by P. D. Clover
“How so?”
“We are waiting on the government to do something, and we are waiting on people to get tired of waiting on the government,” I said laughing.
“Well, you’re not wrong,” Matt said with a laugh.
As we were sitting on the porch, a grey Subaru parked on the street by the obelisks that stood on either side of the walkway that led to my front door.
Bill exited the car with his racoon-colored eyes looking right at me.
“Well shit… Henry, looks like you are gonna get to tie up that loose end today. Fuck, that guy has no instinct for self-preservation,” Matt said with an exhale.
I couldn’t believe he came back. Oh well, what was one more dead body at this point. Looks like Diablo would get another decoration for my nightmares.
I got up off the rails and drew my gun and started to walk down to Bill. He just stood there, waiting for me. As I approached, I said, “You know, I was planning on just letting things be for a while. You should have stayed at Dorothy’s, Bill.”
I raised my gun and Bills racoon eyes went wide, “Henry STOP!” Katy shouted.
I paused. “Katy, close your eyes.”
“We came here so he can apologize, Henry,” Katy pleaded.
That caught me off guard, “What?”
“I am sorry,” Bill said, as quite as a mouse. My Glock was still pointed at his head.
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I was prepared for civil war, EMPs, torturing child molesters if need be…but I was not prepared for Bill to apologize.
I lowered my gun, “What?”
“I am sorry for what I did. I am sorry for putting things into motion the way I did. I am here to ask for your forgiveness,” Bill said, with a sincerity I didn’t know was possible from Bill.
I felt like I was hit in the stomach. I took a step back and silence filled the space between us. Nobody moved or spoke. Equal parts awe and shock. It was like witnessing a miracle.
“No,” I said. “I will not give you forgiveness.”
“Henry, please,” Katy said as she came around the car to stand between me and Bill. I couldn’t help but let out a giggle. She only now moved between us because I lowered my gun. She wasn’t sure I wouldn’t shoot him until I lowered my gun.
As I looked at Bill, he was staring hard at my gun. He wasn’t sure I still wouldn’t shoot him. “That took courage, to come here and face your death. I can respect that, and that’s at least something. I will give you the chance to earn forgiveness, but for now get the fuck outta here Bill,” I said shaking my head. I knew this was gonna bite me in the ass somehow. I just hope it wouldn’t be too bad.
Bill did an about face and started walking to my mom’s house. Katy remained behind.
“So, what do you want little sister?” I asked
“I was hoping to come in and talk, if that’s okay?” The way she said it reminded me of when we were kids and I would catch her doing something she wasn’t supposed to.
“Yeah, come on up,” I said as I holstered my gun and we walked up the path to my house.
“So, how are things at casa de-Dorthy?” I asked with a smile.
“It’s like I’m a kid all over again… But it’s safe, and we have everything we should need for a while. So, I will live with it. She misses you though. She is really upset about…ah, well you know.”
“About her calling you?” I said.
“Yep, and I understand why now. I just wanted to apologize for my part in that. I should have believed you. I don’t know why I didn’t.”
“I do. He is your husband. I get it… I am baffled as to why he did what he did,” I said in a bit of exasperation.
“He said it was because you killed those black men and got away with it. He thought you were a KKK, super right-wing, white power type, or something like that. I honestly didn’t understand his reasoning. I think maybe he was trying to get justice for those men?”
“Justice for those men?” I could feel my blood start to boil.
“Those aren’t my words. They are his.” She put her hands up in mock surrender.
I took a few deep breaths, “Okay, whatever… We will see if we can get past it, later. What brings you here now Katy. You are the only person driving around, so it must be for some reason.”
“Yeah, I wanted to apologize to you and Dee. That’s all.”
“Dee will appreciate that, come on in.” I opened the door for my sister and turned to Matt.
“You staying out or coming in?”
“Staying out. Y’all got some stuff to work out. You don’t need me to referee that.”
