Half Past Midnight

by Jeff Brackett

  The first officer never gave us a chance to open our mouths. “Sorry, folks, but Rejas can’t take in any more refugees. You’ll have to turn around.”

  “But we’re not refugees, Officer-” Amber began.

  The policeman cut her off. “I’m sure you aren’t, ma’am.” His tone said otherwise. It said he’d heard all the excuses and was tired of hearing them. “Whatever you call yourselves, you’ll have to turn around right now. Otherwise, my orders are real specific.”

  Ken shifted in his seat and reached for his back pocket. “Listen officer, we-”

  “HOLD IT!”

  Ken looked up to see the business end of a 9mm Glock aimed at his head. Eyes wide, he froze and swallowed, “I’m just going for my driver’s license, Officer. No need to be alarmed.” Then slowly, very slowly, he pulled out his wallet and shakily withdrew the driver’s license. “But you see, we live in Rejas.”

  The cop read the address on the license, then holstered his pistol. “Sorry ’bout that.” He didn’t sound very sincere. “We really do have a problem with refugees. I guess I should have given y’all a chance to explain, but we got so many people trying to talk their way through here that you just get tired of hearing all the excuses. Can I see the rest of y’all’s licenses?”

  We handed them over. He examined Amber’s and handed it back. Then, he looked at mine.

  “You don’t live here.” Either he was bored silly from this guard duty, or he was just having a really bad day, because the look he directed at me virtually oozed malice. I thought there was going to be trouble, but Amber piped up.

  “He’s family… my son-in-law. My daughter and grandchildren are back at the house. If it wasn’t for Leeland, we would all be dying a slow death right now.”

  “How’s that?”

  “He’s a survivalist. Knows how to build shelters, filters, everything we needed to make it through the last couple of weeks.”

  He eyed me for a moment longer, then turned back to Amber. “Long as you vouch for him, I’ll let him through.” Clearly he didn’t like the idea of letting an “outsider” into his town. Nevertheless, he returned my license.

  Since he was the first representative of the local police department I had seen, I figured he would be the one to ask about the problem we’d had on the way out here. “Who do I need to see to report an attempted hijacking?”

  “What?” He appeared startled.

  “My family and I were attacked on the way out here.”

  “When did that happen?”

  “D-day.” It was what we had all taken to calling June thirteenth while in the shelter. It was shorter than saying, “The day all the bombs started falling.”

  He knew immediately what I meant and obviously didn’t give a damn that my family and I had been attacked. “Ain’t nothin’ nobody can do about that now. Hell, that was a couple of weeks ago.” He barked out a laugh. “What the hell do you expect us to do now?”

  “Well, you might start by sending someone to bury the bodies,” I said facetiously. It gave me great satisfaction to see him sober so quickly.

  “Bodies? You mean y’all killed ’em?”

  “Only two of them,” I replied innocently. I saw an opportunity to pay him back for some of the crap he had just dished out.

  He finally appeared to be taking me seriously. “How many of ‘em was there?”

  “Five.”

  “So there’s still three of ‘em on the loose?”

  “Unless some of the others died from their wounds.”

  “Wounds?”

  This was getting fun. “Yeah. One had a broken knee and a hole in his left shoulder. Another one had a pretty nasty bump and cut on the front of his head.”

  “How ’bout the last one?” He took the bait.

  “Oh, he gave up before we hurt him.” I smiled innocently.

  “How many of you was there?”

  “Me, my wife, my sixteen-year-old daughter, and my nine-year-old son.” I saw the disbelief in his eyes. “Look, Officer, it’s a long story, and I don’t feel like telling it twice. So if you could just tell me who I need to report to, I’ll be on my way.”

  But he wasn’t about to be put off after my last comment. “You expect me to believe that you, your wife, daughter, and son killed two bandits, wounded two more, and another one just gave up so you wouldn’t hurt him? That sounds like bullshit to me, boy!”

