No Normal Day II (Unity)

by Richardson, J.

  “No”, the man quickly said. “I thought if I could find out some more about you, I could win some points with my brother.” Lee got down in the man's dirty face, “Well, I want to know more about your group. How many of you live out there?”

  The man scratched his head, “Dunno, twenty...maybe a few more or less. My brother brings in some, once in a while. Mainly, girls.” He gave a sick grin. “They don't always want to be with us but usually when they get hungry enough or tired of getting whuppins', they decide to settle in with us.” He paused, then mumbled, “Course, that little bitch he got a couple of weeks ago. She ain't done nothin' but scream and cry. I wish he'd get rid o' her.” Jack's stomach drew up in a tight knot. He grabbed a handful of the guys hair and jerked his head back. “Are you saying that your brother is kidnapping girls and keeping them prisoner? Where did he find a young girl on her own?” The man was squirming around. Jack said, through clenched teeth, “you better start telling me something or I am going to pull your head right off of your neck.” The other guys were silent, observing an anger in Jack that they had not observed before. The guy was sputtering and spit was running down his chin, “Alright...al-lright, let go of me, man.”

  Jack released him but stood right over him. Temper was something that Jack had worked hard to learn to control. In his years, he had more than one lesson on this. Time and age had taught him, even when you were right, losing your temper usually made you wrong. The guy said, “I think he found her not very far down the main road. There is a group of folks down there, they are pretty protected. I don't know how many of them are there. This girl was wandering around, away from their secured area. They haven't come lookin' for her, they probably don't know what happened to her.” Jack was fuming, those lessons faded into a fiery haze. He rammed his rifle butt down into the guys foot. The guy howled in pain. Lee put his hand on Jack's shoulder. “Jack, we need to get some more info out of him. Back off a bit.”

  Jack stepped away. The guy watched him like he was the devil in person. Lee said, “What kind of arms does your group have? Guns, how many? Do you have ammo?”

  The guy rubbed his foot and his eyes watered. “I don't know, a bunch I guess. There's a room in the main house with guns and ammunition. Not everyone knows how to use them. I ain't very good, my brother and maybe six others are real good with the gun stuff.”

  Lee said, “This is what you are going to do, A—hole. You are going back to your group. You tell them that you accidentally found our compound and we caught you. Tell your group that there are lots of us here and we have plenty of fire power. You can tell your brother that we knew your group was there, because I discovered it when I was hunting. Tell him, we know the girl's people and figured out she was probably taken by your group. If he doesn't let her go by tomorrow afternoon we will join her people and come to get her. You got it? We will come to get the girl and we won't be in a friendly mood.” The guy nodded that he understood. One of the guys opened the garage door. Lee kicked the man in the butt, booting him out. They watched him limp away.

  Jack had calmed himself down and he said, “Tomorrow morning, we will go to the survivors group down south. The ones that we have already met. Frankly, I don't care if it is one of their girls missing or not. Those vermin, that guy's brother, have a young girl, maybe others. Either with their help or without, we are going to do something about this. Beth was right. We have to establish some sort of law in our vicinity or we will be run over with the bad guys. We gave the guy an ultimatum message to take back. Unfortunately, that will not give us a lot of time to make a strong plan.”

  Jason said, “If the girl gets returned tomorrow, we will have some more time to work out our strategy. Hopefully, we will be able to join with the group and form an alliance. There is also, Joel, back behind our neighborhood. He is still surviving with his wife. We do need a militia and we need to know where we stand, as far as weapons. I think that the other group also had an old pickup truck that was running.

  “I agree,” said Jack, “Long term, there is going to have to be a plan for security that reaches beyond just this compound. I am telling you, first thing that is going to happen, those low lifes are leaving this area. Dead or alive, doesn't matter to me.”

  It was agreed.

  ***

  The rest of the family had been caught up on the information from the previous night's intruder. By daybreak, Jack, Lee, Jason and Eric were on their way to try and make contact with the other survivors group. They had found out about the group, through Jack and Beth's long time old friends. The old friends were surviving in a location, nearly twenty miles from them. But, they had told Jack, there was a group of their former church members, who had a compound only about three miles from where Jack's family was gathered. The War Wagon rolled up to the tall chain link fence gates. The fencing and gates enclosed several church buildings and surrounding grounds. Two armed men approached the gate.

  Jack stepped out, and said, “Hey, I am Jack and these are my son-in-laws. Remember us...we did some trading with you, a few weeks ago. We have something real important to discuss with you. Can we come in?”

  The two men exchanged a quick look, “are you armed?”

  “Yes,” said Jack.

  The gates were unchained and the wagon eased inside the church compound. The two men secured the gates and motioned for Jack and the men to follow them. They entered the smallest of the buildings. The room had folding chairs leaning up against the walls, a table, and a couple of padded chairs sat at one end. The two men spoke to a man, pacing the tile floor. “You remember Jack, sir? He needs to speak with you.” The tall thin man, with gray hair and beard, reached to shake Jack's hand. Jack said, “It is nice to see you again. We discovered some pretty disturbing information, last evening. Would you like to gather anymore of your people to hear this?”

