Charlie's Requiem: Democide (34 page)

The gunfire still rang out as we sprinted yet again through a couple more backyards, twice having to scale fences and once having to skirt around and into the lake to make it to the next yard.

About seven or eight houses away from the club, the gunfire stopped. The yards had no more walls and the land was open, giving each of the houses an unobstructed line of sight across the lake. It may have been a pretty view, but it offered no concealment. With the sunrise just moments away, we made our way up between two of the lakefront homes and off the exposed backyards.

“Just keep going to the left,” I said, pointing down the street. “And we’ll come to a foot bridge that should take us into my dad’s neighborhood.”

“I say we just go for it,” Garrett said. “There’s no cover in the backyards now, and we can’t be more than a mile away from the house.”

Just as I was about to agree, we heard a blood curdling scream coming from our right in the direction of the Racquet club. Ducking back into the side yard of the homes we were passing between, we hid behind a large air conditioning unit and brought our rifles up to our shoulders, ready to defend ourselves.

The screams came closer, and I snuck up to the bushes that hugged the front and side of the terracotta-colored mansion to our right. Looking down the road, a young, thin kid in jeans and a t-shirt was being chased by two tattooed men. The boy, by the looks of it, had been in high school before the power went out and was running for his life. Without a weapon, he only had his legs to try and get out of his predicament, but he wasn’t fast enough. The two very rough looking men caught up with him as one of them dropped his rifle and sprinted after the boy, tackling him in the front yard of the house across the street.

Out of breath and carrying both rifles, the other man caught up to his friend as he struggled to pin the kid down. The two men laughed and spoke in Spanish, finally subduing their victim with a vicious blow to his nose, sending blood spurting out of his nostrils from the next strike to his stomach.

The kid writhed on the ground, clutching his belly with one arm, and protecting his face with the other. After a quick word amongst themselves, the sprinter flipped the kid on his stomach and began to tug on his pants. They were going to molest the poor young man!

“JORGE!” I hissed as quietly as I could. “QUICK!”

Jorge was at my side in an instant, assessing the situation. He took a brief look up the street to confirm no others were coming.

“I’ll take the one on the right,” I said as I brought the rifle up to my shoulder. Looking through the red dot sight, I put the glowing point of light between the right man’s shoulders. I was less than 50 yards away from him, and with both men’s backs to us and both concentrating on the cowardly act they were planning, I knew my aim would be true.

“Now!” I heard Jorge say.

I applied steady pressure to the trigger and felt the rifle jump back into my shoulder. The bullet tore across the space between us, travelling at nearly 3000 feet per second. It slammed into the man’s back, knocking him to the ground.

I never heard Jorge’s shot, being so focused on my target. When I looked to the left, all I could see was the other man sprawled on top of his victim, blood spurting from his neck.

We sprinted across the street, the others trailing us as we moved to get the boy out from under the dying thug’s body.

The gangbanger clutched with futility at the wound in an effort to stem the flow of his life blood as it spurted out with each beat of his heart. Jorge kicked him off the semi-conscious kid who was now face down in the grass; and lifting the boy up, we began to run down the street, away from the club. Dragging the boy at first, then helping him run after he pulled up his partially removed jeans, we made it to the walking bridge and across the small creek it spanned. The bridge, only wide enough for people and bicycles, was a perfect choke point and easily defended. We stopped and turned back after crossing over the brook, Jorge and I taking a firing position and looking back up the road where we had just come from.

“Garrett,” I said. “Take Janice and Maria up the road and wait for us. Take the kid too.”

The four of them left, leaving me and Jorge to set up a hasty ambush in case we were being followed.

After a few minutes, it was clear there weren’t going to be any followers. We quickly caught up with the others, finding them in a thicket of brush around a bend in the road.

“We’re close!” I said. “But before we go to the house, I want to find out what the hell went on back there!”

I approached the winded young man and gave him a look-over.

He was small, almost frail. I estimated that he wasn’t out of his teens, and if you had said he had just started high school, I wouldn’t have challenged you. He carried no weapons and was pretty beat up from the thrashing we saw.

