Early the next morning, a Tuesday, they were already busy planning on what to do next. The group was aware of the possibility that the marauders are going to return for revenge, if not to exhaust the remainder of their supplies. Walter had long been off his duty at the army so he felt confident now that they had his friend, Christ, a retired military, to join them.
The kitchen served as their meeting place. Everyone but the kids joined in on the planning process. Mary, Michelle, and Grandma Taylor also listened in.
Chris was assigned to handle the planning of the security issues within the farm. Walter suggested to him and he willingly took on the role. He gave everyone pointers on what they need to do to improve security within the farm. He also provided suggestions on how to secure the perimeter of the farm to make it difficult for the marauders to access. According to him, these will provide them with enough reaction time rather than being broken into easily.
Walter’s friends from the militia had proven to be useful additions to the farm house. Chris’ military companions also helped to fix the radio system. For over a week now, their communication system had been totally cut off. They were unable to obtain signal on any electronic device. Hence, they had lost contact with the outside world.
Using their survival training from the military, Chris and his friends managed to fix the radio. They performed a test run on the radio to see if they can use it to contact someone. For several minutes, the signal was either too poor or unable to connect at all. Eventually, they managed to successfully connect. The group was excited about the possibility of communicating with others outside the farm. Most of them were curious as to how the rest of Southcrest was doing.
Chris suggested that they contact Sheriff Taylor. He was the town’s sheriff so they figured he must have the information they needed. They attempted to make contact with him for a few times. The connection was somewhat hazy. They would be able to connect but then they would lose the signal in the middle of the conversation. The engineers managed to fix the problem and they finally obtained a clear signal over the radio.
“Sheriff?” Walter talked to him over the radio.
“Yes! I’m here,” he responded over at the other line.
“Sorry if I keep losing you. The signal is still unstable over here,” he said.
“It’s alright!”
“As I was saying, can you give us a status report where you’re from? We are stuck in a farm about 50 miles from Southcrest and we have no idea what is going on in the city right now. There is no reliable signal around here. Not a single thing is on TV,” he detailed.
“The reports I got is that several farms had the same situation as you have described. Lots of families had transferred to the farm to escape the violence in the city. But the trend applies for all. As the people moved from the city to the suburbs, the marauders and the violence followed with them, too. The city looks like an abandoned war zone,” he said.
Aaron nodded as he overheard this, as if to confirm what the Sheriff said.
Walter was aware that Sheriff Taylor was strongly against the idea of bearing arms. He was one of those that opposed Martial Law. But after seeing the situation and the extent of damage in the city, he was willing to use weapons to protect the innocent civilians, and hopefully reinstate peace and order.
“What can you suggest that we should do? We moved to the farm from the city. But since we’ve been here, we get intruder attacks at least once a day. We have been on high alert, guarding the property 24 hours a day,” shared Walter.
“Do you have anywhere else to go?” the sheriff asked.
“Negative for now,” Walter responded.
A brief paused followed. Walter checked the signal again, as he thought he’d lost the sheriff on the line. He spoke over the line again.
“Can you get me the complete address of your location?” the Sheriff asked. Walter provided him the address to the farm.
“Copy that. I’ll try to send over some of my deputies there later today. I will get things organized here first before we embark,” he said.
A pervading sigh of relief followed. The group was happy that additional forces were being sent over to help them out.
“Please keep your radio open until then. I will let you know when we are ready to leave,” instructed the sheriff.
In the afternoon, Sheriff Taylor met with three deputies and arranged for them to get a ride. They were to travel to the farm to meet with the Taylor family, as per Walter’s request. They left the sheriff’s office at about 3PM to make room for travel time. They knew that it would be too dangerous to travel by night.
The drive to the farm went safely and quietly for about halfway in. In fact, the sheriff joked around with his deputies about enjoying the ride without the traffic. “There is just one of the few upsides to all these,” joked one deputy.
They were exchanging laughter when the driver momentarily took his eye off the road. A group of men gathered along the sides of the road. Sheriff Taylor was the first to spot them. He studied them closely as the vehicle neared the group of men. Upon realizing that they were marauders, and before he could react, one of the men aimed a gun at them and started to shoot the sheriff’s patrol car.
Sheriff Taylor ducked quickly. When the deputy who was driving the vehicle saw him took cover, he lowered his head too. Then, he stepped on the accelerator.
“Faster! Faster! Go!” the sheriff screamed out instructions. He yelled as loudly as he could in the midst of the rain of bullets.
The deputy’s foot was still pressing on the accelerator. After a few seconds, the shots had ceased. Sheriff Taylor carefully got up from hiding under the dashboard. He checked on the passenger side mirror to see if the marauders who ambushed them were trailing. But he could not see them from the mirror. He figured they had already lost them.
