Connie started shouting at the top of her lungs, still staring at the ground, “WHERE WERE YOU? WHERE WERE YOU? WHERE WERE YOU?” As Connie shouted, more and more of the suspicious AWOLers turned toward the confrontation.
Fish was stunned and speechless, and looked down at the pathetic little husband as he tried to buck up to him. Fish took in a deep breath and glanced skyward for a second as TC shouted up at his face, “See what you did to my wife? You’re a real asshole, you know that? How do you feel now, old man?” TC laughed at his wife, who was still shouting hysterically, then looked back up at the speechless, dismayed Fish and said, “Look what you just did!”
Stephen knew what was going to happen next before it actually did. Fish reached down, and with his large hands, grabbed two handfuls of TC’s jacket by the chest and launched him airborn toward the convenience store wall. The shocked little man hit the wooden panels with his back with an audible thud and fell to the ground, his breath knocked out of him. He had talked too much shit to Fish, assuming that the “AWOL rules” would have protected him. But he was wrong. He had talked waaayy too much smack, and he was about to pay dearly for it. Fish didn’t give one single shred of damn about the “AWOL rules” at that point.
TC was still on the ground as Fish advanced. Fish knew that all thugs kept their “gats” in their waistband, and he was ready for it. As soon as TC pulled out his pistol, Fish kicked it out of his hand and it went spinning off toward another set of tables. A random sailor leapt from his chair, snatched up the gun from the sidewalk, and then yelled, “Finder’s keepers, motherfucker! Haha!” The happy sailor went back to his chair and laughed as he stuffed away the new prize into his own waistband.
Fish withdrew his 9mm and pointed it at the struggling-for-breath TC’s head. Stephen had to act soon before Fish got them both in trouble with the dangerous AWOL crowd, Smitty in particular, who seemed to be in charge of all the riff-raff on Pioneer Avenue. There was too much rage welled up inside Stephen’s best friend, and he was about to explode.
Stephen bolted next to Fish and told him, “Don’t do it, brother. He ain’t worth it.”
Fish just kept taking short, rough breaths as he glared at the little man on his back.
Stephen begged, “Fish, please, just put the gun away. These guys might kill us if you cap this piece of shit.” Stephen watched as a few of the AWOLers were getting up from their seats. They weren’t coming toward the fray, but they looked like they were ready to, if needed. Even though it was early in the afternoon, many of the AWOL patrons looked intoxicated and ravenous for some new action.
Stephen said quietly to Fish, “Who’s going to take care of Tarra and the Kays, if these people kill you, me or both of us?”
After that comment, Fish glanced at his best friend, frustrated, then back at TC, who was now pleading for his life from the ground. “Please, sir, don’t kill me! I’m sorry! You can have her if you want, just don’t kill me, please!”
Fish started to growl, then it turned into a shout, then a roar, “Ahhhh!”
Stephen knew it was probably too late to do anything but he desperately stepped forward to try and grab Fish’s gun at the last second, but Fish had quickly raised it several inches above TC’s head and fired. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom! Five rounds left his weapon and buried themselves into the wooden paneling. Wood splinters flew all around TC, and some lodged themselves into his slick hairdo as he shrieked a feminine wail and covered his face with the back of his palms. A dark circle appeared and expanded outward in the crotch of the stonewashed jeans that TC was wearing. He had pissed himself, and shamefully wrapped his arms around his head as he rolled over onto his side, crying.
Several of the trigger-happy AWOLers had stood and readied their weapons as Fish fired into storefront, but luckily none of them did anything about it. After all, he didn’t kill TC, he only scared the living shit out of him (or piss, at least). Stephen saw some people running toward the scene in his peripheral vision and turned to see who it was. Smitty’s huge frame was hauling ass toward the confrontation, athletically skirting around humans, tables and chairs as he ran, with three of his henchmen at his heels. Two of them were carrying M-4’s and the third one had a shotgun. “Ah, shit, here comes the boss,” Stephen said quietly to himself.
Fish turned away from the piss-drenched husband and walked back over to Connie, who still had yet to show any type of emotional reaction to what had just went down.
