“Are your men ready?” Jason asked.
Jeff nodded.
“Good, then I’ll go down and talk to the crowd. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” Jeff replied.
Jason descended the stairs and walked into the middle of the mob. In a show of human pack hierarchy, Jason’s bearing bought him free passage to the head of the conversation. Watching from above, Jeff smiled at the unspoken, primitive ways of the human mind. The Alpha Wolf arrives.
Strangely, Jason hadn’t done anything to win the group’s deference, except maybe being a successful businessman in a lifelong past. He couldn’t claim to be a superior fighter, athlete or even a talented people person. But, in the post-Apocalyptic world, through the strange alchemy of human sociality, he was the natural choice for head of state.
One thing was certain: Jeff didn’t want the job. Even with near-total control of the Homestead security force, Jeff wanted nothing to do with political affairs. And, without this mass of idiots down below, his men would have nothing to eat, nobody to farm for them and no one to patch them up when they were injured. As much as he hated politics, Jeff needed the Homestead. That meant he needed Ross, at least for the time being. But there were limits to his patience. He would not let the safety of his family be compromised, no matter how much he needed them.
The arguing subsided as Jason took center stage.
“How are you going to deal with these barbarians you have running things around here?” Alena launched into a new offensive.
Jason waited a moment. “I think we’ve heard enough to know where you stand, Alena. That goes for the medical staff as well. Now I’m going to tell you how it is. When I’m done, if you don’t like it, you are welcome to leave. We’ll even send you away with a few buckets of food.”
“No, we won’t,” Jeff interrupted loudly from the balcony above. He wasn’t willing to let that stand. Jason stared at Jeff for a moment with an inscrutable expression. A silent message passed between the men.
Let me handle this.
Okay, but only if you don’t dick out on our survival.
Jason’s face went red, his fury restrained beneath a thin veneer of practice. “Jeff’s right. The disposition of food will be a decision made by the committee. But that will be my recommendation: that anyone who leaves will leave with a week’s food,” Jason partially corrected himself.
“Who’s in charge here, anyway?” someone in the crowd shouted.
“When it comes to military decisions, and until the threat has passed, Jeff Kirkham’s word is absolute. We cannot second-guess combat orders and expect to survive. I will not quibble with Jeff, and I sure as hell won’t support you in quibbling with him.” Jason pointed a finger at Alena and let it drift over the doctors and nurses, his hand beginning to shake.
“And what if he refuses to give up control?” Doctor Hodges interjected.
“If that means we’ve survived the threat of annihilation, then I’ll be thrilled to deal with that problem when the time comes. I don’t think you’re aware of just how close we are to being wiped off the face of the earth. If we survive this next month, it’ll be a miracle. We do not have the luxury of ethics today. If our children are to survive, we must be barbarians. I realize that we should’ve had this conversation before we invited you to join the Homestead, back in the old world, the world that’s gone. But, right now, I offer no apologies and neither does Jeff. We will probably be forced to fight again—like barbarians—if our children are going to continue to live. Respectfully, Doctor, and Alena, fuck your ethics and fuck your license to practice medicine. I choose for my children to live.”
The crowd gasped. They had expected assurances. They had expected compromise. They hadn’t expected an ultimatum.
“You’re welcome to leave right now with nothing but your personal belongings. If you want to argue for anything else, you’ll have to stay until the committee has time to make a decision. If you’re willing to sacrifice the lives of your children on the altar of your anger, then Godspeed. Leave right now. It gives me no joy to tell you this; you will die out there. But I pray you have the strength and wisdom to rein in your pride and shut your mouth. Stay and live, or leave and die. Those are your choices.”
“I’m leaving, and I’m taking some of the food I worked for,” someone shouted in the crowd. Jeff couldn’t tell who had spoken.
Jason looked at Jeff on the balcony. “Jeff…”
Jeff shouted the order: “QRFs, stand by.”
The seventy-five members of the three QRF squadrons, standing on the outer edges of the crowd, racked their slides and came to the low-ready, stepping back. Most of the crowd jumped, startled by the unexpected show of force.
Jason let the moment percolate, giving the crowd time to digest this new dynamic. Literally, they were now under the gun.
Wailing its woeful drone, the emergency alert began to sound from the ham shack on top of the hill.
Jason shouted above the noise. “Jeff, what’s going on?”
“Stand by,” Jeff shouted back.
Jeff spoke into his radio, calling the ham shack.
“Zach, this is Jeff. What’s going on? Over.”
“Jeff, the barricade on Vista View Boulevard is being attacked by a large force.”
Jeff shouted to Jason, ignoring the crowd. “We’re being attacked at the Vista View barricade by a large force. Time to go. Now!”
The crowd erupted in conversation and Jason shouted them down. “Either you fight now or you’re gone. No conscientious objectors. If you want out, gather your kids and head out the gate. Otherwise, get your gun and run down to the barricade or to your duty station, double-time. This conversation is over.”
Jason looked up and Jeff nodded agreement. Jason took off at a run, going for his rifle and gun belt.
People mulled about, confused.
“Move!” Jeff yelled at the top of his lungs. As far as Jeff could tell, every single person headed for their duty stations, willing to set aside their ethics for the time being.
The sawgrass on the hillsides had long since surrendered to the coming winter. The fall chill frosted the edges of the dried grass, making everything crisp and frozen until the touch of the dawning sun.
Everywhere a man stepped, the frost vanished, leaving boot-shaped trails behind the attackers as they crossed the park strips and vacant margins alongside Vista View Boulevard. There were hundreds and hundreds of boot paths snaking up toward the neighborhood of the Homestead.
Vista View Boulevard twisted up the hillside in a series of sweeping switchbacks. In the distant past, the area had been a gravel quarry, giving the neighborhood a terraced look, like a stack of sixty-foot-thick pancakes. Small mansions serrated the edges of each bluff, tracking with the turns of the boulevard and the cuts of the old gravel pit.
For some reason, Utahans didn’t mind building luxury homes on busy streets, so most of the homes were wedged between the boulevard and a steep mountainside, providing spectacular views of the Great Salt Lake but little room for a yard.
Over the last two weeks, Jeff had invested considerable time envisioning an attack on the big barricade at the base of Vista View. Because of the steep hill into Oakwood Highlands, only a few roads made the climb, cutting across the slopes. This played to the Homestead’s advantage, forcing attackers into a half-mile fatal funnel where Jeff’s forces could control the high ground. His plan, however, didn’t contemplate a tsunami of fifteen hundred armed gangbangers.