  The man responded, “yes, just give me a few minutes.” In less than twenty minutes, there were about two dozen men and women gathered in the room. They flipped open chairs and sat in a semi-circle. The tall man spoke. “This is Jack and his son-in-laws. They have an encampment about three miles north. We can trust these men. They were sent to us by other church members. They have some information they want to share with us.”

  Jack stood up to talk to the group. The door opened and an older man, a woman by his side, stepped inside. He and Jack locked eyes and the two moved to Jack and were enclosed in a hug. Tears ran down the woman's cheeks. Jack was patting the man on the back, “Michael, we heard that you made it to your farm.”

  The man said, “We did. We stayed there over three weeks. We had some patchy radio contact. The kids made it this far and were afraid to go any further.” He put his arm around his wife's shoulder. She said, “We had to be with them. We loaded up everything that we could and made our way back here. Jack, what about Beth and your family?” Eric and Jason stepped up and shook their hands.

  Jack said, “They are fine, we are at the house.” He looked at Lee, “This is my new son-in-law, Lee. He is Lynn's husband. I am so glad to see you two. Right now, I really have to talk to everyone here.” The wife hugged him again and they pulled up some chairs.

  Jack began, “Last night, a man was lurking around our compound. We caught him and pulled him inside for some questioning. My son-in-law Lee recognized the guy. A while back he was on a morning hunting trip, he spotted the man and a girl and overheard some conversation between them. They obviously are living with a group of unknown numbers, in the nice housing development that is behind the woods near our compound.”

  One of the men spoke up, “Our home was in that development.”

  Jack said, “Well, here's the thing. This guy said that his brother is holding some young girls there, against their will. There is one girl that has only been there about two weeks. Do you have....”

  There was a moaning and a woman said “Oh, no-o, oh god...it must be our daughter. We didn't know what happened to her. We didn't know there were any people back in our neigh
borhood.” She gave her husband a tortured look, “She kept wanting that blasted music player! She must have tried to go home.” She was openly sobbing now.

  Jack said, “I am so sorry. I am sure she is alive, though. We sent that scum back to his group with an ultimatum. If your daughter is not returned by this afternoon, we promised to come for her. If she is returned it would give us some time to organize. No matter what you folks decide to do, some of my family are going to clean out that snake pit.

  Jack's friend Michael said, “what do you think we are up against, Jack?”

  He answered, “We think there are about twenty plus in the group. Only about six or seven that are really familiar with firearms, they do have guns and we are not certain how many. Survivors like that group are not self sufficient. They are staying alive by preying on others. We also heard a rumor of a bad gang that is dominating the northern part of the city. We are not sure of their numbers, maybe as many as a hundred. They are likely growing. At this time, there is a whole large city between us and them. We need to accept the probability that they will eventually plunder their way through the city and keep expanding their search for survivors and necessities.

  Either one of our groups alone will be very vulnerable. If we unite and use our combined resources, we might have a chance to keep our area safe. We need to establish some boundaries and some form of law in those boundaries. We know one more man and his wife, near us. They are surviving. He has guns and ammo and I believe he would join us.

  There was a buzz of conversation among the church members group. The tall thin man, who was apparently recognized as their leader, let them discuss things for a few minutes. Michael and his wife came to stand by Jack and his son-in-laws. The leader spoke with a calm voice, “Everyone, quiet down, now.” The noise stopped. “You have heard what trouble could be threatening us. I believe that the offer of Jack's family to join with us, for the safety of all, is the right thing to do. I personally vote to accept their offer.” Those who were not already standing, stood up. The leader took the hand of Michael's wife and she took the hand of Jack.

  Everyone else in the room slowly joined hands and Michael spoke, “I vote yes”. The vote traveled around the room.

  The leader said, “We are united and may god watch over us all.”

  Jack was not a very religious man but as he felt the strong hand of one his son-in-law's grip his own, his heart said, Amen.

  He spoke then, “We will have to do a lot of planning and organizing. Our immediate job is the girl. We will return to our compound. I know that Michael has a running vehicle. We will expect to hear from you by no later than 3:30, whether the girl has been released. If she is not home, then we will meet anyone willing to help at the road that leads to the development, at 4:00. We will be armed and ready to attempt her rescue.”

  “I am hoping that she will be released,” he continued. “If that is the case, I suggest that we all take tomorrow to evaluate each group's resources. We should inventory our weapons and ammunition. We need to have a count of all able bodied persons that can use a gun and help in the defense of our borders. We need to know what vehicles we have that are running or could be. Do you have any mechanics, do you have parts and fuel? I will contact Joel, the man near my compound. We could gather the day after tomorrow. You have a larger compound than ours so here would be fine, if that is agreeable. Once we begin to know our numbers and resources, we can plan some strategy for defense. Our first mission will still be the cleaning out of the group in the large development, it is believed that they have other captives. I would feel much better if we could do some planning and even some reconnaissance so that we would know what we are facing.”

  The leader shook Jack's hand and many others filed by and did the same. The room was filled with a somber but determined air. Jack and his “sons” left to return to the compound. They would tell the others the results of the meeting and wait.