  “Call it whatever you want,” I replied calmly. “Just tell me who to see in town, and I’ll take myself and my bullshit story out of here.”

  He paused, evidently trying to decide whether the importance of my story outweighed the importance of his teaching me a lesson in manners. “You best get a grip on that attitude of yours, boy, or I’ll have to adjust it for you.”

  I was tired, scared, and didn’t know when to leave well enough alone. “I don’t think you could adjust your ass with both hands, you stupid-”

  Amber grabbed my arm. “That’s enough, Leeland!” She turned to the cop. “I’m sorry, Officer. He was hurt in the fight with the hijackers.” She indicated the scabbed-over slice on my throat. It still looked worse than it felt, but for once I was glad of it.

  “Shee-it,” he drawled. “Hunh. Maybe it wasn’t all bullshit, after all.” He decided to ignore me completely and addressed Amber. “Okay, first thing y’all need to do is go to City Hall. The police station’s in the same building. You can make your report to the deputy on duty. Next, go to the titles and notary department and register your vehicle. They’ll give you a sticker to put on your windshield. You’ll also have to fill out a questionnaire. It’ll have a lot of questions about where you’re stayin’ and how many of you there are. What kind of skills you have. Stuff like that.”

  He pointed at me. “You make sure you list that survivalist shit. They might want to pick your brain a little. They’re still trying to figure out how many of us there are and what we’ve got to work with. So far, we’re pretty much cut off from anyone else. Phones are down, and radios don’t work any farther than a mile or two. Hell, if it wasn’t for all of these damned refugees tryin’ to get past us, I’d think we were the only ones left.”

  He signaled his partner, who climbed into one of the trucks and pulled it back far enough for us to get past. “Now, y’all remember what I told you. Go straight to City Hall. Otherwise, you’ll be in a heap o’ shit for drivin’ without a sticker. Probably lose your van.” He waved us through.

  “Sounds like things are pretty serious,” I said as we drove past.

  Ken cocked an eyebrow at my understatement. “No shit! I just had a gun pointed at my head. I’d say that’s pretty damn serious!”

  “Yeah,” I responded. “Real nice town you got here.” I grinned at the lonely finger he showed me.

  We pulled onto Main Street and headed for City Hall. Along the way, we passed the only building in sight that showed signs of life, a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Its parking lot was filled to capacity with vehicles bearing markings from all over the state, as well as quite a few from Utah and Louisiana. I noticed as we passed that many of the vehicles were packed stem to stern with all kinds of supplies. I was willing to bet at that point that most of the refugees of which the officer had spoken were inside that church.

  Other than that, however, the streets were pretty deserted. We saw fewer than a dozen people along the two-mile stretch, and only one moving vehicle, diesel, of course. There was definitely no sign of any crowd of refugees. I commented on this to the others.

  “They probably started turning people back as soon as they realized what had happened,” Ken conjectured.

  “Why would they do that?” Amber asked.

  He shrugged. “To conserve resources? Someone must have realized early on that we may have to make do with what we have on hand and what we can manufacture or grow for a long time.”

  “What about the Mormons back there?”

  I answered, “Mormons have always believed in being prepared f
or any emergency situation. They were probably in town before the roadblocks had even been thought of.

  “I don’t know whether or not it’s true, but I’ve heard a good Mormon keeps enough food on hand at all times to feed his entire family for a minimum of one year.”

  Further conversation halted as we pulled into the City Hall parking lot. Four other cars were parked there, three of them covered with a thick layer of pine pollen, obviously undriven for several days. The fourth was a shiny, diesel Mercedes.

  The plate glass doors were propped open, and as we entered, I was immediately reminded what kind of world we now lived in. In place of the fluorescent lights I subconsciously expected, lanterns lit the building.

  We stopped at the door marked Police and spoke to the lady behind the desk. In a twangy Southern drawl, she told us that she was only the clerk, but that she would be happy to take my statement and file the report. After hearing my story, however, she asked if I would return on the following Wednesday to speak with the chief. She explained that Chief Davis had called in sick with some kind of stomach bug. We left without comment.

