Shadows Of Sanity And Survival (Old Preppers Die Hard Book 3)

by Ron Foster

  “Why don’t you come up and meet me in the middle, leave your crew back there.” Farley hollered.

  “All right.” The man said and conferred with the group for a moment before heading in Farley’s direction.

  Farley did the same, conferring with the nothing of his ghost column as he turned around and made several gestures to nonexistent and unseen folks and carried on his way to talk to the man.

  Farley kept his shotgun pointed at the ground in a low slung one handed fashion with a big grin on his face and said “Well howdy, would ‘hello neighbor’ work?” as his disarming statement made the other gentleman laugh.

  “Works for me! If you want to call us standing out in the middle of the road together talking being some kind of neighbors.” The old grizzled haired Sarge called back.

  “Farley Wilkes.” Farley said extending his hand for a handshake.

  “George Banks.” The man returned.

  “What brings you out on this country stroll?” Farley asked.

  “This ain`t no stroll, we are hard pressed to have even hiked this far. We have been marching down this road a few days and we’re out of gas.” Banks said looking over Farley’s shoulder and trying to catch a glimpse at the non-existent backup he couldn’t see.

  “Yeah, we all got those problems, I been out of gas for months. Can’t help you on that one, but it’s nice to see somebody smiling today!” Farley said disarmingly and doing the ‘how quick can you get to your pistol size up’ of the man in front of him who was shifting around nervously.

  “We were vehicle caravanning down this way from Huntsville way until we finally ran out of fuel and now you see us on the hoofs just dragging along. I know generally speaking where we’re at but can you tell me a bit closer as to just where we actually are at?” Banks questioned.

  “Depends what or where you want to get closer to? What are you looking for?” Farley asked then saw movement in the column in the back of the man and said “They are going to be nice and not froggy aren’t they?” and then stared hard at the man.

  “They’ll be as nice as your people care to be. Like I said, we’re having to walk now, seen a lot of things that ain`t healthy on this road. We’re hopefully headed to some lake cabins; they are not supposed to be too far up the road.” Banks said sternly.

  “Lots of lake cabins down that way, lots of cabins around for seven hundred fifty miles on the shores of this lake. Which ones you are going to I don’t know, might not want to know, but the closest ones to here are probably about four miles In back of you. The next lot that’s on the shore is about 6 miles in the direction you’re heading; there is a small engine repair place down that way if it helps you to know that. I’m just out here hunting with my group today. This terrain is not too familiar with me when I’m using the woods as a compass versus this highway so I can’t help you out on directions too much.” Farley said.

  “You mind if we just pass on through? We aren’t out hunting that is unless there’s an opportunity that presents themselves. Sounds like we are about 10 miles from where we want to be.” Banks said after conferring momentarily to a man with in his group more familiar with the area. Farley eyed him warily but the man was respectful and you might say pretty much very friendly regardless of the mutual shared nervousness of this chance encounter.

  “Oh we don’t mind a bit, most travelers are down on their luck bums just like us now. We don’t have any claims on this stretch of road. Let me warn you all about something though, there’s some crazy hunters back in them woods off to the left a few miles back but since you’re an armed party I don’t think you’ll have too much trouble with them goomers but ya’ll be cautious. Good luck to you all and watch out for them bad souls I warned you about. No sense troubling trouble if you can avoid it. You can proceed on by us no problem, no worries.” Farley said and shook the man’s hand with a sense of camaraderie about it all and said he hoped to see him again.

  “Good deal! So we all right, everything’s ok? I mean about us passing straight on through by your folks?” Banks said still studying the invisible area in back of Farley behind the small hill.

  “Not a problem and the road should be open for you. I got to cut off just over here myself now.” Farley said pointing and indicating the well traveled game trail off to the left of the road just a bit in back of the group’s leader that he just saw. “As far as my party goes, as long as they don’t hear gunshots or me hollering they are going to leave you unmolested and take the back trail around. They should of already started moving up so don’t shoot anyone in the brush. We were just about to turn off from this road when you started approaching, gave us quite a surprise I must say.” Farley said carrying on his usual Farley bullshit when he got into a sticky problem of doing what he called his shucking and jiving.

  Banks looked around and then studied Farley for any subterfuge or lying ways, he then told Farley how nice it was to see a somewhat friendly face these days and asked him further about what conditions were around the lake the way any other survivor that made it this far would.

  “Not so bad, not so good neither. You know there’s no food to be had anywhere and there are way too many hunters out shooting up the woods these days. Game of any kind is kind of scarce in most places. Fishing has gotten surprisingly better these days for some reason if that’s any consolation to ya. Lake’s about five miles off to the left. But like I said, I would try to make me about five or ten miles to the next turn offs in order to avoid the rowdies if you know what I mean.” Farley said pretending to look over his shoulder at the nonexistent people that might now be watching and hiding in the woods or moving off down another trail.

