The Siege (6 page)

     He returned with grim news.

     “The tunnel collapsed. It must have buried them alive. We’ll have to press on without them.”

     Martinez wasn’t so sure. Alvarez was his best friend, and his cellie for nine years.

     “Maybe they made it out the other side. Maybe they’re in the woods
on the outside of the wall.”

     “No. It’s been four days. If they found the others, we’d have heard shots by now. If they didn’t find anybody, Alvarez would have come back long before now. They didn’t take any provisions with them, remember?”

     The men looked at each other grimly. It was sound logic, and something they couldn’t argue against.

     Hance went on.

     “I’m taking charge now. If anybody has any beefs with that, say so now.”

     Nobody had any problems except for Bennett, who disliked Hance immensely. But he said nothing out of fear.

     “Okay, we’re gonna continue on like we did before. Bennett, you continue to feed the animals every day. Eventually this is gonna get settled, and I don’t want everything we came here for to die. Water those plants in the greenhouses too. We might as well eat good while we’re here. And by the way, you’re the cook now too. I know that’s a lot of work, but look at the bright side. You only have to pull guard duty when you ain’t feeding pigs or cooking or whatever. So there’s less chance of you getting shot. So just do it and don’t whine about it, okay?”

     Bennett nodded his head but didn’t say anything.

     “Answer me, so I know you understand.”

     “Okay… yes, sir.”

     Hance had reasserted his role as the alpha male. And Bennett had accepted his role as Hance’s bitch.

    
“Okay, the rest of you listen up. They outnumber us now. We’re gonna have to be on our toes, because if they want their camp back, they’ll attack us in force and try to surprise us when they do it.

     “From here on out we’re on twelve hour shifts. Six to six.
Martinez, you and I will pull days. Douglas, you and O’Neal will pull nights. You two go get some sleep. Douglas, you relieve Martinez at six. O’Neal, you’ll relieve me and you’ll be in charge of night shift. O’Neal, you and I will guard the roof twenty four seven. Martinez and Douglas, you’ll man the gate. Davis, you float. I’ll tell you where I need you day to day.

     “Bennett, you’ll work day shift so I can keep an eye on you. Do your chores and bring us our meals so we don’t have to leave our posts. And be sure you cook enough extra food before you go off duty so that the night shift can eat before they come on.

     “And take a case of drinking water to the roof and another to the gate. We won’t have the luxury of going for a drink whenever we want, like you can.”

     Hance looked at all the faces. He could tell he had their rapt attention. His takeover was complete. No one would challenge him in his new role.

     “Okay, when you’re off duty, keep your door open so you can hear the gunfire. First sign of shots, you bastards better come running. Any questions?”

     There were none.

     “Good. Go.”

Chapter 10

     Marty Haskins and his friend Lenny Geibel were manning the front counter at the Trucker’s Paradise truck stop when the group of four men walked in.

     It was obvious they were bad dudes. They had the swagger usually reserved for members of a motorcycle gang, a street gang, or convicts.

     They were too old to be gang bangers, and they drove up in a Chevy Tahoe. So Marty guessed they were part of the group of convicts set free from the Eden Federal Penitentiary just after the sky went black.

     He’d heard they’d been terrorizing the people of
Eden ever since, forcing half the town to evacuate for safer cities.

     “Good morning, gentlemen,” Marty said.

     The biggest one, and probably their leader, grunted.

     “Some place you got here.”

     “Yep. It’s all stolen from the trailers parked along the highway. And since it’s against the law to traffic in stolen merchandize, none of it’s for sale. It’s all free. Take what you need.”

     “That’s a lous
y way to run a business. If you don’t mind me sayin’ so.”

     A smaller man behind him chuckled.

     “Yeah, well, we’re not trying to make a living at this. Money’s no good any more anyway. We were truck drivers by trade, and that business has gone straight to hell. So now we’re just providing a service, trying to help the world get back to the way it used to be. And we gotta do something. Might as well do this.”

     Lenny joined in the conversation.

     “Are you guys looking for anything in particular?”

     “Fresh beef. Not frozen, or dried. Fresh. Like from real cows.”

     Marty managed a laugh.

     “Well,
if we had such a thing we’d cook some right up and join you. But as far as I know, all the beef cattle are dead in their fields or slaughtered for food a long time ago.”

     “Okay, some information then.”

     “About what?”

     “A friend of ours, goes by Smitty. Big black dude, ugly old fool. Maybe you know him.”

     “Nope. Can’t say I do. Lenny?”

     Marty turned to Lenny, who just shrugged his shoulders.

     “Smitty came to us a few weeks ago. Said he knew of a compound around these parts, somewhere close. Said it was surrounded by a high black fence. He said there were some cattle and pigs inside, and some greenhouses with fresh produce.”

