TEMPEST OF TENNESSEE
Episode Three
By
Terry McDonald
TEMPEST OF TENNESSEE
By
Terry McDonald
Copyright, April 20, 2018. All rights reserved domestic and international.
TEMPEST OF TENNESSEE
Episode Three.
It turned out there wasn’t the slightest objection to me riding out with them. In fact, my slot was to lead the convoy in my Four-wheeler with Annette riding shotgun.
It was a slim convoy. Second in line was Vikas alone at the wheel of a pickup, behind him, another pickup with Abbey driving and Jeffry riding shotgun.
Our first destination was the National Guard Armory in Henderson. To get to the town we used the same stretch of road that led to the plague ruined community. Along the way, we passed by Missus Smelts house and by the house where the old man and I had spoken. Neither was visible and I didn’t stop the convoy to check on them.
We stopped at the community’s barricade of hay bales. I picked a spot to the left of where I’d shot the plague dying man and had Vikas use his pickup to shove an opening.
A wake of buzzards on the other side of the bales lifted wing. Passing through the opening, temporally following behind Vikas as he went to the far side of the community to repeat making an opening, I tried not to see what the scavengers had done to the body of the man I’d shot. My eyes betrayed me. I did glance. His ripped and rotting flesh made me gag. Beside me, Annette echoed the sound.
Going by the close-spaced homes, I knew that four-fifty-four and four-sixty had food secreted in a false wall at the back of their garages, but didn’t call attention to them. I feared that not enough time had passed to render the plague agent non-viable.
It took less than an hour to reach the four-lane highway, and minutes from that point to where we could access Henderson’s Main Street. The Armory was located past the school. We also passed by the service station where I witnessed the boy eating human flesh from a corpse.
The Armory was located directly on Main Street on the right side of the road. Turning into the drive, I drove through the open gates, along the side of the building that served a dual purpose as a gymnasium and as a warehouse for the condiments that were handed out three of four times per year.
Several times as punishment for my behavior at school, they sent me to help hand out food, not only there, but also at the only other place that the poor could get food. Twice a month a religious group passed out a couple bags of old, ‘sometimes too old’, fruits and vegetables.
I don’t know how it worked in other counties, but Chester County was the pits for the poor, two boxes of canned and dry goods less than half a dozen times a year, and two bags of half-rotten fruit and veggies twice a month. Working as a conscript for the system it was horrible to witness the eager need of the poor who showed up for the meager handouts.
Anyway, at the back was the entrance that gave access to the food. The building was concrete block with a heavy-duty steel door and a solidly locked roll-up delivery entrance.
Exiting our vehicles, Vikas, with Jeffry limping with him went to check the doors. Returning to where Abby, Annette and I waited, Jeffry said, “Maybe we should’ve brought the ANFO. The roll-up might give to a good ramming by one of the pickups.”
I pointed to the pickups, “Make a choice.”
Vikas said, “Due to the leg of Jeffry, I will be the rammer. There is not the room between the door and the fence, but I will mash the gas hard.”
Abby laughed, “Hold up, hold up. You do know the airbag will deploy. Sometimes they can hurt the driver.”
Jeffry added, “I was only kidding about ramming it. I’m not sure the truck can gain enough speed to force it.”
Annette pointed west. “We passed by the County Works a short way back. I saw heavy equipment there. They may have something with forklift blades.”
Jeffry said, “A dozer would do the trick as well.”
She asked, “Do you know how to drive heavy equipment?”
Jeffry nodded, “Oh yeah, I can operate heavy equipment. I can drive anything that has a motor and a steering wheel.”
I said, “Annette, stay here and guard.” Nodding to my four-wheeler, I said to Jeffry, “Let’s see what we can get cranked.”
Driving onto the property of the works, we saw several pieces of equipment parked at random on the property. Making Annette a prophet, there was a small dozer with lift blades. I stopped beside it and to save Jeffry the walk, checked it for keys and found they weren’t in the ignition.
Standing at the door to a combination office and warehouse, while using a pry bar from the four-wheeler’s toolbox to force it, Jeffry said, “If it’ll crank, we’ll use the Bob-Cat with the blades. If not, we’ll use the dozer with the frontend loader.
The labeled keys were hanging from hooks on a framed square of wall-mounted pegboard. I pointed to a door on the far wall that led to the warehouse area. “Let’s see what’s in there.”
In there was a plethora of tools and equipment. Saying, “Whoa, we struck gold,” Jeffry immediately limped to a trailer-mounted machine on the left wall and began examining it.
“This is a diesel driven ten-thousand-watt generator. Okay, let me run this by you… all depending on what we can get to crank. I want this. I want the Bob-Cat,” and then pointing further down the wall on the opposite side, “and let’s figure a way to take those?”
‘Those’ were three huge pull-behind solar units. “That’s a lot of very heavy stuff.” I said. “How can we do it?”
“There are several dump trucks on the lot and trailers for hauling heavy equipment. I say we see how many dumps we can get to run. Hook trailers to them and haul everything back to the ranch.”
Shaking my head, I said, “What about our vehicles?”
