The Systemic Series - Box Set

by K. W. Callahan

  We had boarded up almost all the main windows on the first floor, even though the tallest of individuals would have had difficulty climbing through them. We had used a combination of the plywood we’d found in the garage, bookshelves, pieces of desks and beds, and other unneeded furniture to bolster these areas just in case, carving small portholes in our barricades that we could see through and fire our weapons. The areas around these holes were reinforced with anything heavy enough to stop bullets. Cast iron pans from the kitchen, flat stones from around the castle grounds, and huge tomes from the library were used as bullet resistant shields that we could fire from behind in relative safety.

  We did the same thing for our firing positions upstairs as well. The second floor was manned by Sharron and Joanna, one of them on either side of the house. Joanna had the master bedroom and attached office as her lookout post while Sharron took up position in the west-side guest suite that comprised the entire end of the second floor and gave her a view out over the front, side, and back yards located on that side of the castle. Janet was to have joined them, covering the center of the house, but Sharron and Joanna would now have to handle the upstairs on their own.

  It wasn’t a perfect defense, but overall we felt well covered. We’d rigged a large bell in the center of the house that we’d found out in the garden that was to be used as our alarm. Should the house be breached, ringing the bell was our call to fall back to the basement as our last bastion. We’d also found two walkie-talkies in the upstairs office that we used for communication between the first and second floor. The talkies sat on a small table beside the front door. I clipped one to my belt and tossed the other to Joanna as she hustled upstairs.

  It probably took everyone less than two minutes from the first sounds of gunfire to get to the family room, collect our weapons and ammo, and take up positions around the castle. Like elementary school students practicing tornado or fire drills, we’d spent time conducting this action before. I was proud of how my family troopers were executing their preparations, but terrified for them at the same time.

  Claire and I took up our positions near the front door. I chanced a quick peek outside from the protective defensive emplacement behind which I crouched, wondering exactly why the shooting had stopped. As I did so, I saw a man walking across the lawn toward me holding a white flag.

  My first reaction was one of hope, thinking that maybe the attackers had realized the folly of their ways and decided to aim for an amicable truce. But I had my doubts.

  I had to give this guy credit though, he definitely had balls. Shoot at our home, killing a young girl in the process, then stroll up here with his flag of truce. It burned me up inside, but I did my best to remain calm.

  As he neared, I recognized him as the preacher from town, Richard. Moments later, I lost sight of him as he made it up to the front door and knocked loudly, calling out, “We need to talk.”

  I couldn’t let him in because we’d barricade the door, and there was no way I was going to remove our bulwarks. Nor was I going to tell him to go around to the rear of the house to come inside though the backdoor as that would give away our weakest entry point.

  “Go around to the garden,” I called back. “I’ll meet you there.”

  Claire looked at me worriedly, “What if it’s a trap?” she whispered.

  I looked at her and shrugged, “Have to find out.”

  She grabbed me fast by the hand as I prepared to leave, hugging me tight and then kissing me. “Be safe,” she said.

  “You too,” I told her. “Stay behind the barriers…and be ready for anything. If this goes bad, you’ll be holding the center of the house by yourself.” I unclipped the walkie-talkie from my belt and held it out to her. “Just in case,” I said.

  She pushed it away, “I won’t need it,” she stared deeply into my eyes.

  I put it back on my belt and moved to the back door where Emily stood guard. “I’m going out,” I told her. “Re-bar the door behind me. I could be back in a hurry though, so be ready.”

  She nodded that she understood.

  I slid the protective bar from its place and handed it to her, then unlocked the door, opened it, and stepped outside. I pulled it closed behind me, and listened for the sounds of her re-locking it and sliding the security bar back into place before moving on. I scanned the expansive backyard for signs of movement. I was glad that this space was so large because it meant that the forest’s tree line was nearly 100 yards from the back of the castle, forcing any attackers to shelter there at a more distant point and giving us time to see any attack coming from this direction well before it arrived.

  A few seconds later, I’d scaled the back of the garden’s stone wall and was at its front gate where I unchained and then unlocked it.

  I opened it and found myself face to face with Richard, Tipton’s preacher and town leader.

  I stepped back to let him inside and relocked the gate behind him once he was inside. He watched warily as I did so but remained silent. I figured he was putting his faith in God right now, and I let him.

  I turned to face him.

  “It was not my…” he started, but in my mind, all I could see was Janet’s shattered face, her young form lying lifeless on the floor, never to experience the joys of adulthood that had been stolen from her by this piece of shit who preached so mightily from his pulpit.

  Before he could finish his words I threw a hard right hook that landed against his cheek and jaw. Bolts of pain seared through my hand and I actually bit through the inside of my lip as I cringed from the impact. My hand had recovered from our scouting mission to Tipton when I’d injured it during the fight with the Wardlaw boys – the event that had brought us to this point – but obviously not as much as I had thought.

  The blow wobbled Richard and he staggered off balance for a moment, but he didn’t go down. Instead, he steadied himself and looked as though he might retaliate, but then he calmed himself and stood straight again.