“If ya hear shooting, come on in and join the conversation,” I said with a smile.
“HAHA, probably not,” Matt said with a laugh.
Chapter 25
Katy stayed and talked for several hours. She got to meet the band of idiots for the first time. It was a good evening. She had said that Sahara and Timber wanted to come over sometime and meet their cousins, maybe get to know their aunt and uncle again. The strangest topic was on self-defense and their interest to learn how to use a gun and fight. Apparently, Timber had led the push for this particular line-item, to be included in this visit’s discussion. Turns out, the ass whooping Matt had dished out in the front yard struck a chord with the young man. I was taken aback by that. Katy and her clan had been life-long pacifists, if you don’t count Bills throwing rocks at police during “peaceful” protests. I told her we would figure something out, but that under no circumstances was I going to help Bill. I wasn’t about to arm and train an enemy. That was a hard “no”. She understood and said that Bill didn’t want her to ask me to train her or the kids and that violence was what was wrong with the world. Her tone was a little sad when she said that.
Despite Katy growing up shooting, she felt she needed a refresher course. After all, she had only ever fired our biological father’s 1911. It was the only thing he left behind when he ran out. We also discussed what mom had in the basement and how long that could last them. Mom had about five years’ worth of long-term food storage in her basement for one person, which we had purchased for her when she moved into the house. She had hated the gift at the time. Katy informed me that Mom had changed her tune recently. I told her that amount of food would last them about a year, with the number they had in the house. So, whenever food distributions started up, they needed to be in line. And whenever food started getting sold again, they needed to figure out how to buy some. She told me she had about ten grand in cash. She didn’t keep their savings in the bank due to Bill’s online gambling problem, which was news to me. I had no idea they had so little or that he had a problem. He had started gambling shortly after the Christmas party fight. Katy had blamed me for that. She believed somehow that I had had caused it, maybe by hitting him in the head too hard, too many times. Now she understood that it was his guilty conscious eating at him. Before Katy left, I retrieved our father’s Colt 1911, holster, five mags and 100 rounds of ammo. She protested the gift, but I had told her that it was as much hers as it was mine. I also had no use for it at the moment. She gave me a big hug. It reminded me of when we were kids and she was afraid of the dark. She would come to my room and sleep on the floor. Now just like then, I knew it wasn’t the dark she was really afraid of.
After Katy left, Matt came inside, and we all sat down and ate dinner. It was peaceful. When everyone was finished, Matt and I volunteered for dish duty. Well, more like Dee “volunteered” us for dish duty. Neither of us had the courage to object. Dee started wrangling up the heathens for bed while I washed, and Matt dried.
“I’m happy you and Katy made up bro.”
“I don’t know that we made up so much as, laid the framework to rebuild some burnt bridges,” I said.
“Do you think its legit?” he asked.
“God, I pray so. If it’s not…. I don’t know how much of me would survive that task.”
“Hmmm, I hope so too man,” Matt said with a long exh
ale.
We went back to silently washing and drying dishes, when suddenly there was voice over our radios.
“HENRY! YOU WON’T BELIEVE IT!”
It was Josh. He was the only other person with a radio, as we took ours back from Ryan the other night. Or was it this morning?
I grabbed my radio and said “eleven”, then waited for the response.
“Shit, ah, 15!... You need to come down! You won’t believe it!” Josh exclaimed.
“Okay, give us an hour” I said.
“Rodger that!”
I looked over at Matt, “He hesitated to give the all-clear.”
“Well, he does suck at math. He would have to think of the next prime Number and add two. If you remember he voted against that code method because, and I quote ‘I became a lawyer so I wouldn’t have to do math’. He is probably fine.”
“Yeah, he probably is…” I nodded as stopped washing dishes and started drying my hands.
“But you wanna go right now?”
“Yep.”
“Fine, I’ll grab the kit...”
“Nah, we shouldn’t need full kit. Let’s just grab night vision and the soft armor. If it’s something more than we can handle, we will fade back and regroup.”