“Hey,” I said, squatting down next to him. “You alright?”

The young man sat for the longest of times, and I wondered what was going on in his brain as we waited for an answer.

The pretty girl was talking, but I couldn’t understand what she was saying. My God, they were going to rape me. My nose has to be broken and my ribs are killing me. The pain is so bad I can’t think straight.

They were so quick!

I had just woken up, sleeping on the carpet in the clubhouse, when one of the guys yelled. I couldn’t make out what he said, still half asleep and sore from all the lifting and walking the day before. The next thing I knew, bullets were ripping through the walls and two of my brothers were shredded in the first few seconds. I panicked, I didn’t know where my gun was, but it didn’t matter since I had never used it. I ran out the back door and onto the street.

We had been looting Winter Park the last week, sending our goods back to the rest of the group. We had been lucky, finding a lot of jewelry along with gold and silver coins. They told us not to waste time with paper money because it was worthless now.

Unlike the others, I never have pulled a trigger, just because I don’t like killing people. I just want to survive; and until now, I thought we were the biggest and meanest group out there, that is until the damn Spics showed up. Someone from our group said they were from Central America, but most of the guys in the gang were pretty stupid. I took everything they said with a grain of salt.

Now, the Latin gang had killed my crew, all the gold and silver were gone, and these people had saved me.

The pretty girl was still looking at me. Did she say something? I must have had a funny look on my face because she said something again.

“Are you alright?” She asked.

I looked at her and suddenly recognized her! It couldn’t be! But it was.

I thought about the last few weeks and of my white supremacist brothers; They had taken me in and I owed them my life. But while I feel a bond with them, part of me doesn’t want to go back, the looting and killing are eating away at me. I am torn. Could I start a new life with these people? They saved me, and that’s more than most would do.

She tapped me on the shoulders again and I decided to go with them. I briefly worried about the demons within me, but they have receded, lurking just beneath the surface.

Do I go with them, knowing how close to the edge my dark side lurks? Right now, I suppose I don’t have a choice.

“Yeah,” I replied. “I’m alright.”

The kid finally replied; the shock must have put him in a bad place.

“Can you walk?” I asked. “You can come with us if you’d like. We aren’t far from our destination.”

“Yeah, I’d like that!” The kid replied.

We moved off, me in the lead. I turned left when the road hit a dead end and we were on the last leg of our journey to my dad’s house.

As we approached his neighborhood, I felt the presence of the young man next to me. He was on my right, keeping up with me stride for stride.

As we turned down the final street, I leaned over and spoke to him.

“My name’s Charlie! What’s yours?”

“Beker,” he said. “My name’s Beker.”

Chapter 18

“… what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms… the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. It is its natural manure.”

– Thomas Jefferson

“H
ey, Gerry!” The cry came from across the yard.

Kramer was silently steaming in the early afternoon sun, not from the heat of the day, but because his lovely wife had insisted that “they” clean up the garden bed that surrounded their country home. His wife, long since departed to attend to yet another chore that he thought of as totally unnecessary, was now working in the house while he slaved away in a hedge of pittosporum plants. Chopping away at the shoots that the plant was extending upward as it sought the winter sun, Kramer was just glad he wasn’t allergic to the bush, a rather common reaction many people had when their skin contacted the plant’s pollen.

Over the years, Dr. Kramer had learned that women and men held vastly different standards. Even though as a world-class cardiologist he had long ago proven his attention to detail, it was
what
required that attention which caused friction in most marriages. Pruning hedges during an apocalypse just didn’t seem like a good use of his energy; but for his wife, it was a necessity. In the end, Gerry knew two things. A happy wife is a happy life; and secondly, she was usually right when it came to things other than his line of work. She wanted some normalcy, and he couldn’t deny her that. The difference between the two sexes was that most men could adapt to a new normal far better than most women.

“Gerry! Wake up, buddy! I’ve got some good news!”

