The Jared Chronicles | Book 3 | Chains of Tyranny

by Tippins, Rick

  It was becoming too much pressure for a young man who in the past made sure to align himself with a life much easier and far more pampered than his current situation offered. Jared relaxed his stiff hands and wrapped them around his rifle, thinking that in this cold, they should be wrapped around a warm cup of coffee from Starbucks or Peete’s or some other place, maybe Philz Coffee, he didn’t care as long as the cup was hot. Instead a black rifle lay swaddled in his rough hands—hands that knew how to bring the weapon to bear and had done so on more than a few occasions. Hell, the rifle hadn’t been far from his hands for even a single hour since the first day Bart handed it to him back in the older man’s gun store.

  “You okay?” Shannon said for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, snapping Jared out of his daze.

  His lips parted slightly; then his tongue wet them and he spoke. “How much more can we all take?”

  Shannon’s head cocked slightly as her face contorted questioningly.

  “Part of me just wants to lie down and be done with it all,” Jared continued, his voice weak and distant.

  “You’re scaring me, talking like that,” Shannon breathed softly as if trying to gauge the seriousness of Jared’s statement. “No one else can ever hear you say that.” Shannon followed up as she turned and tossed her chin in the direction of the rest of the group. “They are all relying on you to make life a little easier.”

  Jared thought about John for the millionth time and was able to find a bit of resolve in the man’s memory. He hefted his shoulders a half inch higher and locked eyes with Shannon. “I know, I’m sorry. Sometimes it’s a lot—being depended on, I mean. I never had a family, but this—all this and all of them is a heavy burden that I don’t always realize until days like today. When reality hits me, it hits hard, that’s all,” Jared finished with a sigh.

  Shannon smiled softly but remained silent, allowing Jared to get whatever he needed to get off his chest, out and into the open, where she hoped he would air it out in a positive manner.

  Jared gazed at the tired lines in Shannon’s still-pretty face, then shook his head. “Let’s go see what these people are all about.”

  Four hours after Quinten walked out of the group’s camp, Jared and company were standing in front of the man’s home. The entrance to the property was marked as Quinten described, and it took the group only a few minutes to traverse the nearly quarter-mile driveway to the modest country-style home with a circular gravel driveway and dead landscape that had before the event surely made the home look colorful and lively from the outside.

  The house was typical of California’s ranch-style single-level homes, complete with a large front porch and awnings above all the windows. The home was well kept and painted white with gray trim that matched the awnings. A large barn stood across the yard from the house and was red with white trim and two large front doors big enough to drive a large piece of farm equipment through.

  Quinten and his wife, Margie, met the haggard group as they stopped at the home’s front steps. Introductions were made, but Jared nearly missed Margie’s name when they were introduced. His mind was not in the here and now. He smiled, putting on a positive front, fooling everyone but Shannon. Jared couldn’t stop thinking about where John had been taken and how he was managing.

  Jared felt positive if he had been taken, John would have moved heaven and earth in order to bring Jared back to the group. As Jared’s mind wandered, he and the rest of his friends were invited inside Quinten and Margie Thacker’s home, where they were offered a home-cooked meal. The lunch consisted of chicken or maybe turkey sandwiches. The bread was homemade—well, all bread was homemade these days—but this was the first time any of the group had enjoyed a truly homemade meal. It was also the first time any of them were able to enjoy a slice of bread in more than four months.

  Jared wasn’t the only person at the table in a mood. Claire grew more detached as the days had passed. With no sign of a relief effort on the part of the government in sight, Claire spiraled downward at a rate that would have been termed clinically severe. While Jared ate, Claire did not; instead she picked through the sandwich like a finicky four-year-old eater. The young woman had lost a significant amount of weight and was looking less healthy with each passing week. Life on the road, which had only been a couple of days, seemed to have accelerated her decline both physically and mentally.