At that point, he turned to the two deputies at the back seat. They had been quiet the entire time since the marauders attempted to ambush and fired at them.
“How’s it going over there?” he checked on them.
“I’m hit,” one said while covering his right arm. Blood was trickling from his fingers as he covered the wound with his left hand. He was squinting in pain.
“Keep pressure on that,” he instructed the deputy.
“And you?” he turned to the other deputy. He did not respond but he had a stoic look on his face.
“Where?” asked the sheriff. He showed a bloodied leg. The sheriff also checked on the back seat passenger door. He saw a bullet hole through the police car door. He figured that must have been the bullet that wounded the deputy.
“They’re hit?” asked the deputy who was driving the vehicle. Sheriff Taylor responded with a nod.
“Both of you just keep putting pressure on your wounds. Walter told me that they had a doctor with them. He should be able to help us with those bullet wounds,” he said.
Sheriff Taylor instructed the deputy to keep driving faster so they can get to the farm quickly. Fortunately, there were no other marauders blocking the road. The rest of the drive went smoothly and they arrived at the farm before sunset.
Walter saw a police car careening towards the farm house. When it reached the gate, it went to an abrupt stop. Walter was surprised at the urgency, but he welcomed the sheriff at the gate. Chris and his friends from the militia joined Walter as well.
Sheriff Taylor flung the door open at the passenger seat. Walter looked on nervously. “What’s going on, Sheriff?” he asked.
“We’ll take care of the questions in a little while. Help me with this,” he said as he opened the passenger door at the back of the vehicle. He then assisted one of the deputies that had been shot out of the vehicle. Chris examined the body of the patrol car. It had several bullet holes.
“What happened?” Chris felt it was dumb to ask the obvious question. But his reaction was a mixture of surprise and anger.
“It’s the marauders,” said the sheriff. Walter helped carry one of the injured deputies and assiste
d them inside the farm house. Chris also helped him out. Meanwhile, Sheriff Taylor assisted the other injured deputy. He had difficulty walking with one of his legs wounded during the ambush. The sheriff and the other deputy helped him out.
Benjamin followed them outside to check on the sheriff. He was also curious and wanted to get some updates. But to his surprise, they were carrying two injured men. He looked frazzled.
“What is going on here?” he went to Walter to ask.
“They’ve been ambushed Ben,” he said, leaving no room to sugarcoat.
Benjamin wanted to follow up with a question. But he realized that the sheriff is the one to go to for answers. He decided to let them settle first. He quickly grabbed the medical kit that they had scavenged from the surgery center. Then, he started checking on the patients to assess the bullet wounds. Anthony also helped out in providing immediate care for the wounded deputies.
The patients were laid onto the beds at the ground floor guest room, which was occupied by Aaron’s kids. Anthony checked on the bullet wounds of each patient. He noticed that they were still bleeding significantly. Benjamin advised for him to add more pressure on the entry point of the wound. Anthony took a gauze pad and wrapped it around the wounded parts of the victims’ body. Meanwhile, Benjamin also created a stack of pillows in order for injured patients to keep their wounded body parts elevated.
As Anthony and Benjamin worked on providing first aid to the patients, the rest gathered at the living room. Sheriff Taylor provided them with more information about what happened along the road. He described the scene detail for detail that resulted in the two deputies being injured.
“Do you think it’s the same group that tried to break in here the other day?” asked Aaron.
“We don’t know for sure. And even if it’s the same group or not, it is something to worry about,” Walter responded. “These people have no fear or reservation at all. They even attacked a sheriff’s patrol car,” he went on to add while shaking his head in dismay over the situation.
“I’m sorry, sheriff,” Chris added, still looking in awe.
“No, no, no. No need to apologize,” the sheriff insisted as he kept shaking his head. “Instead, we have to think about how we’d be able to move. The road is being blocked by the marauders. It is becoming increasingly dangerous out there,” he said.
“Good thing it did not happen to us while we were headed for town,” commented Aaron. Everybody in the room turned to him with a piercing look. “Sorry,” he said upon realizing how insensitive the comment was.
“I think we really need to come up with a good plan. Our first goal is to find the safest route to get out of the farm. We have kids and women here. We cannot risk exposing them to such dangerous threats on the road,” Chris suggested. “These guys just showed us that they don’t care who you are, civilians or not,” he went on to add.
Sheriff Taylor showed his agreement by nodding at Chris’ suggestion.
Their conversation was broken up when Benjamin showed up. They all looked at him, waiting for an update on the condition of the wounded deputies.
“Walter, can you give me a hand?” he said.
