A Distant Eden (11 page)

Jerry took Karen’s hand, felt her trembling. He pulled her to him in a tight bear hug. “It’s alright. We made it. Let’s go home.”

It was a little after midnight when they at last arrived home. Giving a poor imitation of an owl hooting three times, the prearranged signal, they pulled off their full backpacks and slipped in under the floor. Inside the pit, the candlelight seemed extra bright to them after the hours of straining to see in darkness. Karen was pale and shaking. Jerry, looking tired, sat next to her holding her hand in his lap.

Everyone stared. They had not heard the distant shooting, but it was obvious that Karen was badly shaken. Finally, Shirley asked, “What happened? You look like a ghost.”

Jerry replied, “We ran into trouble leaving the store.” He thought about whether to tell the story in front of the children or not. He decided that in this world, they needed to know the full truth; that trouble happens fast. Hiding that from them would be doing them no good deed. “We killed two men who tried to ambush us.” Shirley quickly moved to Karen’s side and hugged her as Jerry gave a detailed description of everything from the time they left the house until he did his bad owl impression.

“But,” Jerry finished, “we did get almost everything we needed, plus a few bonuses. We couldn’t carry much toilet paper though; too bulky and we needed to keep our hands free the entire time. I don’t know how those men knew we were in the store, unless they had been staking it out and caught a glimpse of us in the darkness. But it’s telling that there are ambushers out there. They could have had anything in the store without waiting for us to gather it up, so I’m guessing that they wanted to torture us for information; where we’re living and how much food we have. That’s my best guess.

“We knew it would get desperate out there, and this proves it’s getting there fast. We’re going to have to be more careful than ever. Pretty soon there will be gangs roaming the streets, breaking into houses, looking for people holed up with food. They won’t be knocking on doors and asking for handouts; they’ll be kicking in doors and shooting anything that moves.”

Dave interjected, “That’ll be our time of maximum vulnerability. They could show up at any moment, in any numbers, and we might not see them coming. We can continue watching from the attic windows and scramble down to the crawlspace if we spot something—but there are blind spots, and we can’t see every approach. We could set guards outside the house, but it would take too many people to cover every direction, and being outside leaves us vulnerable. I wish we could come up with some kind of solid early warning system, but I can’t think of anything foolproof.”

Karen said, “We were always friendly with the neighbors, but just on a wave at them basis. We didn’t visit each other so there are no personal ties with them. I haven’t seen any of them outside in days. From the attic we would have seen them if they were out. Everyone seems to have left or to be hiding now. I doubt if we could interest them in a neighborhood watch kind of thing. Not that I’d want to rely on strangers for our security anyway.”

“We could burn down the houses that keep us from seeing,” Dave said, “but if the fire jumped from roof to roof—we might burn ourselves out.”

Jerry said, “We could continue to watch from the attic, and send out one person as a roving patrol to check on the blind spots. That has weaknesses too. It may be that there isn’t a perfect solution, and that our best bet is to watch as well as we can from upstairs and keep everyone else in the crawlspace except for essential trips, like collecting water and taking out waste. Which reminds me, the creek is drying up and it stinks now. I think with the water off and people not watering lawns and washing cars, the creek’s supply has disappeared. Compound that with what might be thousands of other people getting water from it the way we are. It just can’t supply that load. I think we better begin getting water in other ways.” I don’t believe the creek is going to be flowing much longer and it’s nasty now. “

“What other ways?” Dave asked.

“We can gather dew. Jerry responded. “Just before sunrise we drag clean towels across the grass and plants, soaking up the dew. Then wring the water out into pans. You can’t imagine how much water you can collect when there is heavy dew. Of course, there isn’t always dew to collect.”

“We can make water stills,” Shirley suggested, “only instead of having the bottom covered with plastic to pour water into, we leave the bottom open and add leaves. The sun then evaporates water from the soil and the leaves, which condenses on the top plastic and runs into the collection pan. The volume of water will be small. We can also make transpiration traps.”

One of the older children asked, “What’s a transpiration trap?”

