Dark Coup (16 page)

“We found a five-gallon can on the bank,” Halstead said, “and you can see the sheen from it on the water.  Theoretically, it should all evaporate–depending on the weather–in less than a month, or decompose, and if it was five gallons or less, then as bad as that is, we’ll recover from it.”

Halstead shook his head.  “The bigger problem,” he continued, “is the several hundred, or possibly thousand, gallons that have soaked into the ground around the dump.”

…

“The two dead that we’ve already discussed,” Lieutenant Jackson said, referring to the guard and the pump operator, “plus Mathis.  A number of minor burns, smoke inhalation, a couple people getting over some overexposure to diesel fumes.  And we have a broken arm and three or four sprained ankles.”

Mallory glanced at Halstead.  “The loss of fuel is going to hurt,” he said, “no doubt about it.  We’re going to have to pull maintenance on the reverse osmosis units more often as well, until we know the lake is clean.”

“At least once we clean up the area,” Mallory said and shook her head, “we have a perfect area for a new fuel dump.  I want a fence and wire up around the other two.  We can
not
afford to have this happen again.”

“Already started,” Stewart said.  “The fence should be done by tomorrow, and there’re guards there until the fence is complete.  We’re also cutting back on showers to every three days, except for the firefighters, and clamping down on any unnecessary vehicle usage.”

“And now,” Mallory said, “not to tempt Murphy, but what else could go wrong?”

…

“So what do you want,” Earl asked, as blunt as he’d been on the side of the road, but not nearly as belligerent.

“A guarantee,” Kyle said, “your word–which I’m willing to accept since I don’t know you from Adam–things will change for the better around here.  No more raids, no more abuse of women…”

“Now wait just a minute,” Earl interrupted.  “Who says there’s been any abuse of the women?”

Amanda hung her head, looking pained and uncomfortable, but then she visibly gathered courage, sat up straight and said, “I do.  Russell, he’s the one that ended up getting hog-tied by the crowd,” Amanda said for Eric and Kyle’s benefit, “for one. He’s been slapping the women around in the fields.  He calls it ‘motivation’, but he’s just being cruel, abusive and a,” Amanda stopped herself before she said something she might regret.

She took a breath and continued. “Russell has been.”

Eric was happy that Amanda had been the one to say something, because without her testimony it would only be hearsay.

“Russell will be taken care of,” Earl said.  Kyle noticed that Earl was unconsciously making a fist.  Apparently, he really had changed.

“And as for me,” Earl sighed.  “I’m no saint, and I admit that I had some problems before the power went out.”

Earl looked off to the side and rubbed his forehead and then the back of his neck.  “I had some real problems before the power went out.  Most of ‘em were personal, a couple of them got me in trouble with the law.  Mostly petty stuff,” Earl said.  “You can ask Coop and Tony, they busted me a couple of times.”

“You remember me,” he looked at Eric.  “I was overweight.  I have this damned thing on my face,” he pointed to the foot-shaped birthmark, which was actually much less visible now that his color was better and he was getting some sun.

“I got busted a couple of times for being a peeping tom,” Earl said, and blushed.  “I was always looking at women as an object, or something to own, because; well, because I was
never
going to have one of my own.”

Eric sat back and folded his arms.  “And,” he asked.

“It never went any farther than that,” Earl said, “honest.  I still gave women the creeps, though, because of how I was looking at ‘em.  Since then, I don’t know, things have just been different. And since the botched raid,” Earl shook his head.

“There’s actually someone I’m kind of seeing,” Earl said.  “She seems to like me well enough and I’m not pushing it or anything.  We’ll see how it goes and, I don’t know, maybe something will come of it.  If not, I’m not going back to the old me.  I haven’t actually been in charge of hardly anything for the last six months, but for some reason my name came up.  I’m not gonna screw that up.”

“That’s what I was talking about,” Amanda said.  “He’s just different since the raid.”

“Your people can take at least part of the credit,” Earl said to Eric and Kyle.  “We were only there for a day and a half, and we’d just tried to raid your base, but we were treated with respect, and decency, and kindness.  Even by the women.  I knew that something had to change, and it wasn’t going to be the world around me.”