Smitty ran to Stephen, since he seemed somewhat apprehensive to approach Fish directly, and said, “You better get a grip on your boy over there! I’m not jokin’ around!”
Stephen talked Smitty down from his anger, and explained that they would be leaving very soon. To turn things over on a positive note, Stephen told Smitty that they would be back later with something ‘awesome’ to bring to the table, but he was lying. Stephen wanted nothing more to do with that awful place ever again. It reeked of garbage, ash, and alcohol, and Stephen figured that it would be awhile before the rotten taste left his mouth.
Fish kept staring at Connie, waiting for something, anything as the mid-day sun shined down on both of them. She only looked at Fish’s face briefly and then shook her head in disgust.
Fish barked at her, “One last chance, Connie. You can either leave with us right now, or stay here with piss boy. You choose.”
Constantine didn’t reply for what seemed like forever. She wasn’t responding to anything. Stephen just wanted to leave AWOL right that minute, Connie or no Connie. She needed to choose, and soon. Fish didn’t flinch one bit, he just kept glaring at his short-time ex lover, waiting for an answer as she continued stared at the ground.
Fish frustratingly demanded, “Well?”
“Piss boy!” Connie yelled, and then glared back at Fish with sinister, slitted eyes, equally as angered as he was.
“Fine, fuck it then. Let’s roll, Stephen.” Fish said, calmly. Stephen thankfully sighed and then politely said before they walked away, “Good bye, Connie. Good luck to you. I really do hope everything works out.”
*****
Stephen drove away from AWOL with Fish in the back of the truck again. He knew that Fish was very upset, and hoped that his anger wouldn’t interfere with any of the negotiations at the Safeway store. He had roughly $1200 worth of silver in his pocket, and hopefully predicted that they would only need to use a couple of his precious silver coins to obtain all the batteries that they needed.
Fish never spoke the whole way to the store, he just kept a watchful eye, scanning all side roads and yards for any possible ambush activity. Nothing had happened, thankfully.
When the two arrived at Safeway on Highway 20 and pulled into the parking lot, Stephen was met with yet another chaotic environment. Most of the vehicles were parked toward the rear of the lot, and a large crowd had formed in the center of the lot. Stephen could hear shouting, and watched as angry potential customers milled about amongst each other. Nobody seemed to be approaching the entryway to the store. There was a “dead zone” between the crowd and the entrance. Literally a dead zone. A man’s body lied prone, sprawled out on the Safeway asphalt between the automatic doors and the crowd. Stephen gasped, “What the hell is going on here?”
Fish jumped out of the back after Stephen crawled his pickup to a stop with the rest of the vehicles at the rear of the lot. Stephen asked him, “Did you see that dead body?
“Yeah, but it wasn’t there when I drove through here yesterday. Somebody must have gotten a little bit stupid.” Fish answered. He pointed at the roof of Safeway above the entrance, directing Stephen’s attention to three men armed with hunting rifles who were crouched down and pointing them at the crowd in the center of the lot.
Stephen’s heart began to race. He wasn’t comfortable with the Safeway scenario whatsoever.
“I don’t like this, maybe we should just figure something else out.” He told Fish.
“Chill out, dude. Let’s just get in, get out, and get the blue blazes out
of here.”
Stephen nervously gripped the shoulder strap of his M-4 and took in a deep breath. They walked toward the crowd together.
People were yelling pleas for items toward the entrance, and were met with haggard responses from the owner at the entrance. He said, “We only take real gold and silver. I don’t take diamonds, because half of you cheap fuckers are probably wearing fakes!”
One desperate woman yelled, “My baby is going to die without formula!” Another woman shouted, “Please, just help me! I’ll take anything! My kids are starving!”
Stephen looked at Fish, who just shrugged. They both felt bad for the people in the parking lot, but had their own worries to deal with.
Fish nudged Stephen and said, “Go, hold up your silver and ask if you can come in.”
Stephen hesitated, and looked back up at the roof of the store, where the men still had their rifles trained on the crowd.