  “We’re all past due for a break now if ya’ll want to come over and have a little coffee with us. Got no food to share with you but we’d be happy to share our coffee.” Banks said still studying Farley’s who ‘don’t give a shit’ attitude is” was wearing thin on him. In his opinion, anybody that didn’t give a shit about meeting an armed group had something to hide or was up to something and Farley was looking awfully scruffy and worn out to be any kind of a regular scout but who could tell these days.

  “Thanks buddy but we are just moving on. We are heading towards the spillway over by the power station.” Farley said just picking a distant point to say he was going to.

  They said their farewells and Farley with great relief headed off into the woods and away from the highway to have himself some lunch.

  “Luck is a very thin wire between survival and disaster, and not many people can keep their balance on it.”

  Hunter S. Thompson

  7

  SILVER FIRE SAVIOR

  Farley dug around in what he called his traveling kit and took out his Silver Fire Scout ultimate stove and got ready to fix his dinner. This was one of his favorite survival trekking tools. It was worth every few ounces it took up in his backpack and made the job of heating food or purifying water immensely easier.

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  The chore of setting up a traditional cook fire, even a tiny one is often arduous. Because the compact stove is so fuel efficient you can utilize any kind of biomass fuel such as twigs and dried pine cones. It is a lot easier to just be able to bust up some small branches and cook your dinner with a few twigs in smokeless efficiency rather than trying to build a traditional camp fire and then letting it burn down to coals etc and then starting the process of trying to feed the flames more wood and control it for cooking. Farley could get on and off the trail quickly and effortlessly utilizing it while leaving very little evidence to mark his passing. Everything was there to make his life easier in one compact unit with room for him to add
a few small survival supplies to.

  The all stainless steel construction of his rig was rugged and the well designed nesting unit is the perfect size to stuff in a backpack pocket.

  Farley was lucky; he had himself a can of chili con carne and some tortillas he hade made up with flour and stuck in his pack for himself. His meal took but moments to get hot and he wolfed it down ravenously.

  He felt better after having eaten and packed up his gear as soon as his stove cooled down.

  “Well onwards and upwards, time to hit the road once more.” Farley thought to himself and trudged wearily back to the county highway and resumed his trek. He wished he knew some way to go through the woods to get home but he was lost enough already. Walking on the side of the road these days could be dangerous, speaking of which I hear something coming!

  Farley got close to the edge of the road but not out of sight and waited for whatever he was hearing approach.

  He strained his eyes to make out what it was and was rewarded with the sight of Dump hauling ass down the road on his motorcycle.

  Farley rushed back to the road and waved him down. He was totally exuberant and couldn’t quit grinning at his luck to have Dump Truck run across him like this.

  “What cha doing in these parts of the woods?” Dump asked as soon as he shut his Harley down and took his helmet off.

  “Long story, very long story. I need a ride back to camp. Damn buddy good to see you! You don’t know how lucky it is we bumped into each other.” Farley said just wanting to get off the road and home.

  “Sure buddy, no problem, jump on.” Dump advised.

  “Man I was afraid I wouldn’t make it back in time to go to that meeting with you. We got a lot to talk over and do before Friday. Come on time you know where I live at.” Farley said and they headed back towards the resort.

  Resilience is all about being able to overcome the unexpected. Sustainability is about survival. The goal of resilience is to thrive.

  Jamais Cascio

  8

  A MEETING OF THE MINDS

  “So how many people exactly did you end up deciding that you wanted to bring with us to the meeting with the churches?”” Dump asked as Farley gathered his goods up.

  “I figure since its sort of a gathering of all the clans as it were, that we would bring counting me, 9 people. That’s more than a big enough showing of manpower from us as a representation and is also a manageable size force for us to field if we run into any trouble coming or going to the meet.” Farley declared.

  “So what’s the deal with the meeting place? I know of that old out of the way church you mentioned that they want to meet at. I had thought it was pretty much abandoned or sitting empty all these years.” Dump stated referring to an old white clapboard affair that had probably had served a small community for a 100 years before eventually disinterest or lack of a fulltime preacher had let it fall into disuse except for on certain occasions with long time residents.

  “That’s the place where the churches all could agree upon and so it was decided to gather there. Some folks in the county called it common finding ground and its distant from where any fighting or raiding has been going on so its figured to be pretty safe and away from prying eyes or ears. They are saying one of the rules for the meeting is no carrying guns into the church, but knives are allowed inside. That notion of disarming isn’t flying too well with folks so we see when we get there. I don’t like the thought of getting disarmed these days either. I don’t care if it’s only for a little bit even if people say it’s the respectful and Christian right thing to do. The way I feel about it is that I am not going to church to attend a service. What I am doing here is going to a war meeting or community defense rally of sorts and as far as I am concerned a devil may well be lurking outside the doors of that church that needs shooting and I just soon keep my weapons near at hand.” Farley said hotly not relishing the notion of giving up his gun for any reason.