Shirley responded, “Plants transpire water all day long. It is kind of like plant sweat. It’s water that evaporates out of the leaves. On some plants, like Crepe Myrtle, the transpiration is so heavy that on a hot summer day it looks like it is raining under the tree. A transpiration trap is a clear plastic bag that’s wrapped around the plant or part of the plant. The water that evaporates out of the leaves condenses in the bag and can be poured out. You can keep doing this over and over because the plant pulls moisture out of the ground with its roots. It works better in the spring and summer, but even in the winter like this it can work on plants that still have leaves.”

Jerry added, “Those work. Shirley and I used to make both of those when we were kids. We have to be careful of poisonous plants, and the water should also be distilled to be extra safe. The downside is that these are visible. We’ll have to build the stills and the traps out in the field away from the house. Otherwise it will be obvious that someone is in this house. We’ll also have to hide those best we can in the field and hope no one stumbles on them and starts raiding them, which is a possibility. We have to agree right now, that any raiders caught will be have to be killed.”

“Killed?” asked Dave.

Jerry said, “I know it’s harsh. But we need that water to survive and anyone stealing it is killing us the same as if they were slitting our throats. We can’t allow them to report back to anyone what they have found. It would create too much interest in our field and ultimately someone would find us. Anyone who finds us is going to do one of several things, and all of those are bad. So, yes, killed. And disposed of. We have to.”

There was a long pause in the conversation as these thoughts sank in.

Jerry eventually broke the silence. “One other thing we can do. We can check for empty houses and drain the water heater tanks. Each empty house around here will probably have forty or fifty gallons of fresh water in the water heater tank. Checking for occupants could be dicey stuff though.”

Karen asked, “How would we go about checking them?”

“I’ve been thinking on that and the only conclusion I can come to is to knock on the doors and yell if anyone is home. If the answer is yes, say sorry, wrong house and leave. If there is no answer, stake it out that night and watch it. If we still think it’s empty, we drain the tank. The problem is we could get shot at when knocking, or they might not answer. We might think they’re gone and then we find out differently when we go in. Like I said, dicey. But each tank will provide us with drinking water for a couple of days.”

The next morning Dave was looking for a bush to put a transpiration trap on. As he worked his way into the brush, he looked down and saw a giant hog track.

Matt had spotted the glow of a fire in the distance. It looked like a campfire near trees as the light reflected from the leaves. It wasn’t much and it wasn’t close, but it startled him all the same. It had distracted him from his clicks. Quickly remembering, he clicked three times.

Kristy heard the clicks and pulled to the side of the road, shutting down the engine and getting out of the truck. She made the boys wait inside. Standing outside, she stood armed with the semi-automatic rifle that Matt had trained her on. She was very comfortable with the rifle and a deadly shot—a better shot than Matt, in fact.

Matt turned back and covered the half mile quickly and silently. Matt hadn’t ridden a bicycle since he was a boy, and then rarely at night. He was impressed by the speed and silence of the bike on the asphalt paving. Within minutes, he was at the truck. “I saw what I think is a campfire glow up the road. My hunch is that there is a roadblock there and have gotten sloppy by building the fire. Of course, anyone driving at normal speed with headlights would still run up on it before they could do anything, fire or no fire.”

Kristy asked, “What’s the plan?”

Matt answered, “You and the boys wait here. I’m going to ride back up there and get closer and scope it out. First I want to look at the map and see if there is another route.”

They checked the map by flashlight, but it seemed it would be a diversion of several hundred miles to avoid this roadblock. Matt said, “We can’t go around; we don’t have enough gas and we might find another roadblock anyway. I’m going to take a closer look and see what we’re up against. If the setup is right, you might hear shooting. If you do hear shooting, it’ll be because I started it, but sit tight. If I’m not back in an hour, you try to get to the ranch, but I’ll be back. Count on it.”

Before Kristy could protest, Matt was off again. She saw his silhouette for a brief second—then nothing, not even a sound.