The owner disappeared for a moment, and then returned with a man who was carrying a plastic grocery approximately only half full of items. That’s it? Stephen thought as the man took off running with his baggie. He elected to take the long way around the crowd toward his vehicle, avoiding and ignoring the calls for something to eat from the people in the crowd. A woman chased after him, begging, but he never even turned to look at her as he jumped into his sedan and slammed the door shut. She called him foul names as he drove away.
Hell, if he can do it, I can do it. That guy didn’t even have a gun. Stephen thought, and stepped forward from the crowd. He held the plastic roll of silver American Eagles above his head and shouted, “We have silver!” He felt hands touch his back from the begging pedestrians, but immediately felt them being forcibly removed as Fish went to work behind him, covering his six.
“Keep your hands off your weapons and come forward, my friends!” The owner shouted. Fish and Stephen left the crowd and walked quickly toward the smiling man. He was a rough looking middle-aged man, that had a scoped hunting rifle strapped to his back. A rifle much like the ones the guys on the roof were pointing at the crowd in the parking lot.
Stephen met the man first and told him, “I just need some batteries.”
“Let me see what you got.” The owner asked. He didn’t act or appear intelligent enough to have owned an entire Safeway store. Something wasn’t right. Stephen was suspicious as he brought the roll forward and presented it to the man.
“That’s silver alright. Twenty dollars worth.” The man told Stephen.
“What? That’s over $1200 worth of silver right here!” Stephen gasped.
“You’ve got twenty coins, that’s twenty dollar’s worth.” He snapped, angrily. “Take it or leave it.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“Nope.” The man stated firmly. He was greedily studying their M-4’s up and down. He bargained, “I tell ya what, though. I’ll give ya a fifty dollar credit for one of those rifles.”
Stephen looked at Fish, and said, “This isn’t worth it, let’s just get out of here.”
The owner frowned and said, “Suit yourself.”
Fish eyed the man, and said, “You’re not really the owner, are you?”
The man raised his eyebrows in slight surprise, and said, “Oh yeah? Who ya gonna prove it too, big man? Twenty dollars, like I said. Take it or leave it, fellas.”
Fish calmly looked at Stephen and said, “Just take the deal.” He had that mischievious, ambitious look upon his face, and was obviously cooking something up inside his head. Stephen didn’t like it. That look was never a good thing. The deal went against Stephen’s conservative judgement, but he did, after all, have a lot more silver at home. They really needed some batteries, so he was forced to suffer a loss on that particular transaction.
Stephen grimaced as he handed over the roll of silver to the supposed ‘owner’ of the store. He smiled a toothy grin and said, “Twenty bucks, gentlemen. Oh, and before you go inside, you need to leave your weapons out here.”
“Fuck that.” Fish instantly responded. “I’ll hand you over my magazine, but you ain’t getting my rifle.”
The man thought about it for a second, then nodded and said, “That’ll work. Give me the cartridges in your handguns, too. I know that both of you are packing heat, I can see the bulges through your jackets.” The man watched as they disengaged their magazines from all their weapons, then added, “Don’t forget about the round in the chamber, too.”
The guy definitely wasn’t as dumb as he had appeared. Stephen and Fish reluctantly handed over all their ammo and the man stuffed away the magazines into his large polyester coat pockets. The two M-4 mags stuck out each of his side pockets like wings.
“My son Ben here will be escorting you two through the store. Just in case you decide to develop some sticky fingers, you should know that he has orders to shoot anybody that tries to steal anything.”
Stephen saw a kid around 17 or 18 emerge from around the corner inside the store. He had a shotgun strapped to his back and a large flashlight in his right hand. He nodded at his father.
As they entered the half-darkened store with Ben, the man yelled to his son, “Make sure they stay together!”
The afternoon sun only lit up the front half of the store, and the rest of it remained in almost total darkness. Stephen knew right away where the batteries were at, and headed there with Fish and Ben behind him. It was a bit dark in that part of the store, and Stephen dug into his pocket for the little LED flashlight that he had taken from Eddie earlier that day, and Ben freaked out. “Hold it right there, mister!” He had shouted, and brought his shotgun to port arms, stuffing his own flashlight under his armpit to keep in order to keep both hands on the heavy weapon.