“Copy that! I’ll get the soft armor and NODs,” Matt said as he walked up the stairs.
I followed him up so I could let Dee know what we were doing, but as I knocked lightly on our bedroom door, a voice said, “I heard Josh’s call. You shouldn’t have made the all-clear code math related.”
I opened the door. “You’re not the first person to raise that point. But we need to go. It should all be fine. If, for some reason, it’s not…”
“If it’s not, then I’m sure you’ll figure a way to deal with it. Be safe Henry.” Then Dee turned on the bedroom TV and the security cameras came up.
I nodded and said, “I love you Boss.”
She smiled and said “Come back safe. We need you… I need you.”
I closed the door to see Matt coming down the stairs from the third floor with two vests and two messenger bags. We both went down the stairs to the main floor, “What’s with the bags?” I asked
“Kel Tec Sub 2000s, with 5 big stick mags.”
“The .40sw Kel Tec’s” I asked?
“Yeah, I figured if push comes to shove, it would be nice to have something with a 16-inch barrel. Plus, the mags are compatible with our sidearms, so that’s nice. The bags should carry everything nicely and hopefully not draw too much attention. After the episode in the park with Ryan, I figure the less cool guy stuff the better. So, each bag has one PVS14 in it, they are the range night vision, so, they are pretty banged up and dusty inside, but they work.”
“Good thinking,” I said as I put my soft bullet proof vest on over my t-shirt. We grabbed our new Duluth Jackets that Dee had picked up and rolled out and down the street.
Josh’s house was only two blocks away. As we approached the alley that led behind Josh’s house I said “You take the alley, I’ll go around front. I will signal if it’s clear… Fuck! We left the headsets.”
“Shit, you’re right. We need to get it together. When we get back, we need to set these bags up, so we can grab and roll out whenever need be.”
“Yeah, we will… We need to be better, but I have a feeling we are only just touching the edge of the learning curve. Oh well, if it’s all clear, I call out a Disney princess over the radio. If it’s not, you will hear gunfire.”
“Alrighty, but why a Disney princess?” Matt asked as he got out his night vision monocular.
“Because I have two daughters, and I don’t want to use the number code too much over open frequencies.”
“Okay…. But I don’t have daughters, so make sure it’s one I will know.”
“For fucks sake man, get moving.”
Matt just smiled and I swear I heard a giggle as he walked into the darkness of the alley.
I started moving toward the sidewalk. I swung my bag to my left. This way, if I had to draw my gun it wouldn’t be in my way. I continued walking up the sidewalk, as Josh’s house was in the middle of the block. I looked at the other houses on the street, scanning for danger, looking for the possibility of a trap of some kind. Sad thing was, a neighborhood was the perfect setting for a trap, especially an old one like ours. Big old houses with multiple stories to each home, tons of giant windows, multiple doors to each home, big yards, and tons of buildings and sheds in the back yards.
As I approached Josh’s house, he was on the front porch, waiting. I pushed my jacket back and placed my hand on my gun. I called out, “FIVE”
“Shit, give me second… Nine!” he said with a big grin.
I took an extra second and looked around, I listened and regretted not having my sound amplifying head set on.
“It’s all good man, I found something you and Matt should hear.”
I took my hand off my gun and grabbed my radio, “Cinderella.”
“Okay, killer, what is it?” I asked Josh.
“Where’s Matt? He will want to hear this as well.”
“I imagine he is negotiating your back yard right now. He will be here in a moment,” I said as I walked up on the porch. “Could we kill these lights? I feel a bit open.”
“Oh! Yeah, no problem… Sorry, old habits!” Josh got up and stepped in his front door and turned off the porch lights.
“How are the kids doing?” I asked.
