TEOTWAWKI: Beacon's Story

by David Craig

  They turned down gold and silver, diamonds and jewelry; holding out for factory ammo and one antique Sheffield Bowie knife Old Bill took a liking to.

  It would be a generation, Beacon felt, before the survivors reorganized into any semblance of civilization structured enough to make use of gold and silver.

  Once trade could safely be carried out between villages, forts and fiefdoms there would be a need for something small that wouldn't spoil in transit over long distances. Gold and silver coins with their thousands year long history of value would fill the bill nicely.

  Being of known weight and karat gold and silver coins would facilitate commerce much better than gold wedding rings and diamonds of uncertain karat. Beacon believed he'd have to live to be an old man to see money of any kind return as medium of exchange and it would be many generations before anyone would be foolish enough to trust fiat paper money again although he had little doubt politicians would lead the gullible into that something for nothing scheme once more.

  When all the gas cans was gone they traded the pickup with it's half full gas tank and horse trailer to the town's pharmacist for all the arthritis medicines and pain killers, prescription and nonprescription, he had in stock.

  On the way out of town Beacon found a hand lettered flyer posted on the town's bulletin board which announced the formation of a "Sanctuary Settlement" in the next valley.

  The mountain men's horses could hardly carry all the ammo back up to their retreat. Beacon had to walk the horses back up the mountain with Old Bill riding the stouter horse his medicines in their backpacks with bedrolls tied on top.

  They took a roundabout route back to the cabin backtracking, J hooking to set up ambushes and checking their back trail several times a day for anyone who might be trying to follow them back up onto the mountains. The two cold camped two nights and then, after setting for three hours on one last ambush of their trail, they finally headed for the cabin.

  When they got back up to the gate Beacon took the hidden chainsaw and with Old Bill standing guard went up a mile and down a mile felling trees across the Forestry road.

  Then they filled the keyhole of the gate's lock with J-B Weld. Beacon and, using the last of the gasoline in the saw, felled every tree that would fall across the Old Bill's driveway for a mile up the hill. At the top of every curve they redirected the drainage ditches along the sides so rain and snow melt would run into the middle of the track hopefully washing it out within the year.

  The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Mountain Men

  Old Bill's arthritis had been acting up and they discussed the possibility of joining the Sanctuary Settlement as they wove their way back up the mountain track arriving at Old Bill's cabin just in time to catch a band of bandits looting the place.

  Old Bill got two and Beacon got one before the remainder of the gang sought shelter back inside the cabin. At some point during the firefight something inside the cabin caught fire. Despite the looters best efforts the fire kept growing with them trapped inside.

  The banditos claimed to want to surrender but both he and Old Bill knew it was a trick. The three of them opened the door to make a run for it firing as they ran out. The resulting influx of air caused the cabin's interior to explode into flames as Beacon put a .223 round through the heart of the first one out the door a split second later Old Bill put a 30-30 round into the chest of the second who fell backwards into the last man. The last desperado was incinerated when the second outlaw fell back knocking him into the inferno.

  It took hours for the fire to die down. After checking for anything salvageable among the ashes, aside from some ash covered cast iron pots and pans there wasn't much so they assessed their situation. There was plenty of canned food, guns, ammo and supplies cached in cool dry mini-bunkers all around the mountain, but there was no place left to live and winter was coming quick.

  Sanctuary Settlement

  They bought their way into the Sanctuary Settlement with the loan of the horses to the settlement for as long as they were there, a freshly killed doe and their good looks; specifically their mountain men appearance which promised a steady flow of venison. But the clincher had been the four cases of plastic solar powered sidewalk yard LED lights shaped like gray softball sized rocks from their trading caché.

  Refused admittance to the corral until a group vote in the evening they'd placed two of the gray plastic globular plastic lights in the sun to charge while waiting for nightly meeting.

  Summoned before the vetting panel they'd brought their own lights which outshone the group's candles. One man smacked himself on the forehead remembering the solar powered lights he'd left lining his own driveway as he'd bugged out in an overloaded motor home.

  When Old Bill announced to the gathered group that they'd be trading the "Light Rocks" for a place to stay three families offered them quarters. Old Bill traded all four cases minus six they kept for themselves for a fifth wheel travel trailer near the gate. Keeping their truck for when "the troubles are over" the couple they'd bought the trailer from moved into the wife's parent's forty-five foot motor home and traded the Light Rocks to other members of the group.

  In no time every household in the settlement had at least one Light Rock. Placing the solar powered LED lights in the sun to recharge their batteries every morning became a daily ritual for each household. When people wanted to turn out the lights in their trailer, camper or motor home they simply put a hat over the light or turned its light side down.

  Old Bill had gutted the doe while they waited for admittance. He'd hung the corpse to cool and the next day showed some of the women of the settlement how to skin and butcher the deer. Many of the Settlement's women refused to even look at the hanging corpse. But he noticed they didn't seem to mind eating venison that night.

