Sunfall (Book 3): Impact

by Gideon, D.

  “So we just sit here on our hands and hope Cindy doesn’t follow through?” Ripley waved an arm towards her house. “We’ve been doing that for a week and it didn’t stop them from targeting us.”

  “They’re targeting me,” Dotty said. “And if I can keep it from spreading to the rest of you, that’s what I’ll do. You are not to get involved.”

  Ripley made a frustrated noise and disappeared back into the house.

  “I’m not going to lock myself in the house again,” Mel said. “I won’t do it.”

  “You can help me,” Preacher said, stepping up where Ripley had been. “The sooner it’s done, the sooner I’m here.” He nodded to Lily. “For intimidation.”

  “She needs to be helping me,” Marco called from his spot at the kitchen table. “We need to scavenge. We need to find boards we can put over the windows, so those men can’t see inside, or maybe throw things inside.”

  “Teddy’s got plywood,” Dotty said. “His inventory’s not much, but there’d be at least enough to do the front windows.”

  Preacher shook his head. “It’s spoken for. Gotta cover the shop windows.”

  “Then I’ll get some blankets and cover the windows-” Dotty started.

  “That won’t stop something from coming through,” Marco called. “Rocks, tear gas, molotov cocktails-”

  “It will have to do for now. You said Teddy offered the wood from his old barn. Maybe we can cover it with that later, if we need to,” Dotty said.

  “And tools for whoever helps,” Preacher added.

  “I’ll help with the shop stuff,” Mel said. “Marco, too. That way you won’t be gone for days. We get it done and you’re back here to growl at people while we go scavenge.”

  “I’ve got things to do-” Marco started.

  “And you can’t do them in the daylight, Romeo, so quit arguing,” Mel shot back.

  “I’ll go too,” Ripley called. “And we should find Corey. With all of us, we could maybe knock it out by tomorrow night.”

  Mel snorted. “If we track him down and try to get him to come with us, he’ll spend the entire time bitching at us for being out of the house.”

  “Not in front of me, he won’t.” Preacher said.

  “So we’re just going to leave Miss Dotty and Miss Lily unprotected?” Marco asked. “There are all kinds of problems with this plan.”

  They all fell silent, thinking.

  Dotty snapped her fingers. “If Cindy’s going to accuse me of raising an army, then that’s what I’ll do. I can’t go to the Mayor, but I can go to the people. I’ll talk to Bill and see if he can talk to the congregation. I’ll visit with the people still on the street and see if there’s anything we can do to help them. With a little goodwill, maybe the neighbors will step up and raise a fuss if the City comes here again.”

  “That’s a good idea,” Lily said. “That census form says 48 hours, so they shouldn’t be back today or tomorrow. That gives us a little time. We cover the windows so they can’t tell if anyone’s home. We leave the dogs in the houses to discourage them from coming in, and maybe make them think someone’s hiding inside.”

  “Lily, I don’t want you dragged into my mess,” Dotty said.

  “They were stomping through my yard too, Dotty. I’m already involved. I’m going with you,” Lily said.

  “Find the Warden. Tell him what happened,” Preacher said.

  Lily nodded and stood. “We will. I’ll go find blankets to cover the windows. You think we should do just the front, or the whole first floor?”

  “The whole floor,” Marco said, squeezing past Mel and stepping out onto the porch. “Might be good if we could block sight to the porches, too.” He pointed to Cathy’s house and raised his eyebrows.

  Dotty huffed a breath and clapped her hands together. “Okay then. Lots of blankets for us, and lots of work for you kids. Y’all be careful.”

  Preacher shook a set of keys. “Whoever’s with me, let’s move.”

  Preacher

  “I still can’t believe that woman next to Teddy’s shop nearly shot you,” Mel said. “Although, you do look like you’d be robbing the place.” She pushed a box into his waiting arms. “As big as those muscles are, do you think bird shot would just bounce off?”

  The sound of an engine and a flash of lights pulled Preacher’s attention from Mel’s teasing. He looked towards Teddy’s house and saw headlights coming in through the driveway, stopping in front.