  We then went to the Titles and Notary door.

  “Can I help you?” the lady behind the desk queried.

  “Yes ma’am, we were told we needed to register our van and get a sticker for the windshield.” Trying to fit in, I played up the country accent. I didn’t like being considered an outsider. If the cop at the roadblock was any indication, outsiders weren’t very welcome.

  “Are you the owner?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She handed me a standard vehicle registration form and a pencil. “Fill out the first two sections and sign at the bottom.”

  As I did so, she asked, “Have any of you filled out an Assimilation Form?”

  “A what?”

  She pushed three of the forms at us. I noticed that rather than the fine laser-quality print typical for this day and age, these were mimeographed, something I hadn’t seen since I’d been a kid in elementary school. “Please answer all questions completely and legibly.” She handed Ken and Amber each a pencil and smiled apologetically. “You can sit over there by the window. The electricity is still out.” As if she expected it to be restored at any moment.

  Sitting at a desk that had been moved into the sunlight, I stared at the Assimilation Form. Name, age, address… All of the standard questions. Then it got interesting.

  Previous profession, not just profession… previous profession.

  Do you have any hobbies or skills that might be of any value in reconstruction? “Reconstruction,” a nice, neat, noncommittal term. All of the terminology seemed geared to building an optimistic picture of what had happened. I shook my head. How could they think to sugarcoat a nuclear war?

  What provisions do you have stored?

  What shelter do you have prepared?

  Alarms started going off in my head as I read those two. About a half-dozen more questions of a similar nature followed. I looked up and found my alarm reflected in Ken’s furrowed brow. He looked as wary as I felt. His eyes questioned me as his pencil rested on the first of those troublesome questions. I turned to find the same question reflected in Amber’s eyes. They were both waiting for my lead.

  What provisions do you have stored?

  I thought for a moment, then firmly printed None. In my mind, it was clear. We had prepared so we could be assured of a fairly decent existence after all hell broke loose. We had not prepared a shelter and gathered food and provisions only to turn it all over to people that hadn’t. Call me coldhearted, or call me pragmatic. Either way, I wasn’t about to jeopardize my family by drawing attention to the minimal supplies we had.

  I glanced up and saw that neither Ken nor Amber had hesitated in following my lead. We finished the forms with a series of no’s and none’s, stood together, and returned the forms.

  The clerk took the forms and looked them over. “You don’t have any provisions? No food or anything?”

  “No, ma’am,” I responded for all of us.

  “How do you intend to live? I mean…” She sounded genuinely concerned. “Things have changed. Y’all understand that, don’t you?”

  “Yes, ma’am. But we can hunt and, as you can see on my form, I’m a pretty fair herbalist. I can identify most of the edible plants that grow around here.”

  She shook her head. “There’s been radioactive fallout in the area. You can’t eat any of the plants or animals.”

  I shook my head. “No, ma’am, that isn’t quite true. You can eat most of the animals around here as long as you stick to the healthy ones and eat only the muscle tissue. And all you have to do with the plants is wash them. ’Course you have to make sure that you wash them real well.” She looked at me, dumbfounded.

  Still smiling, I explained, “If you check my form, you’ll find I’m also a survivalist. Now, could I please get that sticker for my van?”

  “Yes, sir, Mister…” She underlined the name on my questionnaire. “Dawcett.”

  So much for not drawing attention to myself. She passed across a metallic-gold, bird-shaped sticker. The words “Rejas Fighting Eagles” were boldly emblazoned across it in black. “Just put it inside your windshield. At the top center in plain sight.”

  I thanked her and left without another word, with Ken and Amber right behind me.

  We remained quiet until we got into the van. Then Amber positively exploded. “What food do you have? What shelter? What gardening implements? What medical supplies? What right do they have to even ask those questions?”

  I remained silent as I attached the Rejas sticker to the windshield.