Gerry Kramer, doctor turned landscaper, looked up from his pruning shears as Ed was trotting across the driveway with a huge grin on his face.

“Will and Rob took the new dune buggy out for a spin this morning,” Ed began.

“Heard it loud and clear!” Gerry replied, grinning back at his enthusiastic friend.

“It’s not that loud!” Ed replied, obviously hurt that his friend was denigrating his latest project. “It’s just darned quiet now and every noise sounds loud.”

“Come on, Ed. I’m just kidding. What’s the good news?”

“It’s not just good news,” Ed stated. “It’s great news. It’s about Claire! I told them to check on Bedford, while they were out joyriding. They just got back. Old Vernon’s gotten in touch with a guy in Nashville. He received a message from the hospital that Clair’s alright, and that they’ll try and put you two on an HF frequency tonight so you can speak with her directly!”

Kramer stood silently in front of his friend. Having compartmentalized his emotions about her safety, Kramer was blindsided by the news that his oldest daughter was alive and well.

“Well, the least you can do is show some gratitude,” Ed said, worried that his friend had gone mute.

“God, Ed. I’m floored.” He replied, finally showing a smile. “I just put it away, figuring I wouldn’t be able to find out anything for a while.”

Kramer hugged his friend. “Thank you. I can’t tell you how much you mean to Barb and me. Come on! Let’s tell her the good news.”

Barb broke down in tears after she found out that they might be able to speak with their daughter later that night. Within minutes, they had all gathered in the Kramer kitchen, only Will was left behind as a sentry out by the road where a berm of dirt had been pushed up to provide some cover for anyone manning the guard post.

It was decided that Caroline, Barb and Gerry would accompany Ed to Vernon’s hidden bunker. They would use the old Cutlass, which Rob and Ed had cleaned up and serviced.

“The Cutlass has a full tank of gas,” Ed said. “I raided the Academy’s fuel bladder and brought back a bunch of fuel in gas caddies.”

Ed had several 14-gallon Duramax plastic gas caddies. They were polypropylene containers with a 10-foot fuel tube, extendible handle and roller wheels. He could move the fuel about like an oversized piece of luggage and dispense the gas from the attached transfer hose.

It had been less than a week since they had spoken with Mr. Bragg. Since then, Ed and Rob had visited the Academy a couple of times, once taking Kramer with them after one of the students had cut himself rather deeply with a large kitchen knife he was playing with. The teenager required a number of stiches and a dose of antibiotics. It was the first time Kramer’s medical supply stash had been called on since his arrival home.

One of the nice things to come from their mutual arrangement, other than the gasoline, was a stash of cigarettes that Raj had found. Abandoned offices at the school had turned up over a half-a-dozen cartons of tobacco products, from menthol 100’s to a carton of unfiltered Camels, Bragg would be getting a nice present for his work. Gerry laughed when he realized that he was actually excited about giving someone a bunch of cancer sticks. My, how the world had changed!

“What time should we be there?” Gerry asked his friend.

“After dark,” Ed replied. “He figures they’ll try about 7:00 or so.”

“Let’s take over some food!” Barb chirped. “I’ll bet he hasn’t had a good meal in a long while.”

They had harvested two hogs for their belated Thanksgiving dinner, and processing the animals brought them nearly a hundred pounds of usable meat. Barb had cooked both tenderloins for their celebratory meal, and the rest had been frozen and stashed in either the Kramer or Grafton’s home. Having filled up both freezers, and with the backup batteries installed and providing more than enough power at night, both Barb and Carol had almost demanded that the men bring them each a chest freezer to stash the leftover meat; they hoped that the men would continue to bring fresh meat in.

Barb brought out a large stash of chops, counting out enough for the entire group, plus extra for Vernon.

“I’ll cook these up and take some to Vernon.” She stated as she got into her “mother mode.”

“I’ll whip up some Duck Potatoes and rehydrate some green beans,” she continued as she planned the evening meal.