  “Heads up,” he called to Teddy, and when the old man swung around, he pointed.

  Teddy peered through the drizzle and spat out a string of sound that was probably curses.

  “Girls, get down out of the truck. Close it up,” he said. “Hurry now. Get on down here.”

  Preacher tossed the box he was holding back into the truck and dodged as Ripley’s foot swung by him. She pulled on the truck’s door strap, swinging her legs out for leverage. The door came rolling down with a loud crash.

  Voices sounded from the front yard, and a flashlight swung around the house. “He’s back there!” a voice called out.

  “Shit,” Teddy spat, then raised his voice. “Boys, get those doors closed.” The old man started shuffling towards the big outbuilding, and Preacher overtook him in a few steps.

  “People here. Close it up,” he called, and grabbed one of the two big doors. Marco and Corey scrambled to him, and together they got the big doors shut just as Teddy caught up. An engine revved, and Preacher stepped around the building to find a pickup truck barreling down the long drive towards them.

  “Let me do the talking,” Teddy called out. “Stay calm. It might be friends.”

  “Friends would announce themselves,” Marco said. “We need the guns.”

  “Not where they can see ‘em,” Teddy said. “Girls, with me. You boys get out of sight.”

  “Mine’s inside,” Corey said. “I’ll stay in the back partition.” He slipped through the smaller door set to the side of the outbuilding.

  Marco and Preacher held back as Teddy stepped out to the front of the building, directly into the glow of the headlights.

  “I don’t like this,” Marco said as they watched the girls join the old man. He jogged over to where his shotgun lay on top of a burn barrel and hurried back.

  Preacher didn’t have a gun with him. Dotty had shown him the shotgun she kept at the house, but he’d left it there. He knew the girls each had a pistol, and Corey had Ripley’s little Ruger 10/22 with him inside. Teddy’s outbuilding looked like a big barn with doors in the center, but was split into three sections with partitions inside, like his old chicken house back on his mother’s farm. They’d been offloading the truck into the far left partition. The center was something of a workshop, or what Mel had called a “man cave”, and in the right section--closest to the house--was Millie, Teddy’s old APC. Each of the end partitions had big swing-out double doors on the ends of the building, with a smaller, normal door on the long side.

  “I’m going for higher ground,” Marco said, and started climbing a multi-level stack of big 50-gallon barrels Teddy had piled on the corner.

  A pickup truck pulled up and stopped in front of the workshop doors, bathing Teddy and the girls in blinding headlights. The old man held a hand to shade his eyes, and Preacher could see by the silhouettes that each of the girls had their hands on their pistols.

  The engine shut off and the truck’s door opened, but the headlights stayed on. “Teddy,” a man’s voice called out. “Just the man I’ve been looking for.”

  “Yeah?” Teddy called back. “Well, you found me. Why don’t you come out here where I can see who I’m talkin’ to?”

  “There’s more men getting out of the back of the truck,” Marco hissed from his perch on top of the barrels.

  “Have your ladies take your hands off of those weapons and I’d be happy to,” the man said. “My officers and I have been shot at enough these past few days.”

  Teddy grunted and stood a little stra
ighter, hands on his hips. “Well Frank, if you’re coming on people’s properties uninvited like you did just now, I can see why,” he said. He turned and looked at the girls, then back towards the truck. “Kill those damn headlights and tell those men I hear to stay in the truck. Then you can come out here and tell me whatever it is you think is so damn important you can just drive through my property.”

  The headlights clicked off. Frank Stalls stepped around the door and came to the front of the truck, hands raised.

  “I’m here on official City business,” Frank said.

  “That’s the second time today I’ve heard that,” Teddy said. “What is it this time? You here to inventory my house too? If so, you can go home.”

  “Like I said, my men and I have been taking a lot of fire the past few days. We need more protection. Seeing you this morning reminded me that you’ve got that APC from the war. I’m here to see about it.”

  Teddy’s stance didn’t change. He just stood, staring at Frank, not saying a word.

