Shadows Of Sanity And Survival (Old Preppers Die Hard Book 3) (5 page)

“No, I ain`t told nobody anything yet. But you keep in mind those rednecks as you call them are our only people that we can even get close to calling friends at the moment. I know where about half of them live and they are all spread out and I’m pretty sure they really don’t know we got a storm cloud of marauders moving in this way. Hell, I heard they had their own problems with somebody coming by and trying to take a hog or something and had themselves a few little skirmishes. But food raiding between them isn’t anything more than something like the old Hatfield and McCoy clans feuding and not anything like what’s coming this way. I don’t particularly like the idea of having them boys and Dump for next-door neighbors but there isn’t one of them boys or girls I wouldn’t like to have by my side in a fight, so you have got to consider that. If we do decide to take them in and I do make an offer, I need to do it under the auspices of all of us living in one lifeboat. That concept I think they can understand best and they might kind of band together with us. However like I said, they got their own family feuds and we’re going to end up with a situation of too many chiefs and not enough Indians. The way I plan on overcoming that is twofold. One is, as long as I can keep the veneer of civilization in front of them that is and they are in the mood to take orders of a sort, is that Charlie is the head of this area or operation and what he says is the final word and that’s it or whoever don’t like it has to leave. I am his second and it’s my say about the traded goods that will come from this place. Main reason for that is we basically have the biggest stores of everything meaning mainly the gas tank and what’s left in the concierge store. So that is commerce and shelter we control. That leaves defense and as you all know every good army needs a general and every general needs a political speaker to inspire the common defense and who that might be I have no idea but I’m volunteering Dump Truck’s sorry ass for that position. Ha! I ought to go ahead and shoot myself! General Dump Truck! Now that don’t even sound right to my ears but that’s what we got and that’s the only person I can recommend for the job. He’s big enough to knock heads when necessary, he’s got that dang bunch of pulpwooders for his bodyguards and he’s smarter than the rest of them as well. You got to give him credit for him having the respect and being able to boss all those heathens around when he was bouncer at the bar. That kind of diplomacy is the closest thing we have got for keeping order around here should we invite anybody in. Otherwise, somebody is going to object to me or Charlie telling them what to do and one or both of us will eventually get an ass whipping or worse if it gets out of hand.” Farley declared.

“I say we take the boats down the river and make it to the Gulf and do that dream sailing trip thing you’ve been talking about Farley and try to make it all the way to the Florida Keys!” Jeremy said and gave Fong a high five.

“What have you been filling them boy’s heads with, Farley? And what in the hell would we do in Key West if we could make it down that far? You think they ain`t having problems? How long would that take for us to do anyway?” It’s about a good twelve hours drive by car if you could do sixty miles an hour. I have no idea how long it would take if we did make it that far by sailboat, but back to my question, what are we going to do when we get there?”: Becky asked both fuming at the notion of leaving everything behind on a jaunt to nowhere although willing to follow her benefactor Farley anywhere.

“Now that’s just an idea I told them boys I wanted to do some day when the grid was up, kinda like on my bucket list of things to do before I die. I thought it would be fun. The West coast of Florida has vast expanses of unpopulated areas and the occasional fish camp etc. and I would much rather have fresh crabs and oysters in my diet than all the fish I am forced to eat around here. I’ll admit it’s probably a stupid romantic notion to even consider such a fool thing but I can pull or sneak into hidden coves in the back end of state parks a hell of a lot easier than I can walk these woods or start considering getting out on the highway to go God knows where. It’s an adventure, it’s a dream. Might be survival, might be pretty dang stupid but it’s something I would consider. I already told you that option wasn’t on the table at the moment for a number of reasons. First off, we got to consider if we do haul ass from here, we got to do it at a moment’s notice. We got us three short term rally points already should we be separated by an immediate attack on this camp let’s start there. We need to go back over that we need to reinforce that protocol and plan accordingly. Then we need to expound upon it and expand upon ideas about exactly what it is that we should do as a group to make a more planned and relaxed evacuation of this area should we decide that it is our best choice. We have been damn lucky so far that nobody has threatened our borders. Some of that is due to my how shall we say, stealing or looting everything that hasn’t been nailed down in my little circle of operations. I won’t go back into re-explaining to you all that it was necessary to remove anything salvageable from houses around us so that scavengers would not come this way. But from what nasty things I hear about this group is that they are like that crazy bunch in the Middle East, ISIS that executes and burns people just because they have to feed the hate in their black hearts. That’s not surviving, that’s not war, that’s not even living. That is pure evil and those that want to perform such evil are having their heyday now. We got to make a decision whether we are going to stand or run and we have got to decide that’s what we are going to do for the rest of our lives. There is no easy answer here and whatever we decide then that will be the direction for our lives for the near future and beyond, maybe forever.” Farley said fooling with his pistol in a nervous manner that meant guns, guts and glory couldn’t serve him or save this day and only wisdom and compassion for each other would chart their course.

“We shoot! We die! They no come here!” Miss Feng said vehemently surprising Farley that her face could redden that much with anger and vengeance before her husband Charlie hugged her closer to say her outburst was nothing more than an emotion he shared.

“Let’s take to the boats Farley!” Fong said excitedly thinking it was a fun adventure without knowing the hardships they would face outside of his mentor’s romanticized version of the trip to see miraculous things he had never heard of like a lobster march.