  Jared was drawn out of his interpersonal thoughts by the conversation at the table. Calvin and Quinten were discussing the possibility of the two groups joining forces to work the Thacker ranch. Quinten was describing his lack of people power and how he had begrudgingly pulled most of his cattle in closer to the house in order to manage and safeguard them. This posed a significant problem in regard to feeding the animals. Quinten had more than enough land to move the cattle from pasture to pasture, allowing the last pasture to regrow while the herd mowed through the next fertile pasture land.

  The Thackers’ issue was there just wasn’t enough land close to the house to sustain the herd, but with added people to patrol, mend fences, and tend to all the other needs of keeping a healthy herd, Quinten surmised they could use each other’s strengths. The Thackers owned beef cattle, but lacked the manpower to tend their herd in its present size. Jared and his group lacked a sustained meat source, but possessed man and woman power.

  Jared swept his gaze around the table and didn’t see a bit of reservation from any of his group. He knew for certain he would not be staying with the Thackers. Jared was instead forming the beginning of a plan in his brain. Jared drew his hands up, clasping them in front of his face, rubbing his thumbs together slowly as he searched for all the right pieces to his plan.

  Jared studied Quinten and marveled at the man’s tactical maneuvering. The man had invited them all over for a meal. A meal the likes of which no one had enjoyed in months. He’d filled their bellies and then began talking of the two parties joining together. After roaming about the land half starved for the past several months, who in their right mind would have said anything other than a resounding yes to Quinten’s offer.

  After lunch, the two parties moved onto a back deck, where they drank warm tea Margie served to everyone. The two children climbed on an old child’s play structure that probably hadn’t been used since Cody had learned to hunt and ride four-wheelers. The adults sat watching the kids while making small talk. No one noticed the absence of Claire until a shout came from the front of the house. Quinten’s ranch hand came careening around the side of the house, his face flushed with shock.

  He shouted in Spanish to Quinten as he pointed back the way he’d come. Jared got to his feet, pulling the rifle around to his front, fingering the selector off safe. The ranch hand turned, then looked back expectantly as Quinten also got to his feet. Quinten shot Calvin a look. Concern and worry were etched across his weathered face as he gestured for the older man to follow. Jared fell in behind the three other men as they hurried toward the front of the house. Jared paused briefly to address Shannon.

  “Get the kids inside until I figure out what is going on.”

  Shannon wordlessly waved at the two kids, who were staring at the adults, their faces masked in fear. The kids in the new world were learning quickly to seek direction from an adult when things seemed to transition from normal to outright dangerous.

  Jared turned and sprinted to catch Calvin. “What’s the problem?” He huffed as he came within speaking distance of the three other men. Calvin turned, his weary shoulders giving a little shrug. “Calvin, stop!” Jared shouted.

  The ranch hand and Quinten slowed, but continued toward the red barn forty yards from the front of the house.

  “Are we running headlong into something that’s gonna get one of us killed?” Jared pressed. Now Jared was on high alert, scanning three hundred and sixty degrees, searching for any possible threats. When his question went unanswered, he slowed his pace, but continued toward the barn.

  The barn was like any barn Jare
d had ever seen in a movie or book. One of the large front doors hung slightly ajar while the second door remained closed. Quinten and his employee reached the barn, where the ranch hand flung the already slightly ajar door fully open. Even after everything Jared had witnessed and experienced, he was not prepared for what he saw in that red barn that cold, but otherwise clear late January afternoon.

  Claire hung from a beam, attached by her neck to a long thick segment of rope. The knot around the woman’s neck was not a noose, but a crudely tied double knot like a child would have used to ensure their sneakers didn’t come untied. Claire’s neck was a full twelve inches longer than Jared remembered it being earlier in the day, giving her an insane human giraffe look. Her tongue protruded from her already swollen mouth while pink frothy fluids leaked from her nose, rolling down and off her chin, where they stained her already dirty blouse a light pinkish color.

  Quinten cursed softly under his breath as Jared stood staring gaped mouth at the woman hanging from the rafters of an old musty barn in a post-apocalyptic world.

  “God damn it to hell and gone,” snapped Calvin, bringing Jared out of his semi-trance.