  Everyone waited, the sound of crickets and bugs from the trees at the back of the property seeming over-loud. Frank slowly dropped his hands, resting one on the hood of the truck. Preacher looked up at Marco, who caught the movement and shrugged.

  Finally, after at least a full minute of no response, Frank cocked his head. “Well?” he said.

  “Well what?” Teddy said.

  “I said I’m here to see the APC,” Frank said.

  “I heard you.”

  Frank took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “Annnnd?”

  “And now I’m waiting for you to leave,” Teddy said, shrugging. “I didn’t invite you here to look at my property, and I’ve got no reason to show it to you.” The old man crossed his arms over his chest. “So you, and all those men there, can go on home.”

  “Teddy I don’t think you understand the situation,” Frank started.

  “I understand just fine. You want my property. You ain’t got a warrant, you ain’t got a valid badge of office, and you ain’t got a pile of cash to buy it, not that I’m willing to sell it. That sound about right?”

  “The City made me an officer, Teddy, and as an officer I have the right to commandeer property as the need arises. The City will compensate you-”

  “No.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I said no. You can’t have it. I’m not giving it up without a valid warrant from a valid judge and due process. You remember due process?”

  Frank sighed and looked towards the back of the truck. Preacher couldn’t make out the details, but he could see the shadow of a man sitting in the cab, and darker lumps towards the back that looked to be about five men.

  “Fellas-” Frank started.

  “Is this where we pull out the guns?” Mel asked. “I’m ready to pull out the guns.”

  “Same here,” Ripley said.

  “You keep your men in the truck, Frank. We don’t want things escalating,” Teddy said.

  “I’m not leaving without that APC, Teddy. I need it, and by law-”

  “It don’t run, anyway,” Teddy interrupted. “Starter’s broke. I never got around to ordering another one.”

  “Bullshit,” Frank said. “You keep that thing running like brand new.”

  Teddy held up his hands in a what can you do gesture. “I got busy.”

  “Show me.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I said show me. You see, Teddy, I don’t believe you. You’ve got some kind of burr up your ass about this whole situation, and you’ve made it clear that no matter what the City says, or what the law says, you’re not going to cooperate. So when you tell me that your APC, that always looks like it just rolled off the showroom floor and purrs like a kitten in all of the parades, isn’t running, I find that a little hard to believe.”

  “I don’t care what you believe,” Teddy said. “Without a warrant, I ain’t showing you a damn thing.”

  “I’ve got six men with me that can force the issue,” Frank said.

  “And I’ve got men with guns trained on you and your boys,” Teddy said. “I give a signal, and they start shooting.”

  “Like hell you do, old man. These girls-”

  “Boys, say hello!” Teddy called.

  “Hello,” Corey yelled.

  “Aimed and ready,” Marco called out.

  Preacher took a deep breath. “LEAVE,” he bellowed.

  Frank flinched. There was muttering from the back of the truck.

  Teddy stood silent for a few moments and crossed his arms again.

  “I think it’s time you turned that truck around and get off of my land,” Teddy said. “And just so you know, I’ll be up at the Rec Center filing a formal complaint about how you’re out here harassing US Veterans.”

  “And young women,” Mel said.

  “Senior citizen,” Ripley added.

  Frank shook his head. “Why you gotta make things hard, old man? A little cooperation-”

  “You took an oath!” Teddy jabbed his finger towards Frank. “The same oath I took ‘fore you was even born! And you’re out here spitting on it! All of ya! I ain’t cooperating! Not now, not ever! I remember my oath! Enemies foreign and domestic!”

  “Is that a threat?” Frank said, his voice suddenly cool.

  “You bet your ass it is,” Teddy said. “Now get the hell off my property.”

  “Frank, let’s go,” a man called from the cab. “We’ll get it later.”

  “You ain’t gettin’ shit,” Teddy called back.

  Frank held his hands up and backed up. Preacher watched as the man climbed back in the truck, still wishing he had his own weapon. He had to fix that, sooner rather than later.