Jeffry smiled, “That’s the beauty of it. If we can get four dumps to crank, we can haul the trucks, your ATV and the equipment. Even though they’re all older models, I guarantee you we’ll find the dumps have automatic transmissions.”
His excitement infected me. “Yeah, let’s see what we can do. Finding a generator here saves us a trip to Selmer.”
Pointing to an identical machine beside the one we were at, he said, “Two generators. We’ll want both.”
We ended up having to locate a set of jumper cables, but we did get four dump trucks to run. All but one had ample fuel, but there was a fuel tank on the property that was able to be hand-pumped.
Knowing the possible had become fact, with Jeffry following with the tracked Bob Cat, we went back to the Armory. Climbing from the four-wheeler, Annette greeted me with, “You were gone over two hours. We were about to come look for you two.”
“You sent us to equipment heaven. We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us.”
Jeffry and I described what we’d found and revealed his plan.
Abby said, “Wow, we’d better get this place open and get to loading. “ Lord, I hope there’s food in here.”
Jeffry drove the Bob Cat to the roll up door, lowered the blades and aligned them with the bottom. Gunning the engine, he drove the blades under, applied lift and with a loud tearing of metal, sheered the locking stays. He continued lifting the door high enough for us to drive in with our trucks.
He lowered the forks and drove into the warehouse. On foot, the rest of us followed him into the dimly lit space.
Jeffry stopped the Bob Cat and activated the headlamps of the small dozer. Its illumination revealed a huge number of food-laden pallets. He climbed from the vehicle and joined where we grouped nearby. I was
telling them about the equipment we’d discovered. He waited until I finished and then he said, “It was my thought to load the pickups and drive them over to the County Works, but what do you all think about going for the dump trucks? I can use the lift to load pallets onto them.”
Annette said, “That’ll sure beat loading them by hand onto the pickups.”
We left my four-wheeler at the Armory, drove pickups over to the County Works and exchanged them for four dump trucks. Back at the Armory, Jeffry in the lead drove his dump into the warehouse.
Due to fumes, we couldn’t leave the truck running, and because we weren’t sure how much charge the battery held, we were leery of leaving the truck’s lights on. Jeffry remounted the dozer. With us using flashlights to point out pallets we wanted loaded, the space, illuminated by the swooping headlamps of the moving dozer, took on a surrealistic aspect.
Because of all the noise we’d made driving the trucks over, fearful that we may have alerted a “Hostile element,” as Jeffry called it, Abby was outside the building standing guard.
The height limit of the lift prevented Jeffry from double stacking the pallets. For that first load, we concentrated on canned meat products, pork, chicken and tuna fish. Using the blades of the lift against the wood at the bottom of the pallets to push previously loaded pallets further back, he able to shove them to the rear. Even so, with two rows, six pallets was the limit.
On subsequent trucks went more meat products, canned vegetables and dry goods. As Jeffry drove out with the last truck, Annette pointed to the remaining food and said, “Christ, twenty-four pallets and we barely made a dent in what’s here.”
Vikas agreed, “It is here to which we must return many times.”
Walking toward the roll up door to leave the building, we heard Jeffry shout, “Halt! Stop right there!”
Unslinging my rifle, I ran for the exit with Annette and Vikas close behind. The bright sunlight blinded me. Shielding my eyes, turning to look in the direction on which Jeffry focused I saw a young man standing alone about thirty feet away. He was unarmed.
“What do you want here?” Jeffry demanded.
I could tell that Jeffry’s attitude frightened the man. “Nothing, sir, I was just curious. You’re the most people I’ve seen alive at one time.”
I stepped closer to Jeffry and whispered, “Lower your rifle.”
Jeffry gave me a hard look, but complied with my request. Of the man I asked, “Are there many survivors here in Henderson.”
“Only a few.”
“Can you give me a guess?”
“I don’t know… ten, maybe a few more.”
“Are there any who might present a danger to us?” Jeffry asked.
“There’s one crazy old man who shoots at anyone he sees, but he either a bad shot, or he misses on purpose.”
To me the man didn’t seem to present any danger. He stood straight and looked directly at whom he spoke. Most people with bad intentions have tells, shifty eyes, guarded stance and such. “Are you alone?” I asked.
“No, we hunkered down and lived off our preps until the worst was over. Preps ran out a couple of weeks ago.”
“Who is ‘we’,” I asked.”
He grew tired of the questions. “Look, I’m sorry I disturbed you. I don’t know your agenda here and it’s none of my business. I’m leaving.”
He turned to go, but I called, “Are you happy here?”
He turned back and I saw anger. “Are you retarded? This place is an open graveyard, bodies everywhere. What the hell is there to be happy about?”
Annette said, “Happy was a poor choice of words, but she’s asking if you’re comfortable staying here in the city.”
“There’s food here and everything else.”
“You’re not worried about catching the plague?” I asked.
“No, not any longer. That crazy man I told you about, he touches the dead. I’ve seen him doing it ever since I started going out to scavenge.”
“Have you touched any?” I asked.
Impatient with me, he said, “Girl, what’s with the questions? Mind your own business.”
“I’m just trying to figure out if you’re the sort of person we’d like around us back at the ranch we’re preparing for long term survival, but hey, if you’ve got something more important to—.”