  The Sanctuary Settlement had been organized by Maggie's parents, Sam and Virginia Chamberlain, who'd fled the city in a forty foot land yacht with their adult daughter Maggie and two sons; high school senor Bull, and twelve year old Buck. Maggie served as her parent's liaison officer, organizer and general straw boss. Her political prowess eclipsed her age and she was able to persuade people several times her age to do things they didn't really want to do.

  The Chamberlains refused to fortify the corral or camp as they insisted on calling it. Saying they would share what they could with the less fortunate who might happen by. The Mountain men figured there'd be a bunch of those and kept quiet about their caches.

  It wasn't long before the sanctuary had to stop sharing with outsiders. There were simply too many of them and even with Beacon's hunting, trapping and snaring; too little food to go around.

  The Sanctuary Settlement's only concession to security was circling its thirty or so cars, campers, SUV's, vans, trailers and motor homes around an old twenty foot tall deer stand that stood near a spring in the middle of a large valley.

  Much to the annoyance of others who stood watch in it Beacon knocked the top sections of the other three walls out of the box blind turning it into a true watchtower with a 360 degree view of the surrounding territory.

  They claimed his modifications left them exposed to the wind. Which was true. The mountain men responded that the purpose of the watchtower was observation not comfort. Which was also true.

  Beacon began taking the dusk to midnight shifts in the tower freeing up the other men to socialize in the evenings and most of them shut up.

  Refugees coming up the trail from the lake told of a horde of outlaws wearing dark blue bandannas calling themselves "Blue Heads" who were pillaging to the south. Sam and Virginia refused to take any additional precautions saying such actions might be viewed as provocative.

  Beacon's offer to give firearms instruction and devise plans of actions to respond to various scenarios had been vetoed by Sam and Virginia as too "militaristic" for a peaceful settlement. Beacon and Old Bill made sure all of their guns were fully loaded at all times after that.

  First Blue Head Attack

&nb
sp; The attack came in mid winter just before midnight. Beacon saw them emerging silently from the tree line and opened fire with his M1A trying to take out the ones in the front hoping that seeing the ones in front of them fall would discourage those behind. The big thirty caliber rounds knocked the Blue Heads flat on their backs with every center of mass shot. It didn't work. There were hundreds Blue Heads, too many to notice the few that were falling.

  About half of the men in the Sanctuary Settlement owned guns but only a few of those really knew how to use them. When Beacon started shooting most of the men in the settlement jumped out of bed and stopped to put on their pants before coming outside to see what the ruckus was about. By the time they'd figured it out and gone back inside to retrieve their guns dozens of marauders were already inside of the circle of vehicles.

  Many marauders had guns but ammo seemed in short supply. The rest of the Blue Heads had knives, axes, homemade spears and Beacon saw one sword. Most were no more proficient in the use of weapons than the settlement men. A free-for-all ensued.

  Ignoring the danger until a few rounds whizzed by his head Beacon switched from shooting the leaders of the charge to anyone with a visible weapon until they got into the circle where he couldn't reliably tell friend from dark blue headed foe in the moonlight.

  Then he took a kneeling position shooting around the edge of the tower's entrance opening. The tower's weathered plywood wouldn't stop bullets, but it provided concealment while Beacon concentrated taking out any marauder outside the corral carrying a gun. The ruse seemed to work, no more bullets came his way.

  When he'd fired up all of the hundred 7.62 rounds he had up in the tower with him he left the now useless M1A in the tower and climbed down.

  Using his forty-five and his Randall's seven and a half inch blade Beacon fought his way through the mêlée towards Old Bill who was standing in the doorway of their trailer in his long johns rapidly building a semicircle of dead marauders around him.

  Numbers were the Blue Heads greatest strength and a major weakness in this fight. The real estate within the circle of trailers, SUV's and mobile homes was overpopulated to the point that those wielding rifles, axes and spears could find little elbow room to bring their weapons to bear effectively. Pistols and knives were the most effective weapons in the brawl giving way to knives as ammo ran out.

  Beacon's pistol was empty and his Randall bloody to the hilt when he reached their trailer. He reloaded the pistol once inside and started grabbing guns and ammo. It seemed like there were hundreds of them inside the circle of vehicles. He and Old Bill had expected a fight, but nothing like this!

  His Ruger Mini-14 was obviously the weapon of choice for this operation, but he didn't have a readily available container for the loaded 30 round magazines he'd need to carry out his plan. He grabbed his Ruger 10/22 and began stuffing 25 round "banana clip" magazines into the front of his coat and every pocket. The tiny twenty-two caliber bullets weren't meant for combat, but he had loads of loaded 10/22 magazines and only no way to get enough of the larger loaded magazines for the Ruger Mini-14 up to the roof with him.