  The truck started and Frank turned it around in a wide arc, then rolled it slowly back up the drive. Everyone seemed to hold their breath until the sound of the engine faded away beneath the light rain. One by one, they came out of their hiding spots and gathered around the old man.

  “They’re not going to stay away,” Ripley said.

  “And lying about the starter won’t keep them from trying,” Marco said.

  “That wasn’t a lie,” Teddy said, slipping his hand into a pocket and coming out with a fist-sized hunk of metal. “Without this solenoid, it won’t start until I want it to.”

  “Smart,” Preacher said.

  Teddy looked in the direction the truck had gone and scowled. “Sometimes being smart only buys you a little time.” He jabbed a thumb at the truck. “You kids get back to that truck. I’ve got some things to take care of.”

  Preacher stepped aside as the little man hurried off towards his house, his steps sure on the slick ooze of the oyster shell drive.

  “What do you think he’s up to?” Ripley asked.

  “Guess we’re about to find out,” Preacher answered.

  Dotty

  Dotty leaned one hand on the back of a kitchen chair, the other holding a cotton hand towel at her hip. Candles lit the space, adding to the muggy heat. Even with both the doors and all of the back windows open, it still felt like a sauna inside.

  She took a deep breath through her nose, blew it out slowly, and looked at the kids seated around the table. “So he just left?”

  “He put the part back in his tank, had a talk with Preacher, and then he was gone,” Ripley said. “He wanted to get out of town before Frank came back with more men.”

  Mel straightened up and put her arms on her hips, then said with a bad imitation of Teddy, “Frank’s showed me twice today how far he’s willing to go. Someone shows you who they are, you believe ‘em.”

  Dotty looked to the porch doorway, where Corey leaned against the frame with his arms crossed. “He didn’t say where he was going, exactly? What route he was taking?”

  Corey shook his head and jutted his chin towards the table. “Just gave us those.”

  Dotty regarded the fat brown envelope on the table. It had a sticker from a legal firm in Salisbury, and her name typed on it. She was
n’t ready to open it. It looked too official. What had that old coot been planning?

  “What about Preacher?” she asked.

  “He’s spending the night in the hardware store,” Ripley said.

  “Even though you’ve emptied it?”

  Ripley nodded. “He said he’ll put the plywood up over the windows tomorrow and then it’ll be done. The guys are supposed to take turns keeping watch on your house tonight.”

  “But we can’t, so Thomas will have to stay up,” Corey said.

  “Or you can sleep next door,” Marco offered.

  Dotty huffed and dropped the towel on the table. “I’m a grown woman in my own home. I’ve been doing just fine sleeping here for years. I think I can handle one night without you men keeping watch.” She pointed at Corey. “But you...this ain’t no time to be headed down to Pocomoke in the middle of the night.”

  “We need plywood, or hoses and tubing, Grams,” Corey said. “We don’t have time to find them piece by piece.”

  “Teddy was right,” Marco added. “We saw them taking things this morning. We need to prepare for that now. Cover the windows. Maybe build something in the living room to catch bullets.”

  “Catch bullets?” Dotty gasped. “Isn’t that a little much?”

  “If someone’s firing into the house, we want to be able to get down behind something,” Marco said. He gestured with his arms. “We can build something to make the bottom two feet of the room safe. That’s enough to crawl and get out.”

  “Maybe we can find some more Quickcrete,” Corey said. “We grabbed everything Teddy had, but it wasn’t much.”

  “You really think someone’s going to be shooting at our house?” Dotty asked. “With all the people in here? They’d have to be-”

  “Desperate,” Ripley said, her voice flat. “Desperate, or just angry. On the way home, people were shooting up stuff just because they could. If the City thinks we’ve got something they want, who knows what they’ll do?”

  “Show up with a bunch of men and guns, judging by tonight,” Mel said.

  The room fell quiet. Dotty picked her towel up, tucked it in her waist apron, and moved to the living room doorway. There was barely any moonlight coming in through the windows with all of the cloud cover, and no candles. No reason wasting a candle if no one was going to be in the room. She took in her pretty lace curtains, her antique writing desk in front of the windows, and her worn area rug.