“It’s just a flashlight, see?” Stephen said, coolly clicking it on, praying that the skittish kid didn’t blow him away.
“Oh, okay. Just don’t do that again.” Ben snapped at him, annoyed.
The little light that Stephen had acquired was quite powerful, despite its size. Stephen was pleasantly surprised at the amount of light it shone, but he wasn’t pleasantly surprised at the amount of goods that remained in the shelves. He had estimated that around eighty percent of the store had been cleared out. Not much was left! Additionally, an odd stink emanated from the frozen section as they passed it, even though all of the food was gone. Something must have happened after the power went out. Maybe mold, mildew or something like that. Stephen couldn’t identify that smell.
Once the trio reached the battery display, Stephen optimistically flashed his beam upon it, but most of it was cleaned out as well. Only the most expensive, high-end lithium ones remained, and Stephen closed his eyes in disgust. Twenty dollar’s of credit barely provided him with enough for two packs of double-AA’s. He needed C-cells as well, for the camp lanterns since they provided the most light. The most comforting light, as well. But they wouldn’t be able to afford any of those. They could pick up the double-AA’s for the smaller flashlights, and that was about it. Damnit! He talked it over with Fish, who kept a sharp eye on Ben as they talked.
Ben had made two critical mistakes at that moment in time. One, he had re-shouldered his shotgun. Two, he had taken his eyes off Stephen and Fish while they discussed which batteries to purchase, and shined his light down the rest of the empty aisle to check it out. It was only for a short moment, but long enough for Fish to reach down, lift up his jeans down by his boot and pull another M-4 magazine out of his sock.
Ben heard the “click” of the magazine locking into place behind him, and then the snap of the charging handle being pulled and released, which locked the first round into place. It was poor Ben’s “OH, SHIT!” moment as he frantically spun around. He had almost swung his shotgun into place again before he was forced to freeze. Fish commanded, “Put your gun down, kid. Now.”
Fish had his M-4 pointed at the terror-stricken young man’s face, and Ben obeyed by slowly lowering his weapon to the floor. Fish learned in Afghanistan that a gun barrel to
the face was twice as intimidating as a barrel to the chest. He heard from some of his marine corps buddies that it was human nature to protect the brain at all costs.
Stephen was horrified. He asked, “What in the hell are you doing, Fish?”
Fish ignored Stephen, and ordered Ben to his knees. He kicked the shotgun with his steel-toed boot, and it slid damn near halfway down the aisle before coming to a stop.
“This isn’t a good idea, Fish!” Stephen exclaimed, but Fish continued to ignore him. Suddenly, out of nowhere, the frightened boy looked hopefully toward the sunlight at the front of the store and called out, “Dad! D-“
He never got out the second ‘dad’ because Fish had whacked him hard in the temple with the butt of his M-4. The unconscious kid collapsed face first onto the shiny tiles and Stephen recoiled with astonishment. “Jesus, Fish! He was just a kid!”
“Yeah, a piece of shit kid with a piece of shit dad.” Fish laughed as he readied himself, preparing to shoot the father or anybody else that ran toward them. Stephen ran down the aisle to fetch the shotgun and took up a defensive position in the next aisle, adjacent to Fish’s. He could barely breathe. What in god’s name was Fish thinking? There was no way out of there, the ‘owner’ had people on the roof! What was Fish’s plan? Stephen briefly thought about surrendering and making up a bullshit story to cover what happened to the boy, but then abandoned the prospect. The man would be too upset about his son to be reasoned with. They were likely going to fight this one out. Not good!
Luckily, after a few long moments of waiting, nothing happened. Fish and Stephen assumed that the kid hadn’t yelled loud enough for the father to hear him. Either that, or, the man was in the midst of another hard bargain outside the store, haggling with another potential customer.
“Okay, so now what?” Stephen said to Fish, exasperated.
“Wait here.” Fish replied. He ran away from the flustered Stephen, but quickly returned with a handful of grocery bags. He slid all of the batteries that remained in the display off the hooks and into a tripled-up bag and handed it to Stephen.
THE COLLAPSE: Swantown Road Page 20