Josh took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, “They are alive. They seem to respond to Reba. I don’t know man, I just don’t know. Time will tell. The girl speaks a little, at least she told Reba her and her brother’s names. Caleb and Mary. That’s it so far. Mary has eaten a little, Caleb just lays in the floor in the fetal position.” Josh stopped talking and just starred off into the darkness.
“So, what’s the big news?” I asked hoping to change the topic.
Josh shook his head, as though he was trying to dislodge some dark thought. “I wanna wait on Matt, he will love it!”
“I will love what exactly?” Matt asked as he rounded the corner to the front porch.
Josh just smiled and reached behind his chair and pulled out a Grundig world radio.
“Cool, I have that same one,” I said.
“Have you checked for broadcasts?” Josh asked with a smile.
“No, we have been a bit preoccupied as of late,” Matt said.
Josh’s smile grew wider and then he turned on the radio, “... the latest reports have it that LA, Seattle, Portland, Chicago and many other major cities in America and worldwide are experiencing rioting. And the army and national guard, or at least as much as could be mustered have surrounded major supply warehouses and distribution centers. We also have reports China has taken Taiwan and North Korea has broken through the demilitarized zone and into South Korea. They are fighting in the streets there. Russia has reclaimed many of its former breakaway states and is consolidating power in Moscow. Pakistan no longer exists. It has been nuked by India. Apparently, most governments around the world found out early about the shit storm we were headed into. We here at Info Wars were given a 20-hour notice, so we can only assume the major players had double that to enact plans. Its chaos out there people! But we can make it! There is hope! GOD LOVES AMERICA!!!” Josh turned off the radio.
I couldn’t help but begin to laugh. “Alex Jones, INFOWARS is still going? All other media is gone… except for him? That’s fucking AWESOME!” I was still laughing. We all were.
Matt had a puzzled look on his face, “How?”
“Looks like he got the same warning from God knows who, that we did! Only he and most of his team relocated to Alex’s undisclosed second location… They are armed, stocked with supplies and they are broadcasting 24 hours a day,” Josh said.
“I’m strangely not surprised. If any media outlet would make it, it would be his. Look how many people, how many governments have gone after that guy. He always makes it through. I can resp
ect that! All the other media were too damn dependent on Government subsidies and info for stories. Not Alex! He built that empire out of big balls and will power. Good for him! At least we know he will tell us what he hears,” I said with mirth.
“Like Big Mike always said, ‘there is no such thing as a secret’,” Matt said. “You know, I needed this. I love that guy. He is crazy, but he’s my kind of crazy!”
“Awesome, feel free to keep me in the loop. I will dig my Grundig out when we get home,” I said.
“Oh, it gets better than just the radio broadcast… He is on shortwave, amateur radio, AM, FM, CB, but best of all, he has an analog TV transmitter. Apparently, he has several. He had them positioned on various towers and has been paying the rent on them. We should be able to watch him. It will probably be grainy, but we should be able to... at night anyway,” Josh informed us.
“That crazy paranoid, beautiful bastard! If I ever meet that man, I’m buying him a beer,” I said with joy.
“The camper’s TV antenna is analog,” I said.
“Sweet!” Matt said.
“Well Josh, that is good news Bro. That was worth the walk,” I said.
“I thought you would like it.”
“While we are here, any word on food distribution?” I asked.
“Actually, yes. I will be covering it at the next Hill Top park meeting. I spoke with the Sheriff, police chiefs who are now some kind of mini-Sheriffs of their own, and the county executives. Some of the county commissioners were there, but due to martial law they don’t actually have a say in anything. That part didn’t go over well with a couple of them.”
“Yeah, I can guess who,” I interrupted Josh.
“And you would probably be right... but we will start food distributions on Fridays for our area. It will be an allotment of dry goods. Each city in the county has been broken up into sections. Each section has a different day that the food bank will be open. There will be no picking or arguing about what people get. It is what it is. The food will be handed out at the voting stations, they will use the voting rolls and will add names to addresses as needed. It’s going to be a mess in the beginning, but with luck it will get sorted.”