if you want to be fed you’ll figure it out. It’s only six miles.”
Everyone stood and stared as the vehicles drove down the driveway away from the house. Seeing the cargo truck loaded with all their food, they were stunned. Gill was in the last vehicle waiting to move out.
“Hey, Sheriff?” Brian called out with a smile. “I just wanted to tell you that if you come back out here again, we will help do even more to feed your families longer.”
Because Brian was smiling when he said it, Gill sat there with a smile on his face. I knew these sons of bitches were holding out and had more food somewhere.
“Oh yeah?” he said.
Brian smiled even wider. “Yeah, if y’all come back we will make sure your families have one less mouth to feed.” He did a friendly tap on the side of the truck and waved.
The smile and friendliness had confused the deputy, and he was out of the gate before it dawned on him what Brian meant by what he had said.
Oh, we will be back.
Chapter 14
The group stared in disbelief as the convoy of thieves drove down the road. When they were out of sight, they all turned to one another, and the whole group erupted into conversation.
“Guys, I am so sorry,” Craig said, “we were watching behind us as much as we could. I didn’t have my towing mirrors on and couldn’t see behind the trailer on the straightaways.”
At the same time, Brandon was apologizing. “I’m sorry I left my post. It looked like you all needed more help to get the trailer up on the pad.”
Christina was saying out loud, “What are we going to do for food?”
Daniel and Doc Hughes were saying some version of, “This is not legal. They can’t just come in here and take our food.”
Lillian stopped all the conversations when she stepped up in Brian’s face and pointed a finger at him. “You mean to tell me you let them take all of our damn food?”
Brian’s hand twitched, he was never one to hit a woman who did not hit him first. St
ill, Lillian had crossed a line on a man that was filled with more rage and anger than he had experienced in his whole life combined up until this point. With a flash from Brian’s side, Evelyn came out of nowhere and half slapped, half clotheslined Lillian, knocking her to the ground. Lillian landed with a yelp.
“How dare you say that shit to him!” Evelyn screamed.
The anger briefly left Brian as his mind tried to comprehend that Evelyn had just hit Lillian. Lillian was sitting on the ground holding her face then looked over to Evelyn. He immediately rushed to Evelyn’s side to make sure she was alright, taking ahold of her wrist to see where she had hurt it.
Craig reached down to help his wife up.
“Did you see what she just did?” Lillian screeched. “Are you going to let her get away with that?”
“I’m glad she hit you,” Craig retorted. “Because if she didn’t, I was about to. You know I have never raised a hand to you in our eighteen years together, but for what you just said to Brian you deserved to get the shit smacked out of you.”
Lillian recoiled, gasping at what her husband had said to her. “What?”
“You got scared being at our house. The only reason we had a safe place to come is because Brian invited us. All the food that was stockpiled here for us is because Brian took it upon himself and did all the hard work getting and storing that food. It’s not his fault that some government thugs came in here and stole it all. As a matter of fact, it is our fault. If they hadn’t followed us towing the trailer in here, then they wouldn’t have come here, and to point even further, it’s your fault.”
“My fault?” Lillian echoed.
“Yes, your fault,” Craig said. “I wanted to come out here yesterday, but you didn’t want to. If we had, they wouldn’t have seen us on the road today. Now you know I love you, but you need to get your head on straight. The world that we knew is gone.”