299 Days: The Stronghold (30 page)

“Yep. $100 a gallon,” Bennington said.

Rich got out Drew’s envelope of cash. He pulled out $1,000. He counted it out to Bennington.

“Ten gallons for this gentlemen,” Bennington said to the Mexican man.

Rich started to get out of the truck to get the gas cans and pump the gas. Bennington stopped him and said, “Nope. No self-service. We’d hate for people to ‘accidently’ put in more gas than they paid for. Not worth dying just because you put in an extra gallon, know what I mean?”

It wasn’t like Bennington to talk like that, Rich thought. It didn’t seem natural for a decent guy like Bennington to say such a thing.

The Mexican man put in ten gallons. Both gas cans were full. Bennington smiled at Rich. That was the Bennington he knew. Not the “you’ll die if you put in an extra gallon” side of Bennington that Rich just witnessed.

Rich liked Bennington and also knew that he needed to get along with him for the sake of the people at Pierce Point, so he decided to keep talking to him, even though Bennington didn’t seem very chatty today.

“We’ll be back soon with the FCard forms and start shopping in town,” Rich said to Bennington.

“Yep,” Bennington said. “We’ll take you back to the city limits and get you the forms.”

The trip back to the city limits was uneventful. When they got back to the city-limits roadblock, Bennington returned to his car. He checked the trunk. The ARs, magazines, and case of ammunition were still in the back. Bennington was never concerned that his truck would get robbed while he went into town with Rich. All the Blue Ribbon Boys and even the FC knew that stealing from Bennington—and ultimately from Commissioner Winters—would be a very bad idea.

One of the FC handed Rich a stack of FCard forms to take back and fill out.

“How many are there?” Rich asked.

The FC shrugged. “Dunno,” he said. “Enough. Fill these out, and if you need more, come back.” The government had no idea whatsoever who had FCards and didn’t really care.

After all the horror of the trip into town, Rich was exhausted and didn’t feel like talking, but he thought he needed to say something to Bennington as they departed.

“Hey, man, thanks for everything,” he said.

Bennington nodded. He didn’t say anything. He was deep in thought about the biggest decision of his life. One that very likely would cost him his life. Bennington had decided to go through with his plan. And hopefully Rich would be part of it.

Chapter 136

It’s Not Just Guns and Gardening

(May 14)

Rich was still exhausted, mentally and emotionally, from the trip into town. So was Cindy; she just looked out the window. She had stopped crying and she just felt cold and dark.

On the way back, Rich kept thinking about the graffiti that said, “I miss America.” He couldn’t stop thinking about how that summed up everything. Everything.

Ryan was also deep in thought. After a while, he couldn’t take the silence and had to say something. “Did you catch all that?” he asked Pow in the back of the truck.

“All of what?” Pow asked.

“The guards, the layout, the locations. All of that,” Ryan said.

Pow was relieved that Ryan had been thinking the same thing he had. Pow didn’t want to admit that he had been thinking for some time now that surviving in Pierce Point was great, but they should be ready to hit back at anyone hitting them. Pow had gone from thinking purely defensively to offensively. The two were related in this situation.

“Roger that, brother,” Pow said. “Roger that.”

Ryan smiled. These UCG—“untrained civilian goofballs” as the Team called themselves—were pretty good at this, despite a lack of formal training.

Ryan fished out two small notepads and pens from his kit. He handed one to Pow.

“Here,” Ryan said. “Write things down now, while they’re fresh. Draw maps. Put it all down.” It was a little too bumpy in the back of the truck to write, but Pow started jotting down the important points he’d follow up on later, when the truck stopped.

“Thanks,” Pow said. This was a lot more than shooting on the range with his buddies. This was sketching out maps of enemy facilities. This was getting bigger.

When they were a half mile from the Pierce Point gate, Heidi Copeland, the “comm chick,” heard a crackle on the CB set to channel 11.

It was followed by a whispered voice on her CB. “Company. Rich truck. No one following,” said the voice. It was Sniper Mike somewhere out there in the woods.

Heidi replied, “Copy,” meaning she understood the message. She didn’t talk much to Sniper Mike, just acknowledged receipt of his messages. Mike had his volume turned down all the way, but still there was no need to send out lots of sound from Mike’s radio. She would hate for him to get caught because of her.