“Well then,” Eric said, “I think we can put the issue of abuse to bed.  Raids need to stop though, like yesterday.  You’ve started farming, and Amanda says that Clint was working with some local farmers and ranchers, so they shouldn’t be necessary anyway.”

Earl nodded.  “Clint was doing it just to thumb his nose at your Major after the embarrassment of the raid and the meeting afterward,” Earl said.  “He wanted to prove that he could still do whatever he wanted and there wasn’t anything she could do about it.”

“Well,” Eric sighed, “that ends now.”

“Agreed,” Earl said.  “There’s something else though, I can tell.”

Kyle nodded and glanced at Amanda.

“If she wants to leave,” Earl says, “that’s totally up to her.  I thought I made it clear that I don’t work that way.”

Kyle made a face.  “It’s a little more complicated than that.”

…

The air-raid siren went off shortly before lunch finished since everyone would still be close to camp.  Ten minutes later, Earl, Eric, Kyle, and Amanda were standing on the picnic table.

Earl held up his hand, and the group quieted down almost right away.  Clint was sitting off to the side, still tied up, and now with his legs tied up too, to keep him from running off.  He was beyond mad about how easily the group had switched allegiances.  He consoled himself with the knowledge that it would all fall apart around Earl, just like it had almost fallen apart around him, unless Earl started ruling with an iron fist.

“First of all,” Earl said, “thanks for getting back so quickly, I know it’s a pain.  Second, there’s going to be a few more changes, and the first is going to affect everybody in one way or another.”

“I know things haven’t been perfect around here,” Earl said.  “C’mon now, let me finish.  Yeah, they’ve been far from ideal, but some of that is going to change immediately and some of that is going to take some time.  The worst parts are changing right now but–and this is a big but–I know not everyone is going to want to stick around if they have a chance to leave.”

Clint was watching Earl take everything he’d built up and tear it right down in front of him, and he was just numb to it.

“I don’t want anybody making any decisions until tomorrow,” Earl said, “but the day after tomorrow, if you want to leave, Eric and Kyle are starting their own group.  Amanda and William are leaving with Kyle, and she’s taking her stuff with her.  I’m willing to let them take some of the R.V.’s as well—Clint, Tony, and Coop won’t need theirs anymore, after all.  Now, it would be foolish for a dozen different groups to start out on their own because, well, we’ve seen what happens to small groups out there.”

“Which leads to my second point,” Earl continued.  “The raiding stops now!  We’ve got some crops growing, and I hope to find us at least a couple of farmers to trade with; we don’t need to raid.”

“If a large enough group decides to go with Eric and Kyle and Amanda,” Earl shrugged, “I’m not going to stop you.  I’d like to keep a large enough group together here for protection and defense, and to continue with the farms, but I won’t stop you.”

“And it’s done,”
Clint thought. 
“Why did I even bother?  I might as well just die now.”

…

When the siren went off at 5:30 the next evening, there was a constant hum in the air, and you could almost reach out and touch the slight tension in camp.

“Everybody,” Earl said, “there’s really only one thing to do now and that’s declare your intentions.  I’m going to head over here to my left and Eric and Kyle are over there to my right.  Before I do, though, I want to make a couple of things clear; first, no hard feelings if anyone wants to leave. Second, I plan on having a relationship with the other group, and the Army base, and the other town for that matter.  It’s not like anyone who leaves is dead to us.”

Earl hopped down off the picnic table, which is something he never would have done a year ago, and walked off to his left. To his amazement and joy, he was immediately joined by Teri, the woman he’d been seeing for the last couple of months.

…

Chapter Seventeen

“I had no idea that this many people would want to stay,” Amanda said.

“You said between a third and a half would want to leave,” Kyle said.  “And that’s about what it looks like.  Maybe a little less than a third want to come with us, but we’re still looking at about one-hundred and thirty people.”

Kyle looked at Eric, “You ready for this?”

“Absolutely not,” Eric said.  “It was going to be you and me, and then I was probably going to die doing something stupid.”

“Yeah, how’s that workin’ out for ya’,” Kyle asked.

“I don’t know,” Eric said with a smile.  “This looks pretty stupid to me.”