That got his attention. “Say what?”
“Say nothing else until we know if you’ve had contact with any of the dead.”
“Okay, no I have not touched any of the dead. I don’t go into the stores or other places where the bodies are, but other survivors do and none of them seem to have caught it.”
I turned to Jeffry. “We need more people, here’s a candidate. Do we take a chance?”
Annette supplied, “From what he’s implying, the plague’s run its course here. That may not hold true in larger cities, but it seems it exhausted its supply of vectors in this town.”
Jeffry didn’t make a decision. “I don’t know.”
I took him literally, and made the decision, ignored his gasp when I called, “Come on over so we don’t need to shout.”
In a low voice, Jeffry said, “I don’t think that’s wise?”
Shaking my head, I whispered, “You had a chance to speak up.”
The man crossed the short distance to us. Jeffry took several steps back to widen the distance from him, calling for Abby as he did.
Abby nodded in his direction to acknowledge she’d heard him but remained with the rest of us.
I turned to the man. “Stop there and let us look at you.” To the others, I asked, “Do any of you see anything to suggest he’s infected?”
“Looks fine to me,” Annette said.
“My wife thinks so,” he quipped.
Abby chuckled, “He’s well enough to have a sense of humor.”
From Vikas, “His eyes are bright with no sickness.”
I reached out my hand. “You’re married, huh? My name is Tempest.”
He was late taking my hand because he’d just recognized what we’d loaded onto the dump trucks.”
Taking my hand, he said, “Powell, David Powell. That’s a lot of food on your trucks. Did you leave any?”
Annette extended her hand. “Plenty left. My name’s Annette.”
“Glad to meet you. Then he answered my question. “Yes, I’m married. We have three children. One’s an infant, nine months.”
“How old are you? Abbey asked.
“I’m twenty-one.”
Abby snorted, “Twenty-one and you already have three kids. How many do you think you’ll have by the time you’re thirty?”
“Only four… that was our plan, four quick children and then I’d have a vasectomy.”
With a smile, Abby said, “I beg your pardon. What a great plan.”
I noticed Jeffry had sidled back to join us. Tired of the small talk, I said, “Here’s the deal. We’re prepping a large ranch for long-term survival. We’ll need more people to make it a go.”
Jeffry said, “Hey, don’t you think that’s a proposition that should be discussed with Jules and Maggie? Besides, yes, we need more people, but he’s bringing with him a baby, and judging by his age, the other two are toddlers. That’s three unproductive—.”
Jeffry was beginning to piss me off. “You’ll be smart not to finish that sentence.”
I could tell he didn’t like me fronting up on him. In a sharp tone, he began, “I’m only saying—.”
Abby spoke in a sharper, angrier tone. “Enough, Jeffry… take Tempest’s advice before you put your foot deeper.”
Red faced, Jeffry said, “Okay, I’m out of it.”
David said, “I appreciate your invitation, but I’d rather not be where I’m not welcome.”
Abby said, “You and your family will be welcomed. Jeffry was speaking for himself, not the majority.”
While my respect for Jeffry had depreciated, Abby had gained. Marine for a husband, yeah, was she afraid of him, no
. I didn’t know if it was a true change of heart, or fear of being in the doghouse, but Jeffry said. “Of course he and his family will be welcome. I was only—.”
Again, he couldn’t finish his sentence. Abby said, “Good, great. So David, what do you think?”
“Deborah and I have spoken of moving to a farm. She claims that in the end, eating only canned goods will kill us. Do you have a milk cow?”
Abby agreed, “She’s correct. Slowly but surely your health would fade. We don’t have a milk cow, but that’s on our near-term agenda.”
“I’ll need to talk to her about this.”
“Abbey said, “As you should.”
I stepped into the talk. “We’re going over to the County Works to load a bunch of equipment. We’ll be there a couple of hours, maybe longer. If that’s too short of a time, we’ll be back tomorrow morning for another load.”
David said, “If we decide to join you, we’ll be here tomorrow morning.” He pointed to the warehouse opening. “Did you notice any infant formula in there?”
Annette said, “No, but there’s plenty of canned and powdered milk. You’ll find cereal as well.”
David said, “Thanks. If you don’t mind, I’m going in. I’ve already been gone longer than I told Deb I would.”
************
At the County Works, as soon as we left our trucks, Abby led Jeffry well away from us and though we couldn’t hear their conversation, their stance suggested he was the recipient of a severe dressing-down.
It took us longer than I thought it would to attach the trailers to the dump trucks and load onto them our vehicles along with everything else that would fit. One reason it took so long is that we loaded the pickups with yard tools and small gas equipment, weed eaters, chainsaws and such.
Leaving, I drove the lead truck with Annette riding in the back perched on a pallet as a guard. Because of the large trailers mounted behind every truck, and including the spacing between the vehicles, our convoy was hundreds of feet long.
We arrived back at the ranch and hurried to detach the trailers to beat the setting sun. The trailers we detached near the barn so we could off load the equipment on them. All of the dump trucks we parked he near the house to facilitate off-loading the pallets into the detached two-car garage.
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