  “You piece of shit!” I said. “There’s a 16-year-old girl dead on the floor in there with half her fucking head blown off because of you!” I pointed at the castle behind me. “You couldn’t have come to talk before you started taking potshots at us?”

  “I’m sorry,” he said, looking shocked and surprisingly remorseful. “It wasn’t supposed to happen that way. No one was supposed to fire without my order.”

  His admission of guilt and apology acted to quell some of my anger, but not all of it.

  I took an antagonizing step toward him, fists clenched, hoping to provoke a reaction, but he stood motionless as though welcoming my reprisal. I pulled my arm back, readying for another swing, but restrained myself, gritting my teeth so hard I’m surprised I didn’t chip any of them.

  “We wouldn’t be up here were it not for you claiming one of our own first,” Richard said. “The one who fired those first shots at your home just minutes ago was the brother of the man you killed. He and his family are here for justice.”

  “Wardlaw,” I said menacingly.

  Richard looked surprised, “Yes…you know him?”

  I nodded, “We came down to your town to try to introduce ourselves. We’d been having some trouble with theft up here. Someone stole some meat and our ATVs.”

  Richard listened, nodding knowingly.

  “While we were down there, your hillbilly twins, the Wardlaws, took one of our group…a female member,” I explained.

  Richard looked surprised by this revelation.

  “One of them got himself killed in the process of our getting her back…while they were trying to rape her,” I added. “Sadly, I consider it a pretty lenient punishment compared to what I would have liked to have done to him. I hope I can provide his brother with a similar fate…even more so now that he’s killed a defenseless teen. Why don’t you send him up here and just go back home? It won’t be an even trade, but at least you’ll be rid of him. I can’t imagine he’s doing your group much good,” I said, using my insid
er knowledge of the strife between Richard and the Wardlaws in hopes of ending the situation without any more bloodshed.

  Richard shook his head sadly, “I didn’t know about them taking the woman,” he said. “I’m very sorry both about the encounter in town as well as the incident here.”

  He seemed such a reasonable and intelligent man. I was glad to be dealing with him rather than the clan of halfwits he had under him. I half felt sorry for his having to deal with them and was tempted to invite him and any of his group that were halfway normal to join us.

  “However,” he went on, “you don’t seem to understand the situation. This is our land and we want it back. We’ve allowed you to live here relatively peacefully, but you’ve outstayed your welcome.”

  “Huh,” I snorted. “Our welcome? This is what you people call a welcome? Stealing our food and vehicles? Killing and attempting to rape innocent people?”

  “It wasn’t supposed to happen that way,” he said. “And I’m sorry it turned out like that. But there isn’t much I can do about it now.”

  “The hell there isn’t,” I said. “You can turn around and go right back down the hill, back to your little town, and stay there. Believe me, you won’t be seeing us again. We have no desire to be any part of your community…if you can call it that.”

  Richard looked at me calmly. I could see his jaw was already starting to swell from where I’d hit him.

  “I don’t think you understand,” he said. “You people are leaving one way or the other. Personally, I really don’t care if you stay, but most of the people out there,” he gestured behind him, “do. To them, you’re dangerous outsiders who are taking their food and killing people in their community. I’ve talked them out of coming up here since your incursion into town, but they’re starving and you have good hunting grounds up here. They know it, and they want them. Justice for the Wardlaw boy is only an excuse. They want your food and your land, and they want you gone so that there’s more of it for them. At this point, I’m just a mouthpiece to give you your options.”

  “Our options?” I said, hoping to call his bluff. “The way I see it, I should be giving you options. You really think you can take this place? We’ve had months to prepare our defenses. We’re well armed, well trained, and we’ve been preparing for this. You don’t stand a chance.” But then I made a slight misstep. “I’ve seen your numbers when we were in town. There aren’t enough of you.”

  I saw Richard blink, thinking, considering his response, and then he said, “There’s more of us than you think. What you saw at the church was but a fraction of those of us who survived the flu…our community leaders so to speak, representatives of the greater whole. Others from surrounding towns and counties have joined us, but many of them don’t come to the weekly meetings. They send one or two representatives so that the others can attend to other duties.”

  I wasn’t sure if he was lying or not.

  “All you need to do it leave,” he said. “We’ll give you an hour to pack up and get out. You can take your vehicles, your weapons, and anything else that you can load up, but you have to leave and never come back. It’s a fair deal all things considered, and I think you should take it.”

  “Fair deal?” I scoffed. “Bullshit!” This is our home now, and we’re not leaving just because you’ve asked us to.”

  Whether they had more people or not, it would be a tough go of it for them if they tried to take the castle from us. My main concern was ammunition and fuel levels. I wasn’t sure if we had enough for a prolonged attack. If they decided to wait us out, things could get rough in a hurry.

  I quickly debated whether we should indeed cut our losses and move on, not risking any more bloodshed in the process. But move on to what? What awaited us out there? Likely just more hardship and death. And if that was the case, wouldn’t it be worth the risk to defend what we already had?