“What’s up?” Walter responded as he stood up.
“I need to perform surgery on them. We managed to control the bleeding. But unless we take the bullets out, they could be at risk for losing more blood. The sooner we can get the surgery done, the better,” he explained to the group.
Walter froze momentarily. He remembered the time when Benjamin performed a surgery on Victoria’s bullet wound. A rush of those memories came haunting him again. Those were the days when he felt scared because he thought he had lost Victoria for good.
“Walter?” Benjamin asked him again. He noticed that Walter had lost his focus. This jolted him back to his senses.
“Yeah, coming,” he said.
Benjamin rushed back to the room and Walter followed him there. Anthony also stayed in the room to assist in the surgery.
***
Chapter 25 – Joining Forces
Later that night, Benjamin had finally finished doing surgery on the two injured deputies. The patients were resting and recovering from the operation. They let them sleep in the room for the rest of the night.
He, together with Walter who assisted in the operation, re-joined the group at the kitchen. The discussion was focused on their new plans to move out of the farm. It was based on the sheriff’s suggestion because he felt that the farm was not safe anymore for them. He pointed out the fact that even a sheriff’s car was ambushed.
“It only means that these people are out for blood,” he stressed. No one responded out loud. However, they all had the same expression of displeasure in their eyes.
“Before I left for the farm, I spoke with Colonel Caesar,” the sheriff started.
“What did he say? How’s he doing?” Benjamin asked, curious about the welfare of his former neighbor.
“He told me that you, Dr. Benjamin Perry, must return to town,” almost everyone in the room gasped in unison, particularly Mary. “The same goes with all of you here who are working at the hospital.”
“I don’t understand,” Benjamin said in protest.
“He wants you to run the hospital again,” said the sheriff. Mary burrowed her face into her hands. She did not want to her more of it. After hearing about the attack on the hospital, she did not want him to go through that again.
Benjamin was also infuriated about the news. He felt betrayed. He remembered the retired colonel warning him about not revealing his profession as a doctor. Why is he doing this to me? Why would he put me into this situation? He thought to himself.
“I can’t wrap my head around this,” was all he could say. Benjamin was visibly stunned.
“No, this can’t be…” Mary protested, crying. “My husband is not going back there. They’ve been attacked! Who knows what will happen next? He is not leaving our side again, I won’t let that happen!” she said in between sobs.
Benjamin went over to give her a consoling hug. In his mind, Benjamin was protesting, too. But he realized that the colonel might have a bigger plan behind this. The colonel was a key factor in him re-uniting with his family. And he owed him a lot for that. A flood of thoughts went rushing to his mind at once.
But as Benjamin hugged Mary tighter, she broke down and cried even louder.
“Hang on,” said the sheriff in an effort to pacify the situation. He noticed how quickly the emotions rose and he was not expecting that.
“The colonel told me that you will be joining him, along with the militia, in running the town. It will be under his command for a while and he wants you to join forces with him. This will be temporary, of course, until after the US army arrived and they can take over the town again,” the sheriff explained.
“That might not be such a bad idea, Ben,” Walter commented. Benjamin did not respond. All he could think of the moment is being away from his family again. And the thought scared him.
“It is clearly stated in the executive order for Martial Law that all government employees need to return to their post. It applies for everyone, whether you like it or not,” said the sheriff. He looked at everyone in the room. All of them looked dingy.
“Walter, can I talk to you in private for a sec?” Benjamin addressed his friend. He simply nodded. They went over to the adjacent room so they can discuss in private.
Mary looked on with curiosity. She was starting to calm down after breaking down earlier. The sheriff resumed his discussion with the rest about their plans on moving out of the farm.
“What are you thinking?” Walter asked.
“I don’t really know,” Benjamin said, looking more confused than ever. He let out a deep sigh to calm his nerves.
“I don’t think I can put Mary and the kids through that again, you know what I mean?” Walter nodded. He saw how Benjamin struggled being apart from his family when the riots started. He knew how difficult it would be to be away from hi
s loved ones again. He was also feeling that way about Victoria. He knew that she needs special care while recovering. To not be by her side is unbearable for him.
He gave his friend a light tap on the shoulder, as if to say he understood how he felt. “I think that the colonel might be up to something,” Walter said to console him.
“You think so?”
“Of course!” reassured Walter. “He helped us get out of that mess. I don’t see why he would drag us back there for no reason at all,” he added.
Benjamin considered this thought. Walter raised some valid points, he thought. He knew the colonel well enough to know that he has their welfare in his mind.
“I think now we just got to learn to trust his plans,” Benjamin finally gave in.
“I know it sounds odd given the situation. But you’re right, we need to trust his judgment on this,” Walter agreed.
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