     “Do tell?”

     “Yeah. Smitty asked if we wanted in on the bunch that was gonna go get it. We said sure. Then Smitty and some of the other fellas just up and disappeared. We’re thinking they went without us. And we ain’t none too happy about it.”

     “Well, I’m sorry to hear that, fellas. But people around these parts come and go all the time. Most of ‘em ain’t from around here. Maybe Smitty and the others just got homesick and went back to wherever they called home.”

     “Not likely. Not this bunch.”

     “Sorry. Don’t know what to tell you.”

     “Are you sure you don’t know where this compound’s located?”

     Marty wasn’t intimidated, and held his ground.

     “Positive. Feel free to look around. We don’t have any fresh meat or produce. Everything we have comes off those trailers out there. But if you find that compound, we sure would like to have some fresh meat. We’ll barter you some of this other stuff for it.”

     “I thought
you said this stuff was all free.”

     “Not if you have fresh beef to trade.”

     The man found this funny and laughed a lot harder than he needed to.

     “Oh, we’ll find it. And we’ll be back. And we may just have Smitty’s head on a stick when we do. But we’ll see you again.”

Chapter 11

     Marty and Lenny watched as the four men left without taking anything from the shelves.

     It was obvious from their demeanor that they were used to controlling others through fear. But Marty wasn’t intimidated or afraid. Marty was an old school trucker. He’d seen and dealt with badder men than these before.

     Lenny, though, was glad to get rid of them.

     And he was also curious.

     “Marty, back in the days just before the freeze, you and Joe went scouting the area for a safe place to stay when the meteorite hit, remember?”

     “I remember. Why?”

     “You told me a year before, you delivered a load of steel to a construction site deep in the woods off of Highway 83. You said they wouldn’t tell you what they were building there, but I remember you mentioned greenhouses and said they were building a high wall around it.”

     “How come your memory isn’t this good when it comes to remembering to do your chores around here?”

     Lenny just looked at him.

     “Yes. I remember. I said it might be a good place to ride out the cold, until we set up
our own camp here instead.”

     “Well, do you think it’s the same place?”

     “Probably. I don’t reckon there’s too many places with greenhouses hidden in the woods around here.”

     “Well, do you want to go check it out?”

     “And do what? Risk getting shot? Usually people put up high fences to protect what’s theirs. And sometimes when they protect what’s theirs, gunfire comes into play. Yes, I’d like to have a fresh steak, and we could probably barter some of this stuff to get some. But chances are equally good that we’d get shot trying. So as far as I’m concerned, if they happen to have fresh produce or livestock in there, then good for them. If they want to barter it, they can come over here. I won’t shoot them on sight like they may do me.

     “Besides, that was seven years ago now. I’m not even sure I could find the place again if I tried.”

     That night, as he lay in bed, Marty struggled mightily with his memory and his conscience.

     He remembered delivering that load. He’d driven past the turnoff twice and had trouble reaching the buyer because cell phone service was spotty in the area. He finally got through, and was told the turn-off was an unnamed gravel road, marked by a lonely piece of orange surveyor’s tape tied to a tree.

     He’d gone back for a third pass, and was finally able to spot the tape and deliver the load.

     He tried to remember exactly where that gravel road was. The problem was, there were dozens of such roads along Highway 83, unnamed and seldom used. Many of them led into the woods and to ranch houses, where old geezers with shotguns might not take too kindly to visitors. Many others led to old
oil drilling sites, or were service roads for the power lines that went through the area.

     Finding the same road again after seven years would be difficult, even if he had a mind to.

     And what he told Lenny was true. He’d like to have a big juicy steak or some fresh tomatoes, but it wasn’t the end of the world if he didn’t get them. He and Lenny and carved out a fairly comfortable life here. Despite what the sign out front said, it wasn’t quite a paradise for truckers. But he was surviving from day to day on dry stock stored in the abandoned trailers along the highway.

     And they were performing a needed service to other survivors by providing them necessary provisions as well, at no cost.

     And the old farmer out in back of the truck stop, well, he was starting to get some things to grow from old seeds preserved by the long freeze.

     So all in all, it seemed like a fool’s game to go
traipsing off to find some kind of utopia hidden in the woods. And even if he found it, it wouldn’t necessarily mean the people inside would share or barter with him.

     In the end, he decided that nothing in the fenced compound would be worth the effort of finding it.

     That left him with just his conscience, telling him he needed to warn the people in the compound that bad men were looking for it. And that they had plans to take it by force.

Chapter 12

     Hannah
was applying mineral oil to the stitches on Sami’s back. She was due to get them out in a couple of days, but in the meantime, they itched like crazy, and she couldn’t reach them to apply the oil herself. Her boyfriend Brad was on duty at the control center, so that left her best friend.