The Duck Potato or Wapato, was growing in thick patches in the shallow water of the property’s lake out back. Gerry hadn’t even known about these plants, but learned about them from the books he had brought back from their foray into Winter Garden. He and Rob spent several hours with a heavy rake uprooting the plants, letting their root ball float to the surface. The rhizomes on the roots were edible and had a chestnut flavor to them. Last night, Barb had sliced them and fried them in oil. They were heaven. Tonight, it sounded like she was boiling and whipping them up with some rehydrated milk powder.

The herb shop had provided him with a treasure-trove of knowledge. Besides learning about the air potato, he now had a small garden bed prepared next to the house. A veritable herbal nursery was developing in back of the house with multiple medicinal plants germinating in small pots around the pool area. As soon as their shoots were strong enough, he was going to transplant them into the manure-enriched dirt. Very soon, he could start manufacturing tinctures and powders that would alleviate any number of ailments such as diarrhea, aches and even thin the blood of patients with an irregular heartbeat. Although he missed the accuracy and advancements modern medicine provided, he had developed a strange sense of satisfaction at the idea of growing the medicaments from the earth.
It’s probably similar to the feeling farmers get when their produce is consumed around their own kitchen table
, he thought.

Dinner was served before dusk, and Barb made a picnic basket filled with food. Three of her pork chops were wrapped in foil, and several paper bowls full of potatoes, beans and a desert of vanilla pudding were placed in the wicker basket. Ed added two bottles from his precious stash of Budweiser beer, and the four of them drove away to meet Vernon at “Bragg’s bunker,” their new name for the old man’s home.

Pulling into the yard in front of the buried Quonset hut, Kramer flashed his lights three times, a pre-planned signal that they were the expected guests for the evening.

A few moments later, Vernon appeared at the side of the car, seemingly materializing from thin air. He wore MARPAT fatigues and had darkened his face, while his shotgun had been replaced by a very deadly looking battle rifle.

“Saw yer car from a mile away.” He stated with some disgust. “I think I gotta give you boys some training on OPSEC.”

“Get yer lights off and come on in!” He spat.

Little light spilled out of the open door as the crusty old man stood in the shadows while the four exited the car and entered the metal structure.

Vernon entered last, scanning the yard and woods beyond with an electronic, flip-down device he had attached to a skull cap he was wearing. Closing the door, he peeled his headwear off and set it on a table by the hut’s sole entrance.

Seeing Kramer’s inquisitive look, Vernon picked up the night-vision device and handed it to the curious doctor.

“PVS-14, Gen 3+” Bragg said.

“I have no idea what you just said,” Kramer replied. “But I assume you can see in the dark with this.”

“As long as there’s stars or a moon, I kin see just fine. But it don’t work too good if’in there’s no light. Called an intensifier inside. Don’t see in the dark, just makes the low light brighter! I kin show yer after the call.” He offered.

“That would be fascinating.” Kramer replied with some boyish enthusiasm.

“Boys and their toys!” Barb interjected.

She set the basket down on a cluttered wooden table and began to unpack its contents.

“When will you get my daughter on the phone?” Barb asked.

Bradford let out a laugh, his coughing limited to a single hack.

“Tain’t no phone,” he started. “It’s a radio. It ain’t like you kin just dial a number and git someone on the other end. They’ve gotta be listenin’”

“Well,” Barb replied, unfazed by the explanation. “When will we be
radioing
my daughter?”

“I figure in about fifteen minutes we kin give it… Hey! Wacha got there?” He asked as Barb unwrapped three huge, cooked pork chops.

“Dinner,” She replied. “For you!”

Vernon Jackson Bragg, man of the South and named after two of its most famous generals, stood slack-jawed as Barb set a place for him at his messy dinner table.

“Well, I’ll be…” He said, stunned at the feast that has appeared before him.

“Yer didn’t have ta do that fer ol’ Vernon,” he said as a tear welled in his left eye. “I’da done this fer ya anyways.”

“Actually,” Kramer said as he deposited a plastic grocery bag full of cigarettes onto the table, “I think this is part of our agreement.”