  Old Bill's Sheffield Bowie knife was being bloodied by the time he got back outside with both of Bill's backup six shooters and Bill's extra lever action rifles and a double-barreled shotgun.

  Dropping the double armload of old guns and a box of shotgun shells by Old Bill he climbed up on the roof of their trailer his with his scoped Ruger 10/22 and went prone. He would, once again, remonstrate with Bill on the inadvisability of insisting on using old slow loading Cowboy Era weapons when this was over, he didn't expect to convince the old codger.

  A twenty-two caliber bullet in the body of an excited adult although deadly long term given the current lack of antibiotics might not be noticed right away by an excited or drugged up man, but most people found one of the little hollow points in the face or neck worthy of instant attention. Stumbling around holding their faces or throats they were not only dead men walking but, more importantly, out of the fight.

  Taking aim at a gap between two of the vehicles that seemed particularly popular to the invading marauders Beacon began empting the first to his twenty-five round magazines into the gap. Not having to worry about identifying friend or foe he simply popped a round into every face that showed itself in the gap. Soon the marauders had to pause to climb over their fallen comrades making it easier for Beacon to shoot the next one in the face. He'd plugged two gaps that way and was working on a third when he ran out of ammunition again.

  He jumped back down and was putting both the Colt and the Randall to good use as he fought his way back to the trailer for the Mini-14 when three whistles sounded from somewhere along the tree line. One whistle was high pitched another low pitched and the third warbled quavering up and down the musical scale. The marauders began flooding out of the settlement as quickly as they'd entered it.

  Picking up one of Old Bill's six-guns Beacon crammed a few rounds in the loading port as he followed the retreating Blue Heads to the edge of the circle of vehicles and was carefully emptying it into the backs of the retreating horde when Maggie; echoing her parent's admonitions of peace, love and brotherhood demanded he stop shooting because they were running away. Beacon opined that they were just regrouping for another charge but the revolver was empty by then anyway.

  Maggie changed her tune when she discovered her parent's dead bodies inside the tent they had set up at the base of the tower. Beacon was reloading magazines when he heard her scream. She took up a pick ax and began attacking the bodies of marauders as she screamed curses at them.

  At dawn, as Beacon finished tending to his and Old Bill's weapons, Maggie began tying dead marauders to each other by their necks then to horses. Beacon hurriedly searched the corpses for guns, knives and ammunition before Maggie dragged them out of the camp.

  He'd relieved the rest of the marauder corpses inside the corral of anything of value by the time she got back for the next load. Then he started on the bodies outside the settlement. He had to finish off a few, but all items of value had been removed from the corpses before Maggie got to them.

  By the end of the day Maggie had built a mountain of corpses down at the trailhead where it came up from the village by the lake. She'd stuck a stake through a couple of the bodies with a sign on it: "GO TO HELL ZOMBIES!"

  Maggie never again referred to outsiders as anything but zombies. Her parent's peaceful coexistence policy was buried with them. Maggie somehow blamed Beacon for not stopping the attack that killed her parents, but realized she needed his help to kill the zombies.

  The surviving men of the Sanctuary Settlement spent the remainder of the winter felling and trimming trees for a stockade. In the spring when the ground thawed they planted the logs in a trench dug, more or less, where Old Bill marked the outline of a frontier style fort in the dirt.

  Some wanted a second gate at the bottom of the fort where the stream exited the encampment for easy access to the corral and one fellow even quoted some OSHA fire regulation which caused Beacon to break out laughing.

  Old Bill and Beacon wanted two story blockhouses at each corner extending out from the walls to keep attackers from hiding against the walls out of reach of the defenders in the fort who would have to expose themselves leaning out over the top of the walls to shoot down at them. Old Bill also wanted a gatehouse extending over the single gate for the same reason, but necessity and available manpower allowed neither blockhouses nor two story gatehouse. The existing watchtower remained their only lookout.

  Bull

  Beacon waited patiently where the game trail turned uphill as Bull stormed back up from the marsh. As usual he'd barged on ahead using strength to bull his way through the woods rather than pay attention to the sign the animals had left. He'd missed the faint trace at the turn in the trail and pushed through some briers stopping only when he was ankle deep in mud.

  Beacon started up the trail as Bull approached swearing under his breath, using his big bore rifl
e as a battering ram against the briers.

  "Wait," Bull bellowed, "I want to lead the way."

  "Back into the fort," Beacon finished silently for him. Billy 'Bull' Waitly was supposed to be learning bushcraft from Beacon. Instead, as usual, he was using size and muscle to bully his way through the forest ignoring all of Beacon's softly spoken advice.

  Taller and thicker than most; Bull looked his nickname. Before The Blowup any high school football coach would have loved to have Bull as an offensive lineman. But Bull had developed a bad habit of using his size and strength instead of his brain.