…

Shortly after lunch, almost fifty SUVs and their attached trailers pulled out of the encampment.  Good-byes had taken a little while, but, logistically, it just took a long time to maneuver that many big vehicles around without breaking things. 

Clint, Cooper, and Tony were in the back seat of Kyle’s SUV, with Amanda covering them.  William was in the front seat between them.  She had instructions to shoot any or all three of them if they looked like they were getting loose, or going to cause a problem.  The likelihood of that was pretty slim though, since they were doped up on a triple dose of diphenhydramine.

Kyle was in the lead, with Eric pulling up the rear.  They were going to drop off their prisoners at Promised Land because that was, in their eyes, the logical place–being the only real law in the area.

The twenty-mile drive took less than fifteen minutes, and Kyle used his radio to call ahead when he was about five-minutes out.  The radio operator told him the Major would meet him at the I-40 entrance to the park since the quarantine was still in effect, which was fine with him.  He didn’t want to have all these people in campers have to make U-turns in the middle of the park and then try to pass each other on the road to get back out.

…

 “Sergeant Ramirez,” Mallory said, when he got out of the SUV and came around to check on Amanda.

“Major,” Kyle said, with a quick salute, but without coming to attention.  Old habits die hard, but he wasn’t on the parade ground and, frankly, she wasn’t in his chain-of-command right now.  Eric was pulling up to help with the prisoners.

“So, what have we here,” Mallory asked.

“Mr. Clint Baxter,” Kyle said, as he helped a slightly groggy Clint out of the back of his SUV, “Robert Cooper, and Anthony Roach.  Also known as the unholy trinity or the three stooges of cell-block whatever you put them in.”

“Excuse me,” Mallory said.

“Clint has been behind the raids in our Area of Operations for at least the last eight months or so,” Kyle said.  “Even after the meeting at the airport.  The group he was ruling elected a new leader a couple of days ago, and we have reason to believe things are going to change–for the better.”

Eric was out of his truck at this point, but hadn’t said anything yet.

“Well,” Mallory said.  “I guess that’s good to know.  I suppose I should be happy to have the two of you back, but we honestly don’t have room for,” she paused and looked to be doing some mental math, “another hundred-plus people.”

Kyle was floored.  What the
hell
?  “Excuse me,” it was Kyle’s turn to say.

“That would be ‘Excuse me, Ma’am’,” Mallory said.

“No,” Kyle said.  “I think I’ll pick and choose when I say Ma’am at this point.  I didn’t ask if we could stay here, and frankly it’s quite an assumption you just made, thinking we were back to stay.”

Eric folded his arms and leaned against Kyle’s truck.  This was completely between Mallory and Kyle, and he was going to let them have it out.

“Mr. Ramirez,” Mallory started.

“That’s
Sergeant
Ramirez,” Kyle interrupted, “unless I’ve been court-martialed in absentia, and since you’ve already called me Sergeant once I know that hasn’t happened.  For your information, I’ve already done a far more extensive “meet and greet” with this group of people than anybody has done with any group you’ve brought in before,
ever
.”

Mallory glanced at Amanda and smirked.  “I bet you have,” she said half under her breath.

Kyle took two steps towards Mallory and both she and the MPs who were there with her took a step back.

“Oh,”
Eric thought but kept the grin off his face,
“you have
SO
stepped in it now, girl.”

“You’ve got a lot of nerve to say something like that that,” Kyle said.  “I would have expected that from some people but not from you; never from you.”  He didn’t yell, he didn’t hiss, he didn’t whisper, but the edge to his voice was so raw, and the fury, hurt, and disgust was so obviously barely contained that one of the MPs took another step back.  The look in Kyle’s eyes told Mallory that she hadn’t just pushed too far, she had crossed a line that she didn’t even know existed inside of Kyle.

It was then that Mallory saw the boy in the front seat of Kyle’s SUV, and it sunk in that he’d said
you
instead of
we
.  “Kyle,” she started.

Kyle reached up and pulled off his Velcro nametape.  “Save it,” Kyle said.  “I resign.”

Kyle flicked the nametape at Mallory who caught it by reflex.

Kyle returned to his SUV as Eric reached in and pulled out Cooper.  Kyle grabbed Tony and they delivered them both to Mallory without another word.