  Jared’s engineer’s mind kicked in as he quickly reconstructed the scene. Claire had obviously found the rope and climbed into the hayloft, where she’d tied the rope around both her neck and a beam before leaping to her death. The fall obviously broke Claire’s neck, which was now elongated to twice its normal length. Jared could see the grotesque scene, but wasn’t fully processing it yet. Next to him Calvin lamented through low guttural curses as he beat himself up for not intervening in the girl’s downward spiral, which had just ended in the black abyss of suicide.

  Quinten finally barked something to the ranch hand in Spanish, and the man clambered up to the hayloft, where he began cutting through the rope, using a small folding knife. Jared, Calvin and Quinten held the girl as the rope was severed, lowering her gently to the ground before stepping back.

  Jared turned to Quinten. “Can we bury her here on your property?”

  “Of course,” he answered softly.

  Quinten and Calvin set about wrapping Claire’s body in a tarp while Jared trudged back to the deck to inform Barry, Carlos and the remaining women. When he got there, they were all waiting anxiously as the kids peeked out the back door.

  “Essie, you and Salvador go inside and close the door,” Jared instructed. The two heads withdrew and the door clicked shut. Jared knew they’d be listening, so he kept his voice low as he updated everyone. Upon hearing the news, Shannon’s hands flew to her mouth while Stephani lowered her head into her hands. Barry and Carlos immediately set off for the barn as Jared stood waiting for a response from the two women.

  After a moment, Shannon whispered, “As far as the children are concerned, Claire had an accident.”

  Jared nodded, glancing over his shoulder to ensure the littles weren’t eavesdropping. “She fell from the loft in the barn,” was all Jared said before turning and walking back to the barn.

  Quinten started a blue tractor and pulled it to the front of the barn, where the men loaded Claire’s body in the front bucket. The men followed as Quinten drove slowly out away from the house to a large tree. Under the tree, Quinten gently deposited Claire’s form on the ground before scooping out several bucketloads of dirt. When Quinten was finished, he’d dug a proper grave for Claire, at which time she was deposited at the bottom of the hole, and the grave was refilled. No one said anything, although Jared and Calvin stood over the woman’s grave for a solid thirty minutes after it had been covered.

  Calvin was the first to break the silence. “I knew something was up with her and even tried talking to her, but she shut me down pretty quick.” He was quiet for a moment before continuing. “Didn’t have to be like this. We have to be more proactive with each other’s well-being,” Calvin muttered.

  Jared nodded, clapping Calvin on the back. Slowly the two men pivoted on their heels and walked back to the house.

  Chapter 7

  After Claire was put to rest, Carlos and Calvin stabled the horses, giving them real feed and fresh water Cody hand pumped from a well. When all the outside chores were complete, the group retired to the spacious living room of the Thacker home while Quinten built a fire consisting of wood Cody hauled in from the side of the house. Once the fire was crackling and the heat began to fill the air, seeping its way into everyone’s bones, Calvin opened a bottle of bourbon and asked if Margie had any glasses.

  While Margie went to retrieve the glasses, Jared stared around the room at all the people in it. What had happened today with Claire was a testament to their situation and how utterly real and oftentimes hopeless it could make a person feel. Jared felt down himself, but nowhere near down enough to take his own life. Maybe the girl was so tied to the electronic world of old, she wasn’t able to cope with the harsh oppressive lifestyle the post-solar-flare world left them to wrestle with. Jared couldn’t blame the girl, while at the same time he also couldn’t condone her actions. What he could do was not judge the woman’s actions.

  He felt absolutely miserable every single day lately. The weather was cold and wet; therefore he was cold and much of the time wet. He was always hungry and oftentimes thirsty. He drank water and then prayed it wouldn’t make him sick. He ate food and worried about the time when their reserves would run out. Since the solar flare, Jared was fairly sure he could count the full nights’ sleep he’d enjoyed on a single hand. He’d been shot, shot at, forced to shoot at and shoot people. He’d lost friends and suffered being terrified or at the very least scared seventy percent of the time, so he understood how all those pressures could drive someone to do what Claire did.