Matt rode back to where he could see the glow, and then rode slowly forward until he the fire was just over the next hill. He dismounted and stashed the bike beside the road. He was armed with a 9mm pistol and an M4 rifle with a 30 round clip. Matt quietly walked alongside the edge of the road, hugging the brush line as he walked up the hill. As he crested the hill, he saw a small campfire fifty yards ahead, on his side of the road. Two pickup trucks had been pushed into the middle of the road, blocking it.

He saw five men. Four were sitting around the fire and one was standing off to the side, relieving himself against one of the trucks. They were all armed with long arms, but in the dark, he could not make out exactly what they were. “Wouldn’t matter anyway; they won’t to be using them,” Matt thought to himself. He watched awhile, making sure there were no more men out there. There was room to bypass them on the shoulder on the other side, but even in the dark with no lights on they could get several well-aimed shots off, and that was not acceptable. Matt briefly thought about bargaining with them, but knew that would never work.

Matt hated to do it but there was only one course of action. He knelt down and prayed for guidance. The answer was still the same. He hadn’t asked for this, for these people to have done this. But he couldn’t go back or around, either. His family’s survival depended on him getting to his destination. These men had to die. The last man returned to the fire. All five were now sitting around it—staring at it. They would be fire blind. Matt could walk up to them, and as long as he stayed back about thirty feet or so, they could look right at him and not see him.

He continued forward quietly. When he was as close as he thought he would be able to get without alerting them, he began firing. He swept from left to right and then back again, firing two shots into each man. Not one of them had time to shoulder a weapon, much less get off a shot. They all hit the ground, convulsing for a few minutes until they were still. Matt stood where he was for another moment, then turned on his walkie-talkie called Kristy and told her to come on forward but to stop at the top of the hill when she saw the fire.

Matt felt sick about shooting the men. He wasn’t a killer at heart. If there had been an alternative, he would have taken it. He prayed for their souls, and his own.

When Kristy arrived, Matt walked to the truck and told Kristy what had transpired. “I’ll go ahead on the bike. Give me a half mile head start.” Matt got the bike and headed out again. Kristy drove past the roadblock, but went back and got the guns, ammo, and the few cans of food left behind. Matt had been too upset to think about it, but was always thinking about their children and their survival.

They continued the rest of the night that way, finally stopping and pulling over into thick brush just before sunrise. Using a machete, Matt cut limbs and covered the truck until it was invisible from the road. Finally, exhausted, he stretched out on the backseat and fell asleep while Kristy stood first watch. Matt woke up when it was his turn to watch and studied the map to determine where they were and how much further they had to go. He believed they could make their destination the next night. In a few more miles, the country would flatten out and the roads would have fewer bends in them. Roadblocks would be harder to set up. They could drive, lights out, at a decent speed.

As Matt expected, they arrived without further incident at the ranch house shortly before dawn. As they drove up Matt turned the headlights on. He saw his friend Alfred come out the front door. Alfred had been up all night waiting for them, worried sick that something had happened. There was hugging and crying from the women as Alfred and Wilma greeted their friends. They were all exhausted and tired, so after a quick meal, they headed to bed. It was noon when they awoke the following day, slumber disrupted by their stomachs.

Alfred made coffee. “I’m going to miss this. But, as this is a very special occasion, I am going to break discipline and use some of these precious last grounds for a celebration pot.” The four adults sat at the table enjoying the coffee and eating deer steak and fried potatoes. The boys ate on the porch and were soon exploring around the house. Once they’d eaten lunch, Matt went out and armed the young boys with a rifle each.

He told them, “Stay near the house, within conversation distance. If I need you, I don’t want to have to raise my voice. Keep an eye out for anyone or anything unusual. You guys are on guard duty. Take it seriously.”

Back inside, Matt said to Alfred, “The boys are going to grow up fast now in a world like this. I put them on roving guard duty; they’ll let us know if anything happens we need to see to. Now, let’s get caught up and do some planning.” For the next couple of hours they caught up their visiting until there was a natural long pause as the conversation was ready to shift to future plans.