War Zone: Homefront

by Thomas A. Watson

  “I hope Nathan made him squeal like a pig before he killed him,” Penny growled, and Aiden took a step back, shocked by his wife’s feral response.

  “Ah, I didn’t ask, but I got the impression he received his just desserts,” Aiden confirmed, again taken back by his diminutive wife’s fierce reaction. Penny Conklin’s five-foot-five height matched her barely one hundred and thirty-five pounds in an altogether pleasing, but petite package. Her slender, high-breasted figure and short cut hairstyle might give the impression she was one of those cold, Eastern society women who demanded to be called Mizz in public, but Aiden knew her better than that. In fact, at this moment, her low, guttural growl reminded the lawman more of an agitated junkyard dog.

  “Good,” Penny confirmed. Then in a smooth voice that was almost a pleased purr, she continued, “So, the federal government means to put us in re-education camps or kill us outright? That’s what has you stirred up over Gina?”

  “Right,” Aiden said, relieved to find himself back on more familiar ground. “Probably just kill us. From what Nathan said, anybody who disobeyed the government, even if it was just violating the travel ban, got a bullet. He reported finding hundreds of citizens shot down in the streets by what could only have been government-issued weapons. Some of which, he said he knew were operated by foreign troops.” Before Penny could ask the inevitable question, he continued, “Nathan said he found the spent shell casings for a machine gun firing 12.7x108mm rounds.”

  “And that means absolutely nothing to me, Aiden,” Penny said with a slight sigh of exasperation. “I go to the gun shows, honey, but I don’t memorize the calibers like you boys do. I know the calibers for my boomsticks, and that’s good enough for me.””

  “Well, I had to think about it too,” Aiden confided. “That’s almost a 50 caliber BMG, but Rusty reminded us the actual dimensions are 12.7x99mm. This other round is used by a lot of countries in the former Soviet Bloc, including the Russians.”

  “Gotcha,” Penny replied as the pieces fell into place. “We’re really getting our own real-life version of Red Dawn, aren’t we? And you’re worried Gina will have to fight on the front lines in this conflict?”

  “Yes,” Aiden all but hissed. “I know we can’t stay here bottled up in our little valley forever, but I was hoping to spare our child the worst of it. At least until she gets older. She’s only thirteen, Penny.”

  “I know, Aiden. I was there when she was born, remember?” Penny said, her tone sassy for a moment. Then she continued, her voice softer now. “I hate the idea of having to shoot anybody, and I hate it even more for our little girl. But, God help me, I don’t see the Powers-That-Be giving us much of an alternative. If FU-GMAN is correct, and you’re telling me Nathan has independent confirmation, then there’s no choice but to fight.”

  “That’s what I figured,” Aiden replied, cracking a smile. “With my little hellions, how can we do anything but fight?” Then more seriously, Aiden continued, “First, Rusty thinks we need to get a handle on those raiders out of Spokane. We can’t even think about taking the fight to those Chinese troops until we have some idea of the size and composition of this enemy closer to home.”

  “He thinking about going out and scouting the area? Awful lot of ground up here to cover,” Penny pointed out.

  “Way too much of it’s vertical, for my taste,” Aiden grumbled. It was a familiar complaint, and only meant to bring a smile to his wife’s lips. Even after all their years together, she delighted in calling him ‘flatlander’. Aiden had grown up in the Texas Panhandle, which had a few tall hills and a mesa or two, but otherwise sprawling grasslands. Penny, on the other hand, was a local girl and raised nearby in Sandpoint. Only her considerable charms had proved capable of drawing this rambunctious rodeo cowboy into settling down in a place where several feet of snow in the winters was not unexpected.

  “Yeah, there’s lots of places in the mountains to hide, which is why we picked the area,” Penny agreed, “but not when you have a large group of outlaws laying waste to the communities.”

  “That’s a valid point,” Aiden conceded. “We’ll just look for the biggest cloud of smoke and head that way.”

  Penny swallowed her next words when she heard Gina come bustling into the kitchen. At thirteen, the girl looked like a smaller clone of her mother, her hair and eyes were the same, but at just five feet (or maybe a touch under) Penny was waiting for her growth spurt to hit. What really made Gina look much smaller was her very slender build. She wasn’t skinny by any means like Amanda. She was just small-framed.