“That’s if we made it there all in one piece boy. That’s hundreds and hundreds of miles of traveling and I’m sure there are pirates and unwelcome shores to greet us. Back to what I was talking about. Like I said these folks are evil and from what I hear they are kind of like some primitive religions or some danged African tribes out there you hear about like Idi Amin that says you eat the heart of your enemy. Many people said they were cannibalistic .I got to wonder if they actually are as well fed and armed as they are said to be that they might just be capable of doing such disgusting acts. Now more than likely that’s all hype and racial innuendo but I don’t plan on finding out personally. Miss Feng! Where in the hell is your rifle?” Farley asked in a strong tone.

“It over there next to dish wash thing. You no yell at me Farley, get back to story. I get rifle.” Miss Feng said rarely taking any admonishment from Farley but instead giving it, and went to retrieve her weapon.

Farley’s biggest thing amongst everybody was to have their weapon always at hand. If it was put down, he would steal it. If you dropped it or abused it in any way he depended on the military basic training way of enforcing respect for it by telling them you owed him some pushups. Getting Miss Feng to do pushups for messing with her gun was not something that either one of them took lightly. It didn’t help matters that Farley rejoiced in catching her with any kind of infraction of this taboo and that Miss Feng would proceed to screech his ears off about everything that Farley had done to date before complying to the delight of everyone watching her play along.

It was a very uneasy way of aggravating the hell out of each other that they both seemed to rejoice in which seemed to be Miss Feng winning because Farley would overlook many discrepancies and let her out of her pushups because he did not want to hear her berating him later about something at the top of her lungs. Fong and Jeremy lived for the day they could catch one of the adults not having a weapon handy or dropping their rifle in order to give the same command ‘Give me twenty” but soon found out the adults had more ways of getting even with such than the momentary satisfaction of enforcing the rule.

Charlie would swear on the very rare occasions that Farley called inspection on the few weapons that they had managed to accumulate from trade or foraging that he had dirt on his hands when touching a rifle patch that would send you back to go clean it some more. He even told them one time that he didn’t have anything else for them to do the rest of the day and he just wanted to relax and have his beer with the group and relax so he found faults in some of the damndest places to clean that you hadn’t even heard of yet. To which everybody kind of caught on to the waiting game and wouldn’t be the first to hand their weapon to Farley for inspection if they didn’t think he had enough beer and was grinning enough yet. They knew they would have to return to the job and be scrutinized even more closely later if they tried to say they were done to early.

Better for them to talk and gossip and look like they were doing something. That all weapons were in perfect working condition, lightly oiled and smoothly functioning was a given. That everybody could shoot or clean every kind of weapon on this place was a given. That Farley would tell you the weapon was done and fully cleaned was always questionable and you could not predict this unless you just studiously get working on it until it was time for dinner or something signaled quitting time.

“Farley just how in the hell do you think your going to be able to get the other tribes or camps to side with us if you can’t even get around them without fear of being shot?’ Charlie Wu said wondering what Farley might have had up his sleeve this time.

“Well I been thinking on that, I sort of know their ranges and territories and hunting grounds and I figured on posting a sign or two on the edges of them asking for a parlay next week at the horseshoe bar. I am going to make a personal foray to them zombie gamer prepper boys area once I figure out how to make sure one of them doesn’t try to ventilate my gizzard while I am approaching. After I am announced well enough and they are put on notice to expect a visitor. I guess I just walk in. But I would prefer driving. Maybe I will tie a deer haunch partially in a sheet and write parlay on both sides of it and hang it off the back of a stick hobo style and march into their area. That way it kinda looks like I am carrying a truce flag or something. I mostly stay away from them gun happy boys, security they got, common sense and woodland skills they sort of lack. I never talked to one except from behind cover and that was mostly me hollering I wasn’t looking for trouble and them telling me to move on. They are out hunting everyday but I don’t think they have much luck, they fish over by Waterman’s Beach Bar and I just avoid the area as a no mans land. I think there are about 14 of them or there was, Barnet down at the bait store said they got in a skirmish with somebody and came in hunting a doctor for one of their band that had a gunshot wound. I told Barnett if he saw them again to tell them I wasn’t no aggressor if they run up on me but he said they were kinda of cocky about that and were in what he called “Rambo mode” but were looking the worse for wear.” Farley said now wondering how much of an asset they might be versus a detriment to be around.

“Does Dump Truck know anything about them?” Charlie asked.

“He knows about as much as I do about them. We don’t even know where they are from. I was the one that warned him awhile back they don’t take kindly to strangers. He said he would tag along with me to talk to them if I was going to pursue the idea of organizing a force around here to protect the territories as one big force but he is not too keen on that idea and neither am I. He is sort of in the mindset that we should be retreating deeper in the woods until the danger is past, but he is not adverse to us assisting the church militias in harassing our mutual enemies and trying to get them to move on out of the area quicker. Problem with that shit is, that gang of thugs is known for retaliation. That means anyone taking pot shots at them or doing any kind of little skirmishes or ambushes upon them needs to warn everyone within 10 miles that you’re thinking about kicking that big anthill camp. We are too disorganized and far too few to do much more than play willow the wisp and carry out a few guerilla raids to keep them from expanding their territory too much. A direct confrontation would be suicide from what I hear, they got plenty of combat vets that brought back some war skills from the big sand box for that and even if the whole of them look like a rabble they have some dedicated platoons that don’t mind getting down to some conventional warfare.” Farley declared.