  ***

  A small pair of bare feet, skint up and dirty, walked very gingerly towards the tall chain link gates. The teen girl was moving in a fog of weariness and pain. The armed man behind the gate squinted. The sun was in his eyes and he was trying to see who was approaching. He exclaimed, “holy s---!” and started unchaining the gate. The other guard ran out and scooped the girl up in his arms. He ran inside the church compound, carrying her and shouting out, “We've got her! We've got her!” The leader came to them and touched the girl's hair. The girls parents reached them at the same time, her father took her from the guard. Her mother was kissing the bruised cheeks and she laid her head against her father's chest.

  Michael spoke to the leader, “Thank god, she is here. I need to go and tell Jack, it is already 2:30. We will meet with Jack's family, day after tomorrow, right?”

  The parents, the leader and others standing around, looked at the battered girl. “Yes,” was the emphatic answer. He went to his vehicle, an older SUV, and the guards opened the gates for him to exit.

  A couple of the other men from the church compound accompanied Michael. Just a few minutes later, they were pulling up the steep driveway of Jack's family compound. He saw the boarded windows, Beth's new car sitting idle at the top of the drive, the barb wire coiled along the wooden privacy fence. He felt a twinge of sadness, remembering all the times that he and his wife had pulled up in the drive, arriving for drinks and a Bar-b-que. A fun evening with Jack, Beth and other good friends. He shook the thoughts from his mind. The big garage door lifted, Jack welcomed them in.

  Michael, quickly said, “The girl is home. She's not looking so great but she seems to be okay”

  Jack let his breath out with a soft whistle, “Thank god. We can take a little time to plan, now.”

  A pair of arms surrounded Michael's waist from behind, with a hug. “Hi there, old friend, “said Beth. “Jack told me he found you. I am so glad you are both good.” There was no time to wallow in the swamp of emotions that they all felt. There were some introductions. Beth said, “is there anything that you need?”

  “No,” said Michael, “You know we had been preparing at the church for a very long time.” He looked to Jack, “We need to get back now. We will all look forward to our meeting, day after tomorrow.” Jack nodded and they shook hands.

  Jack's anger still simmered around the edges, yet he was grateful that the girl was safe. When he went to deal with those low lifes that kidnapped her, he wanted to be well prepared. Later, he sat on the patio and his thoughts were racing. He decided that he would just relax for tonight. As the afternoon drifted away, Beth brought him a shot of bourbon. Some more of the venison was cooking for supper, one of his favorites. He got up and squatted down where Nicky, Brook and BJ were busy playing and said, “Who wants their ribs counted?” waggling his finger at them. There was an outburst of giggling. He didn't even remember the last time that he played with the grand babes. David and Shawna were climbing the ladder into one of the big tree platforms. Better not count on them being watchful. Various members of the family were scattered around, doing their work, they talked and laughed.

  Lynn caught his eye and sent him a smile from her pretty face. He saw Dianne push a dark strand of hair back as she stirred a pot. Trish, her hair pulled back in a ponytail, walked out to a water barrel and filled a bucket. Life played out behind these fences, he was going to do everything in his power to see that it continued.

  ***

  The next day, the whole family pitched in to get an accounting of what provisions they had that would be useful to a militia. They inventoried the guns and ammunition, they also had about ten large hunting type knives and a couple of baseball bats. You didn't want to be close enough for knives or bats but they were weapons. They knew that all of the residents of their compound, other than the three children were competent with the guns. That made eighteen of them, ranging in skills from basic to very proficient. Tate had some good input. He suggested that for a militia of any size, to be effective in protecting their borders, they were going to ne
ed more than just a couple of vehicles that were mobile. The family discussed all of the possibilities.

  Even though, they could not all leave and go to the meeting at the church compound, they would all contribute their ideas. It was agreed that Beth would go to the meeting because she should see her friend, Michael's wife. Kat would go along, in order to see if anyone in the church group had nursing or medical skills. Her husband Tate would attend, he would be able to give some of his ideas about acquiring some other vehicles and find out if there were any mechanics in the other group. Jason and Lee would go, to organize some plans, for recon on the group of kidnappers. It was agreed that Shawna was close to the age of the kidnapped girl and that she might make a connection with her. Jack was the assumed leader of their family and would be present. They had made contact with Joel and he was on board. He would come to the compound and ride along.

  The War Wagon, with it's eight representatives, pulled into the church compound about mid morning of the next day. They were welcomed into the small building. There was a long table set up. The leader and Michael and a couple of other men already sat at the table. Some of the other members of their church group had taken a seat in the folding chairs around the room. Beth immediately spotted Michael's wife. They embraced, sat and visited. Like Michael, they had a moment of sadness for the life that they had lost. However, these were women who knew how to be strong when they needed to. This was the now, this was the After world and they did not have time to dwell on things they once had.

  Kat asked some of the group about a nurse or someone with medical training. She was introduced to a nurse and a Veterinarian. They moved over to an area to have their own meeting. They would exchange info about the level of supplies and expertise that their group and Jack's family had to offer. Shawna asked Michael's wife if she could be taken to the young girl who had been returned. The two of them and Beth went to find the young girl.