  “Hey, ‘Lil Bit,” Aiden called, giving Penny a significant look before turning to face his daughter. “You want to spend some time at the range tomorrow after I get back from duty?”

  “Sure thing, Dad. You know I love shooting with you,” the young teen enthused.

  “Well, I was thinking we’d have some other folks out as well. Maybe Randal, Tyler, and Robin, as well as some of Nathan’s kids that don’t go with him. How’s that sound?”

  “Sounds good, Dad. As long as they don’t mind getting smoked at the six-hundred-meter range.”

  “Yeah, um, about that…” Aiden stammered. “I think we’ll be working on some closer-in shooting at first. I want to run you guys through some tactical drills, too.”

  “Oh, that’s cool. Nathan has been working on some drills with all the kids. Well, except for Emma and Chip, that is. They’re still too little.”

  A new world, Aiden told himself. They were in uncharted territory in a new world, where a child as young as ten years old, like little Casey, needed training to shoot and move. If she wanted to ever see eleven...

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The house looked much the same as when he’d left it, Nathan noted, but he still felt weird driving up to see the changes wrought by others. The fence remained in place, for instance, but the steel gate had been damaged at some point, and a poorly-crafted patch job stood out sharply in comparison.

  “My daddy built that gate,” Nathan pointed out sharply as he pulled to a stop. At Rusty’s suggestion, he was driving his beat-up farm truck they’d collected for the retreat. No sense in advertising we got those little new flitters, Rusty reasoned about the Warthog buggies, and Nathan had agreed. Now, after leaving before daybreak and spending over six hours on the logging roads to approach from the back way, Nathan was beginning to feel the pressure build when he saw the familiar territory of his home.

  Tim, sensitive to his friend’s emotional state, simply pointed out, “They fixed it as best they could with the resources on hand, Nathan.”

  “Also means they weathered another attack,” Rusty added. The three of them were the only ones in the first truck, but behind them, Nathan knew the trio of Jasmine, Amanda, and John waited in the other truck. Nathan had wanted to come alone, but he’d been overruled. No one, not even Nathan, knew what might happen if he tried coming by himself.

  As Rusty had bluntly stated his position. “Nathan, you ain’t going without some adult supervision.”

  Nathan pouted, but as Amanda had pointed out, he was proving Rusty’s case for him. Darned girl is too smart for her own good, Nathan fumed, but he agreed. Message received. He would go, but only with an escort.

  They parked in plain view of the gate, and the two working vehicles and a half dozen people drew the attention of the two deputies on guard duty.

  “That you, Rusty?” one of the guards called out.

  “Hey, Mack. Yeah, just me and Tim and a few more friends.”

  “You don’t have that many friends, Rusty,” the deputy named Mack called back, not sounding quite so friendly either this time. “Why are you here? Something happen at your little bugout fortress?”

  “We’ve come to see the sheriff with news,” Rusty continued, fighting to keep the frustration off his face and out of his voice. Mack’s derisive dig made Rusty want to backhand the bastard through a wall. He’d approached nearly a dozen other deputies over the years, trying to get a
commitment for the retreat plan. The initial idea had not been to lock themselves away from the rest of the county and their responsibilities. No, in the event of an emergency, Rusty wanted a secure base for the families, so the county’s law enforcement personnel might be able to focus on the job of protecting and serving their community.

  Instead, Rusty faced ridicule from his dismissive coworkers, who were quick to label him as Chicken Little. Rusty also rapidly came to realize that the inane ‘Armageddon Preppers’ television show might have done more harm than good. Sure, the families depicted might have possessed some good ideas, but the producers of the program only wanted to highlight the most outrageous of personalities. In a nutshell, they wanted to titillate, not educate. Thus, serious-minded individuals like Rusty ended up being viewed by many as a crackpot.

  In the end, only with the quartet of Aiden, Bill, Nathan and Tim, did Rusty find men with the will and commitment to do something about securing their future. Too few, as it turned out, to implement the original emergency management plan Rusty had envisioned.