Heidi radioed Dan on the daily use channel, which was 27 that day. They rotated it each day. “Fred One return,” she said into the CB.

“Roger,” said Dan. “Fred One” was Rich’s radio call sign. They just made up “Fred One” for Rich. Dan consciously didn’t want to get “too military” with call signs like “Eagle One” or “Alpha One.” It seemed overly dramatic for what they were doing out there, which was just surviving. Dan knew that the guards and Team would be taken a lot more seriously by the residents if they kept it simple and low-key instead of “playing Army.”

That being said, there was plenty of military structure out for the guards, the Team, and beach patrol. There had to be. They had to maintain discipline and be effective. But it would be easy to overdo it if they weren’t careful. Remember, Dan kept telling himself and the others, we’re just here to get through this. We are not a military unit and we’re not trying to be. Guarding your neighborhood is just temporary until things return to normal. “Winning” at this means there is no longer a need for guards. Or radio code names.

Rich came up to the gate. He waved and a guard ran up to open the gate. Rich pulled into the volunteer fire station.

He looked at his watch. It was 12:15 p.m. He was hungry and Mrs. Roth’s funeral was at 2:00 pm, but it was time to get some work done. He had to brief Dan and Grant on what had just happened. He asked Heidi to get Dan, Grant and the rest of the Team there.

Cindy was still sitting in the cab of the truck. She didn’t want to get out. She was frozen.

“You OK?” Rich asked her.

“Oh. Huh? Oh, yeah,” she said. She had been zoning out so hard that she was nearly in a trance. She had been thinking so hard about all that had happened and the nearly empty hospital. The diapers in the parking lot. Little Tony. She needed to snap out of it and get to work.

“We’ll get you and the new supplies up to the Grange,” Rich said to Cindy. She nodded.

Rich realized that Cindy knew some things that shouldn’t spread around Pierce Point. Like the fake fifty Marines and dozen contractors, and the awful conditions in town.

“Cindy,” Rich said to her in the privacy of the truck cab, “you saw and heard a lot of things in town that can’t get spread around. Please don’t talk about them.”

Cindy nodded. She seemed to have snapped out of her trance and was listening.

Rich went over all the things Cindy shouldn’t talk about. The bribe, the five squads of Marines, the corruption, and the lack of a real hospital. “We don’t want people in here to lose hope. Highlight the positive. We’re going to fill out FCards, that kind of thing. They…”

“I know,” Cindy said. “I know. They need hope. I know.” Rich could tell that she needed hope herself. And that was much harder now that she’d seen what was going on in town. She got out of the truck.

Rich noticed that Pow and Ryan were still sitting in the truck.

“You guys gonna get out?” Rich asked, puzzled at why they hadn’t jumped right out.

“Making some notes and maps,” Ryan said.

Rich grinned. Wow. He was so lucky to have all these amazing people here. What a treasure trove of human beings.

Rich thought about all the work he needed to do. It would be a few minutes before Grant and the Team got there. He was hungry. He headed over to the volunteer fire station to see if there was some food. Everyone was asking him how things were in town. “Fine,” he’d say. “We’re way better off in here, but there’s hope.” That’s all he’d say over and over again when he was asked the question.

Some people asked him what the purple and gold armband was for. He told them that it was safe passage into town. That was good for them to know: there was such a thing as safe passage, but you needed a pass. And only Rich had it so don’t try going into town on your own.

Rich ate some lunch. Beans and rice with some deer meat. One of the Mexican ladies in Pierce Point made lunch. It was fabulous. She was grinning from ear to ear; she loved to cook for people.

They had been eating traditional foods like hamburgers up until now. Rich could tell that the “store bought” kinds of food, like hamburger buns and cheese must be running out. It was back to basic staples now. Hopefully those FCards would arrive just in time. For the first time, Rich was getting a little worried about the food situation.

After a while, Dan, Grant and the rest of the Team showed up. Pow and Ryan joined them since they had first-hand accounts, and now notes and maps, to add to the debriefing. Rich took them out to his truck so the guards couldn’t hear. Rich told them about everything he learned on the trip into town. Getting FCard food from town quickly emerged as the most important item. They agreed to get working distributing the FCard applications. The next issue was who would go into town.