Bragg snatched the bag and rummaged through the collection of tobacco. A look of dissatisfaction hit him when he pulled out some packs of thin, menthol cigarettes.

“Chick sticks!” He scowled. “But I guess beggars can’t be …”

He stopped his tirade when he pulled out several cartons of red and white-boxed Marlboros and the 10-pack container of Camel unfiltered cigarettes.

“Hot Damn!” He shouted and slapped his knee. “Yer hit the jackpot!”

“And this,” Ed added as he pulled out two cold bottles of Budweiser beers.

“Well,” Vernon said as he surveyed his new treasure. “Yer takin care of ole Vernon, ain’t ya?”

With a gratified nod, he attacked the first pork chop, chewing on it contentedly, then washing it down with a long draw on the beer bottle.

“If’in yer ladyfolk weren’t here,” He said after the first large mouthful had been swallowed, “I’da let out a burp that the NSA coulda picked up on them satellites they got over my house!”

Bragg finished the first pork chop in record time, polishing off the beer with his final bite.

“That hit the spot!” He exclaimed. “Thank yer, ma’am. That weren’t needed, but appreciated! I kin eat the rest later. Now, let’s git yer little one on the radio!”

“Now before ya git yer panties in a wad,” he started. “We only got a few minutes with her. The government’s listenin’ in on things and we got ta be careful. Just don’t argue with me and do what I tell ya. I ain’t jokin’ either. Yer been good ta me and I’m doin’ yer a favor learnin’ ya how the feds work.”

Bragg sat at the workbench where his radio gear was placed. Dialing in the proper frequency, he made contact almost instantly, with a man named “Slackjaw” at the other end.

“Hey Slack, yer got the little one with ya?” Vernon asked.

“Copy that, Cornbread. Got the little one here!”

Vernon got out of his seat, and before letting Kramer sit down, he explained a few basic things about the radio and Operational Security or OPSEC, as it was called in the military.

“First, ya punch that bar on the microphone ta speak, then let it up. Otherwise, yer broadcastin’ and we can’t hear nothin’ coming back.” He said, pointing to a long bar that sat on the base of his desktop microphone.

“Second, don’t use any names. Use nicknames or no names at all. Don’t want the feds gettin’ any more information than they need.”

“Third, I’ve worked out a system here. Just do what ol’ Vernon says an we’ll all stay safe. Got it?”

“Got it!” Kramer replied.

“Ok then,” Bragg said. “Sit down and push the bar!”

Kramer sat in the old wooden roller chair and pushed the microphone’s bar, transmitting over the High Frequency ham set.

“Bug? Are you there, little one?” Kramer asked, using his nickname for his oldest daughter who used to buzz around the back yard taking care of the horses and her other chores.

Static came from the speakers on the desk, momentarily depressing the mood in the room. A high pitched squelch came back and a woman’s voice hesitantly replied.

“It’s me, daddy!” She said. “I’m here!”

Barb let out a small cry and both Caroline and her mom began to sob.

“We’re all here, baby.” Kramer added.

“Ask her a question only she’d know, ‘cause It may not be her.” Vernon suggested.

Caroline jumped in and said, “Ask her about the Max.”

“Bug?” Kramer said into the mic. “Tell me about Max.”

Max was their family’s late dog, a mix of a Labrador retriever and some type of pointer. He had been injured driving off a large feral hog that had charged the two girls in the back yard. That incident forced the family to reinforce the barrier that surrounded the property, adding strong mesh wiring to the bottom of the corral-style wooden fence.

He had recovered and lived to be 14 years old when a kidney tumor took his life. It was then that the 18-year-old Claire decided to become a doctor, and Gerry had often wondered if her choice of nephrology had been influenced by the loss of her childhood pet.

“Injured by a hog and died when I was a senior in high school.” She replied without hesitation.

“Please let me talk to her!” Barb asked.

They switched spots, and Bragg monitored their conversation to ensure they didn’t give out any information that would compromise the group. Caroline took a turn, and for a couple of minutes, all was right with the world.