  “We had another mob attack the house,” Mack explained. “They were desperate, but not very smart.” Seeing Rusty’s distracted air, Mack took a closer look at his group and gave an audible gasp when he recognized Nathan.

  “I thought he was…”

  “In Atlanta,” Rusty finished for Mack. “He was. Now he’s here. Home.”

  “Well, hell,” Mack muttered. “I thought we could stay here until…”

  While Mack continued to speak, Rusty and Tim led the way, trailed by a bemused-looking Nathan and his three traveling companions. All six came walking up to the gate with grim expressions and weapons close at hand. Rusty promised Mack, the sheriff would want to see Nathan, no matter what else transpired, but the older deputy couldn’t guarantee the embattled lawmen would be willing to exit Nathan’s home without quite a bit of spirited discussion.

  Nathan didn’t care. This was his home. The place he grew up, and the place where his parents’ ghosts resided, as far as Nathan was concerned. He could see the trees planted by his father, and the gazebo his mother had demanded her menfolk build for her one summer after she’d seen one in a park in Denver. No matter the thing would be covered in ten feet of snow in the winter and would require a special sloped roof, so the weight of that same snow wouldn’t collapse the structural members. Ten-year-old Nathan had set to cutting the necessary boards with typical youthful zeal, and after several ruined two-by-fours, he was introduced to another of his father’s lessons. Measure twice, cut once.

  Looking around, Nathan could see all the familiar landmarks of his home, from the big red barn to the ranch-style main house and on to the smaller equipment shed Tim had helped him erect two summers ago. Things were off, though. The windows of the house, bordered by the decorative but functional metal shutters, appeared to be sealed up tight for the first time since they’d been installed, and the sheet metal walls of the big barn looked wrong somehow. The color was wrong on two of the panels, and the next one to the right was darkened, as if damaged by fire.

  They’ve been patched, he realized, with some of the spare corrugated sheets he’d kept stashed in the rafters of the equipment shed. Somebody tried to burn down my barn, Nathan thought, and the anger bubbled up in his system. Tim and Rusty let these freeloaders stay here and they couldn’t even be trusted to keep the property secure.

  While Nathan and his small party approached the wide front porch, he realized one of the guards, a deputy he recognized from the evening shift named Mack Tate, walked along beside Rusty and whispered urgently to the older deputy. Nathan barely paid him any attention, as his focus remained on the state of disrepair he saw all around on what had once been a shrine to his dead family. Flanking Nathan, John and Jasmine remained on high alert, and Amanda spent half her time walking backwards as she covered the rear. The three could feel the uneasiness radiating from Nathan.

  When Nathan stepped up onto the wide front porch, he saw the front door, a heavy, steel, fire-rated model painted to look like wood, stood slightly ajar. Even in one-quarter profile behind the door, the spare, lanky frame of the sheriff could be made out from the dim conditions inside.

  “Good afternoon, Nathan,” Sheriff Frank Hargrove said, his voice steady despite the turmoil boiling in his gut. He’d never seriously considered Nathan’s return, despite Tim’s assurances the man would still be coming home.

  After the first chaotic weeks of looting and killing, the Sheriff had assumed it would take an army to travel across that much of the war-torn countryside, so he’d felt confident in accepting Bill and Tim’s offer. That beat trying to take the well-equipped farmhouse under his own form of Eminent Domain. Too bad those kids had taken all the food with them, though.

  All those thoughts and plans came crashing down as soon as Frank Hargrove saw Nathan walking up to the front door. He’d been alerted by the field phone strung from the gate house when Vinnie Esterhaus, the other deputy on duty, nervously spread the word while Mack tried to slow the newcomers down with his constant chatter.

  He’s come with only five, the sheriff thought quickly, and we have the house, so maybe we can take them. This idea was dismissed almost as quickly as it came to the sheriff, though. His men still thought of themselves as deputies, Frank knew, and he doubted they would be willing to gun down some of their own. For Frank, more politician than law officer these last dozen years, the rules felt more flexible. His new motto might be boiled down to ‘Do whatever it takes to protect me and mine first’. Looking at Nathan’s face, Frank quickly realized, they might be able to take this small group, but not many of his own would survive. Of those that did, he knew for a fact, when the rest of ‘The Posse’ showed up for revenge, there would be no survivors.