  “Sorry, no,” I said. “We’re staying. And now I’m going to give you my personal opinion. There’s no way you’re going to be able to take this place from us. So why don’t you send the Wardlaw clan up in the first attack. My sharpshooters will take them out for you, and then you’re rid of them. You can call it a day, head back to town free of your troublemakers, and we’ll be happy to shoot a few extra deer for you each month and send them to town for you. It’s a win/win for both of us. You’re rid of those pain-in-the-ass Wardlaws, you’ll be getting the food you need, and we’ll both be out of each other’s hair.”

  He just shook his head. “I wish it were that simple. Unfortunately it’s not. Wardlaw blood goes back a long way in this area. It’s spread throughout the community, and what they say here, goes. I’ve been able to sway opinion for a while, but they’re out for blood now. I was barely able to convince them to give you the option of leaving. They insisted on just coming up here and killing all of you, but I finally got the rest of the town to go along with the idea for their own safety…certainly not for yours.”

  “So if we left, what’s to stop them from shooting us on our way out?”

  Richard shrugged, “Nothing, I guess. It’s a chance you’ll have to take, but I think it’s a chance worth taking.”

  “Sure…you would,” I said. “But we’re not going to. You seem like a reasonable individual, but if you don’t have any real influence over your minions out there, then I guess there’s no sense in wasting our breath. Sorry,” I held out a hand to him.

  I was genuinely sorry for him. He was playing the shit hand he’d been dealt. He was trying to make the best of it, but he was under the thumb of the Wardlaws, and as long as that was the case, he was stuck.

  He shook my hand, “Yeah, me too,” he nodded.

  And with that, he turned around and walked back out the gate.

  I re-locked and chained it behind him, than dashed around to the back door. On the way, I ripped the walkie-talkie off my belt and alerted Joanna upstairs. “Get ready!” was all I said.

  Emily let me back inside, “Get ready!” I bellowed as soon as I was inside. I didn’t need a bell to alert our people, my voice was enough. It echoed throughout the castle walls, and I knew it was unnecessary anyway. Everyone was ready and waiting.

  I tore my way back to where Claire waited for me at the front of the house and pushed her down close to the floor.

  Moments later it started.

  Gunfire echoed out across the mountaintop, followed instants later by bullets that began smashing into the house. There were pings, zings, and little puffs of smoke from where bullets struck the castle’s exterior stone walls. The crashing of glass and cracking of wood emanated from where bullets smashed into windows and the barricades behind them. Some rounds zipped their way through cracks and openings into the castle, pounding home into walls, furniture, and artwork.

  There was no sound of return fire. Everyone was waiting for the initial barrage to diminish, conserving their ammo just as we’d discussed in our planning for this situation. As we waited, I wondered just how many people Richard did have under him. From the sounds of the shooting, and the amount of fire we were taking, it felt like a lot. Maybe Richard hadn’t been lying about his numbers, but it was impossible to know at this point.

  I raised my head and did a quick scan of the area outside. It appeared that the townspeople were content to fire from the cover of the forest and their vehicles right now, but I figured it wouldn’t be long before they started probing the house. We had to keep them at bay. If they made it up close to the walls, the angle would make it extremely difficult to have lines of fire from our secure positions and we would have to risk exposing ourselves to shoot at them.

  The gunfire eventually began to dwindle just a bit and I sneaked another peak outside. I could see a cluster of six or seven men moving across the front lawn toward the walled garden. I tapped Claire and nodded to her to get to her firing position. As soon as we got in place, I could hear gunfire begin from our eastern flank – Will and Dad. I saw one of the men drop on the lawn and lie there motionl
ess. I took aim and fired my own rifle, hitting another in the group and dropping him. I heard gunfire begin from the second floor and saw another in the group drop as Joanna did her part from above. The rest of the men turned and quickly fled back to the protection of the forest, leaving their dead or dying comrades lying exposed on the lawn.

  The gunfire from the forest and the cover of the vehicles re-intensified, this time striking home closer to our firing positions and forcing us down into cover. I knew exactly what they were doing. Richard had sacrificed a few men in order to get a better read on our defensive firing positions. It was a good strategic move, and one I hadn’t expected. I didn’t think that they’d be willing to risk the manpower in such an effort. Maybe they indeed had more people at their disposal than I’d assumed.

  The ferocity of their gunfire was pinning us down and keeping us from putting up any sort of return fire. The shooting continued, and after another minute, I heard the sound of forceful banging at the front door. I was ready for this, but hadn’t expected them to reach the walls of the castle so soon. I tapped Claire again, motioning her to stay put as I belly crawled across the floor from the front window where we’d taken up our positions, and over to the front door. The door and the barricade in front of it had been riddled with bullet holes and were vibrating with the impact of some sort of battering ram with which our attackers were smashing it. I could see that one side of the door, and the frame around it, were beginning to splinter, and I knew there wasn’t much time until Richard’s men forced their way through and inside the castle.

  We’d expected that something like this might happen, and we had put together a plan to combat it. In middle of the front door, about waist high, we’d cut a small, three-inch wide by seven-inch long slat that we had then covered with a piece of steel that could be slid aside but only from within. From outside, it was hardly noticeable.