  Undaunted, she continued her tirade. “Do they actually think we’re so stupid that we don’t know what they would do with that information? They want our supplies!” She glared at me, then at Ken. “Tell me I’m wrong,” she challenged. “Go ahead! Tell me.”

  There was nothing for me to say. As we pulled out of the parking lot, I thought about what she said. She was right. Unquestionably. The only possible reason I could see for the town government to be pinpointing supplies would be to create a communal stockpile, a noble gesture perhaps, but futile. There couldn’t possibly be enough to go around. Besides, by my estimations, anyone who hadn’t had adequate shelter over the last week and a half had a ninety-five percent chance of being fertilizer within another month. Personally, I doubted Chief Davis would be returning to work next Wednesday, or any day.

  The town government evidently had good intentions, but we all knew where that road led.

  I tried to calm her down as we drove back. “They’re just trying to help as many people as they can. You can’t blame them for trying.”

  “But we’re barely going to have enough for ourselves.”

  “And that’s still more than they’ll be able to say in Rejas in about a month. Think about that.”

  The rest of the ride was grimly silent.

  June 30

  I found it truly amazing that chickens and goats could so totally wreck a home. Even more surprising were some of the strange things that goats would eat. I had always heard stories of them eating such odd items as tin cans or some such, but I’d never truly believed them.

  No more. After seeing what those animals did to the inside of Amber’s house, I believed. They actually ate the carpet! Large patches of it anyway. And bits of wood paneling, cabinet doors, even sheet rock! Truly amazing.

  The amount of animal crap was pretty impressive as well. Chicken droppings all over the furniture. Goat droppings all over the floors. All in all, the house was pretty well trashed.

  After the time in the shelter, we had asked Ken and Cindy to stay on with us, at least until things stabilized. It took all of us several days of hard work to get the house back into serviceable condition. Even then, the kids elected to sleep outside in sleeping bags for four more nights to “get away from all the stinky smells.”

  We had to scavenge sheetrock and cabinetry from abandoned homes in t
he area for our repairs. Plumbing was out for the time being, so we built an old-fashioned outhouse in back until we could figure out something else. Ken, with his contracting background, was a huge help in the repairs. He even spoke of rigging up a hydraulic ram system that would use the current from the stream out back to pump water into a raised water tank and feed enough water back into the pipes to give us at least a little water pressure again. I didn’t understand it, but he seemed confident.

  “The ram will be enough to get us started, and we can add a water wheel to it later.” He snapped his fingers excitedly. “We can even tie a generator into the water wheel and get some current for lights, maybe more. Cindy’s a fair electrician. Maybe she can rig something up to get us more juice.” Lost in his thoughts, Ken turned away, apparently forgetting I was there. “Cindy!”

  I shook my head and went back to the more mundane work of patching sheetrock.

  On a darker note, the first of the inevitable profusion of deaths had begun to occur in town, with hundreds of people taking sick and dying. Messengers went out to anyone with any medical training, beseeching them to help out in the overburdened hospital. Since Amber had admitted to being a retired nurse on her “Assimilation Form,” she was one of the first sought out.

  Chapter 8

  July 03

  Nouueaux venus lieu basty sans defence,

  Occuper la place par lors inhabitable:

  Prez, maisons, champs, villes, predre a plaisance,

  Faim peste, guerre, arpen long labourage.

  Newcomers, place built without defense,

  Place occupied then uninhabitable:

  Meadows, houses, fields, towns to take at pleasure,

  Famine, plague, war, extensive land arable.

  Nostradamus — Century 2, Quatrain 19

  Almost three weeks after D-day, a pickup pulled into the drive. The same police officer that had manned the roadblock five days earlier stepped out. I had been working with Ken, pulling the remains of the soiled and smelly carpet out of the den when I heard the vehicle and saw him outside the window. I quickly stepped outside. I wasn’t trying to be polite. I just remembered that questionnaire and didn’t want him to see any of the food and supplies we had stacked in the kitchen.