  Rusty and Tim had been badly mistaken about their friend’s mood, taking Nathan’s brooding silence for agreement to the status quo. Nathan gave little hint of his thoughts, other than a slight flush to his features, and Jasmine, Amanda, and John knew Nathan was on the verge of going ballistic on someone. They’d seen that look before. The other two members in their party, familiar with the old Nathan, still didn’t have a clue until Nathan opened his mouth. Rusty and Tim might have been forgiven their error, if the stakes had not been so high.

  “Get your shit and get the fuck out of my house, you no-good, freeloading asshole!” Nathan roared, the veins in his neck protruding like high tension cables.

  “But, Bill said…” Frank started, shocked by this side of Nathan, his reserve deputy.

  “Bill said you could stay, if you kept the house and grounds protected!” Nathan thundered, gesturing around wildly. “Does this place look protected?! Look at that damage! This is un-fucking-acceptable!”

  At Nathan’s first growl, Amanda, John, and Jasmine drew their sidearms within a split second of each other, triggered by the sound in Nathan’s voice. John and Jasmine held their pistols at low ready as they eased into a back-to-back stance, but Amanda didn’t hesitate when she covered the trailing deputy.

  With the raised voices, Deputy Tate clearly decided something was wrong, and his hand drifted to the butt of his still-holstered pistol. Amanda sensed the man’s motion and reacted instantly.

  “Get your hands up!” Amanda shouted, her high, girlish voice suddenly sounding much more menacing. “Get them up! I won’t tell you again!”

  “Look, little…”

  Whatever Mack Tate might have said would never be known as Amanda unleashed on him.

  “Call me little girl, motherfucker, I dare you!” Amanda screamed, her voice drowning out even Nathan’s bellowing as she vented on the deputy. “Say it! Say it, and I will shoot you right in your tiny, shriveled little pee-pee and watch you bleed out!”

  “R…Rusty, a little help here?” Mack demanded. His fingers remained poised over the holstered pistol, but he could see the girl’s eyes. They were wide, but without emotion. Mack stared hard, and he saw his death there.

  “I don’t know,�
� Rusty replied laconically, feeling a bit guilty, but relishing the opportunity to get some of his own back. He didn’t want things to spiral out of control here, but if they did, he was backing Nathan and his crew. “I don’t reckon I got a lot of friends here after all, right? I can tell you, that young lady will kill you if you reach for that shooting iron on your hip. I can honestly say, she’s killed more than any of you, or me, if you want to get technical.”

  “Damn right, I’ll shoot you! Then I’ll skull-fuck the hole I scoop out of your head!” Amanda bellowed, and Nathan, hearing the last few pronouncements from his adopted thirteen-year old daughter, halted his diatribe against the sheriff in mid-sentence.

  “Will she pull the trigger?” Sheriff Hargrove managed to croak out in a strangled voice. As he gestured with his left hand, Nathan had instinctively taken a grip on the sheriff’s shirt with his right, bunching up the fabric as he lifted Sheriff Hargrove clean off the floor.

  Hearing this, and knowing he was about to choke the man out, Nathan eased his grip and lowered the sheriff, so his feet were once more touching the tile of the entryway. He stepped back a pace, watching the man’s hands. If he twitched wrong, Nathan was going to kill him.

  “Yeah,” Nathan replied with more than a touch of scorn in his voice. “She’ll kill him graveyard dead and never blink when she ransacks his corpse.”

  “But she’s just a kid!” Sheriff Hargrove exclaimed.

  “Sure, but it’s a hard world out there these days,” Nathan growled, the thought of how he’d first seen Amanda, nearly catatonic and so caked in mud and filth, he couldn’t tell if the creature in front of him was a boy or girl.

  “Amanda’s thirteen, and she and my other kids took out a whole team of hardcore, military-equipped killers without batting an eyelash. They also did it without letting me know what they’d planned. If Mack doesn’t comply, she will kill him and then start on everybody else here.”

  “Mack, stand down!” the sheriff called out, his voice interrupting Amanda’s ongoing stream of trash talk.