“How do we control who goes in?” Grant asked.

Rich pointed to his armband. “I got the only one.” That was a very effective way to control who went into town. They agreed that they’d round up any Marine fatigues they had out there—Ryan might have the only set—and get a few young “Marine looking” guys to be the ones to go into town. The “Marines” would have fake squad numbers and act like they were part of the “five squads.” They would be sworn to secrecy. The Team would go into town, too, in full kit. They would make up fake “contractor” personalities. Grant and Wes wouldn’t go into town because of the POI and AK things. They talked about gasoline and how to pay for it to go to town.

They decided that runs into town would only be for FCard food. No vice runs. If people wanted booze or whatever, they had to risk it on their own.

Actually, it was not OK for people to go do that. Pierce Point didn’t need people spending their gold, silver, ammo, eventual FCards, or cash on that stuff. They needed people to hold onto assets and spend them on food. They didn’t have the time or resources for that kind of stuff. They wouldn’t “outlaw” vice items at Pierce Point, but they would not give people rides to town to get them. The meeting out at Rich’s truck broke up. It was 1:30 p.m.

People were getting in trucks to go to the Grange for Mrs. Roth’s funeral. They left enough guards, but most people went to the Grange.

There were more people at the funeral service than at a typical meeting at the Grange. There were new faces there. Many people were more drawn to a funeral than to the “politics” of running the place.

Fair enough. Not everyone had to be interested in what happened at the Grange meetings. “Politics” had acquired such a well-deserved dirty name with all that happened, so people couldn’t be blamed for shying away from it. At least the new people were out of their homes and involved in a community event, even if the occasion was not a happy one.

Pastor Pete conducted the service. He kept it non-denominational and didn’t proselytize, but he acknowledged that Mrs. Roth was a Christian. Mary Anne told the story about Mrs. Roth’s absolute lack of fear about dying. That touched a lot of people. Several were crying. Many people at the service were strengthened by Mrs. Roth’s bravery. They knew they might be dying soon, too. They wanted the peace Mrs. Roth had.

When the service was over, most people stayed and talked. Grant had never seen this before. Sure people talked for a few minutes after a funeral, but not an hour. Grant reminisced that funerals during peacetime—Grant marveled that he was calling the past “peacetime”—ended at a particular time because people had to get back to work or pick up their kids and take them somewhere. There was a hustle and bustle to get back to. Not now. Almost no one had a “job.” In fact, Tammy was the only person Grant knew with anything like a real job. With the gate and Grange guard duties taken care of at the moment, there was really no reason anyone at Pierce Point had to leave. Most of them hadn’t seen anyone other than their neighbors for days.

People were talking about all the things affecting them. They were making arrangements to share and trade things. “Come on over and we’ll can those,” was something being overheard. Or “I’ve got some .22 shells. I need that old limb that blew over cut up and cut into firewood. Can you come over with your chainsaw?”

Not everyone was in the sharing and trading mood. Some people, almost all of them new faces who hadn’t been to the Grange meetings, just sat back and watched. Grant got the feeling that they were sizing it all up. They weren’t mentioning they had food or something of value. They either didn’t have much or they were afraid of letting people know that they had anything. Or both. Or maybe they were Loyalists who still thought their government would ride in and save the day.

Grant tried to mentally catalogue these people. He knew they would be trouble. Probably not violent trouble, but they would be the kind of people who looked to the community to support them without offering to do anything in return. This would be hard for them to pull off because if they wanted a meal card they needed to do something for the community. Grant smiled to himself. The meal card system was a thing of beauty. He was so glad he read that novel that provided the meal card inspiration. He would have never thought of that on his own.

Grant noticed that a board had gone up at the Grange called “Wanted/For Sale.” It had index cards on it with things people wanted to buy and sell. Grant found Ken Dolphson and showed him the board. Grant suggested that Ken start putting the items on the board in the
Pierce Point Patriot
. It would boost readership. Ken laughed and said, “I can tell our little economy out here is taking off. I now have competition.” That was good news.