  Claire’s death hadn’t caused Jared to mourn for her loss; it instead scared him to his core. Claire’s departure from earth signaled the possibility that all the stressors of this new world could drive a person mad. Jared was a firm believer that every person was capable of anything and had only to reach their personal breaking point to realize their true potential. He couldn’t say definitively he would never take his own life, but he was positive he would fight any urge to do so with all the internal strength he possessed.

  Margie returned with a handful of glasses, depositing them in front of Calvin, who set about wordlessly staring a person in the eye before pouring or moving on. When it came to Cody, Calvin glanced at Quinten, who shrugged, but Cody shook his head, and Calvin moved on. Once those who wanted it had it, they all sat back, aiming at achieving an elusive relaxed comfortable state only known before the solar flare and rarely if ever attained after it.

  Jared melted into the large pillow cushions of the Thackers’ couch as he took a draw off the glass of brown liquor. He was always amazed at how the first pull could peel away many of the day’s stresses within seconds of cascading down his throat and dropping into his stomach. The children murmured at the far end of the room, where Shannon, with Margie’s help, had set up a board game for them to play.

  “The invitation to stay remains.” Quinten’s voice seemed to boom in the quietness of the room.

  “I’m staying,” Carlos said softly, failing to meet Jared’s eyes as he stared at the carpeted floor.

  Calvin took a drink and set his glass on a side table, making sure to rest the glass on a coaster. Some things hadn’t changed, in Calvin’s opinion, and one of them was manners. His glass resting on the coaster, Calvin studied Jared a moment before speaking. “I think we should all stay—at least until spring or warmer weather sets in.”

  Jared saw heads bob in unison at Calvin’s suggestion before quickly turning to Shannon, who raised her eyebrows, tilting her head in Essie’s direction.

  “This was my plan all along,” Barry added, with more than a little hesitation in his voice as he shot Jared a furtive glance.

  “I’m with Calvin on this, Jared,” Stephani broke in. “It’s pretty hard living on the road with everything that’s happened, and it hasn’t even started really raining yet.
I say we stay until we can figure something out.”

  Jared emptied the glass of bourbon and set the glass atop a coffee table. “You all seem to forget one thing; John is out there somewhere. We needed him and he was always there for us, and now he needs us, and I for one am going to Stockton and, at the very least, try to help him.”

  Shannon’s eyes narrowed as she leaned in toward Jared. “We’ve gone over this; you have certain responsibilities—”

  Jared cut her off. “This will be a safe place for you and Essie while I’m gone. I will go and come back. When I get back, we can all sit down and decide what’s good for the group.” Finished, Jared wished he hadn’t drained the glass so he could have done something besides sit and engage a haughty Shannon in a staring contest with the odds of his winning being about on par with the odds of his winning a fight with a grizzly bear.

  From the doorway to the rear of the house came Devon’s voice. “I’m coming with you, Jared.”

  Everyone in the room started at the sound of the lad’s voice. They all turned in unison to see him standing in the darkened doorway, his rifle clutched tightly in hand, the rat bag slung over his shoulder, and wearing a determined look on his youthful face. Devon’s sudden arrival was a surprise for two reasons: the first being no one had heard him arrive, but the second one being Jared hadn’t even missed the teen as the group sat drinking and discussing their future.

  The rest of the evening was filled with much lighter conversation as if Devon’s proclamation somehow put a stop to any further discussion regarding who was staying to live at the ranch and who was planning an assault on a fortified military-controlled airport more than a week’s walking distance from said ranch.

  Quinten Thacker planned on offering Jared and his group the barn for sleeping quarters, but after the Claire incident, Margie insisted they all stay inside the Thackers’ home. When Essie crawled up to Jared’s side and fell asleep, he stroked the girl’s hair, staring at her tiny face while cursing his predicament. The choice should have been an easy one, but it wasn’t. Jared knew John would have come for any one of them, so he was going to return the favor. Essie would be fine here with Shannon and the rest of the group while he was gone, Jared told himself in a dismal effort to shed the guilt he felt cloaked in.