  Oh they had plenty of scouts and militia on the outside to guard the meeting and your groups personal lieutenants were welcome to join that force or just hang out side the church as an armed rabble if they wanted to. However who ever was speaking for the group inside the church was to be armed with nothing more than their knives they normally carried.

  Farley was threatening to wear his big old Cold Steel Gladius Machete to the meeting. You didn’t see him with it often but it was handy for chopping sugar cane, clearing a honeysuckle vine patch etc and he just loved fooling around with it in general

  “Go ahead and wear it if you want to! Why not? I got the biggest Bowie blade I could find to wear. You probably won’t be the only one that might be thinking of wearing a sword to the meeting. I will hold your gun for you outside if need be but I would rather be inside listening to what goes on..” Dump said regarding Farley.

  “Hell I would much rather have your big heathen self in there also, you speak for the majority of our little force although the other folks going to be present have no idea how big or small of a group we actually are.” Farley declared.

  “I plan on keeping it that way too. I told the Lazarus boys just to stick to themselves and don’t talk to strangers much. Did you tell Becky the same? That girl worries me sometimes.” Dump said gravely.

  “Yea I told her, then I told her some more. She has her instructions all laid out and I stressed to her no talking to the preacher’s much as one of the most important rules to observe. I sure wish you could have come up with a couple more females for us to bring along to this discussion as part of our makeup but it is what is.” Farley said referring to what he called his war parties organization.

  He had six strong men with him plus Becky and two sixteen year old boys with their old retired Marine uncle playing patriarch to that clan attending. They carried 3 shotguns, 9 plus pistols visible, 2 lever action 30-30 rifles, a scoped 270 deer rifle, two AR 15s and an AK47 model plus his scoped 9mm carbine as their defensive armaments. Nice show of force.

  Not a bad showing at all standing by him to represent his little lake tribe. No sir`eee! They looked very capable and resolved, as well as mean and dangerous if need be. The mix of people they had chosen for their delegation spoke volumes as to what they wanted to represent and what other bands of folks might think of them as a force. Farley and Charlie had a long talk about just because we were all talking about forming a militia together now didn’t mean there might not be spies present or everyone stay friendly afterwards.

  Farley had considered for awhile that they should look like a couple generations of tight knit lake dwellers. You know the kind; they live miles from the lake but spend a lot of their time at it. Country folks, lucky enough a couple generations ago to have had a dam built somewhere close by to their small acreage and ended up a few miles from the waterfront in forested land. He had gone in for the mix of ages and backgrounds of everybody to appear more diverse than they were in governance and defense. Anyway he applied some SWATS" (Scientific Wild Ass Theories) to the initial impression the group would make and meet some folks doing the same. Hopefully it wouldn’t turn into a rooster show and maybe since it was being held in a church everyone would keep their grudges to themselves until the got back home.

  There was bound to be some kind of friction going on between the various groups competing for food and other resources in limited terrains. Farley hoped like hell that he wouldn’t have the bad luck to run into anyone that specifically had it in for him at the meeting. Hell for that matter there still was the fact he might be maybe recognized or suspected of a past misdeed that he may or may not have committed. He was sure he might have shared some smoke and lead with somebody present, he had fired some rounds in self defense or anger several times over the last 6 months. Whether he was accountable for somebody not being present remained to be seen.

  Reverend Jim eventually wandered over with his little band of what Farley snidely referred too as his “merry men” because they always seemed to be smiling and agreeing with the pas
tor about everything. That they wore suits and ties in their personal opinion that meant that they took their job seriously and wanted to be identified as such.

  Yup! Farley had to go and ask about that right off, wasn’t often he saw a starched white shirt and got curious about how those boys were managing to keep up appearances so well. Dang every time he saw them over the last few months they had themselves a fresh shirt and a crisp crease in their pants.

  The men proudly said their wives did that bit of laundry and ironing for them. Farley laughed politely with them when they bragged about using a gas powered electric generator to run the clothing irons off of while the whole time wondering what kind of idiots had he teamed up with?

  “Hell it was their gas and maybe they had a lot more than Farley had thought might be available. No, he found out they were limited on times run but had gotten their daily routine of running a generator to charge some batteries down pat.

  “There is no way that they running steam irons on batteries, I got to ask them what exactly they are doing. Sounds interesting.” Farley mused before listening intently to the group.