The nerve-wracking events from last night were still playing in John’s mind as he stepped into his boots and left the house. The second security detail was on shift. Frank must have also left to rest, since one of the recruits was up in the tree stand. John climbed the ladder and when he reached the top greeted the recruit. They were using a deer rifle. On the platform was Frank’s Barrett M107.
“He doesn’t want any of us using it,” the recruit said.
“Maybe that’s for the better. Takes some real training to use a beast like that.” John surveyed both barricades. “Anything to report since I left?”
“No, sir. Those fires have died down.”
John went to the south end of the platform and scanned the area just past the line of roofs on Willow Creek. Thin black smoke continued to rise, which meant the embers were still smoldering, but the worst of the fire was over. He guessed two, maybe three houses on Midland Street had completely burned to the ground. He would wait a few hours and make sure there wasn’t a resumption of gunfire before sending out a team of three recruits to investigate.
The recruit next to him called him over and pointed toward the Pine Grove barricade. At first all John saw was a man struggling with a large suitcase, walking in the middle of the street. He was heading north, ignoring the barricade as if he didn’t see it.
“The man’s in shock,” John said. He’d seen civilians acting in a similar fashion after their neighborhoods were torn apart by war.
“Where do you think he’s going?”
“The interstate,” John replied. “That’s my best guess.” The highways were likely still being used to enter or escape the city by people on foot or on bikes.
Then more stragglers began to emerge and the fog horn sounded with a single, sharp blast. At first they came in pockets of ones and twos, then parents and children and before long groups of families. Some were pushing wheelbarrows filled with personal possessions. Others had shopping carts and anything else they could find to transport their few remaining valuables. John looked on in horror. The sight reminded him of French peasants fleeing Paris as the Nazis approached.
One group cut off from the rest and began heading for the barricade. That was when John climbed down, double-timing it toward Pine Grove. The two recruits manning that checkpoint were speaking with them, but John was too far away to hear what was being said. He arrived a moment later.
“They want to come in,” the recruit said, a young girl in her early twenties.
Already more people from neighboring streets peeled away from Pine Grove and headed for the barricade.
“Please let us in. We’ve been hiding all night. Our street’s covered in dead bodies.”
“Who attacked you?” John asked, trying not to let his emotions get the better of him.
A middle-aged woman in torn jeans and a dirty sweatshirt had her hands on the sheet metal which formed the front of the barricade wall. “I have no idea, mister. They were shooting anyone who moved, kicking down doors. For all I know, they might have been the police.” She put her hands to her face. “It was horrible.”
Now other voices were joining hers. Men, women, children crying. Soon there were dozens of people pressed up against the barricade, begging to get in.
“They’re gonna come back and kill us all,” one man said, tears streaming down his face as he tried boosting his young daughter over the wall. The sight was overwhelming. At the same time, John had to keep his cool just in case this was some kind of diversionary tactic intended to distract them from the main assault force.
John turned back, locked eyes with the recruit in the tree stand and pointed two fingers at his own eyes. He was sending him the message to keep an eye out and stay alert.
The earlier fog horn blast had brought several residents of Willow Creek running from their homes, many of them wielding pistols, shotguns and in many cases kitchen knives, hammers and rakes. They looked like those angry mobs you saw on television back before all the sets in the country got knocked out. John intercepted them and with Peter’s help divided them into two groups. None had drilled with the recruits and so he would use them as auxiliaries to plug holes in the perimeter and keep the crowd back from the barricade. But what they needed most right now was an emergency committee meeting.
Chapter 22
They met at Patty Long’s house again. Her dining room was large enough to accommodate everyone and it only seemed right to keep all the meetings at the same place.
John took a moment to explain the situation. Already, most assembled had listened to the sound of gunfire throughout most of the night. Most were probably thankful Willow Creek had been spared, but that led directly to the point John was about to make.
He stood with his palms flat on the table. “So far it appears our street is the only one that banded together and erected any kind of defensive posture. There’s a good chance that had something to do with us not getting attacked last night.”
“Do we have any idea who they are?” Curtis asked. As the one in charge of gathering information, he’d been ordered to stay put after going off without an escort. Al was also in the dog house for the same thing, although once the current crisis passed, they’d have the protection they needed to find out more about what was going on out there.
John nodded. “Armed gangs taking advantage of the breakdown in law and order. Hard to say at this point if they came together after the collapse or represent a criminal organization. Either way, they proved last night that they’re ruthless and willing to take a human life to get what they want.”
Susan Wheeler cleared her throat. “Do we even know what these bandits are after?”
John shook his head. “Right now, we have very little intel. Assume it’s the usual. They want what we have. That goes for food, water, weapons and maybe even people. They want to snatch as much money and valuables as they can so when the lights come back on they’ll be set for life. Again, I’m speculating. They may not have clued into the fact that it may be months or years before the country’s infrastructure will be back online.”
“And what about these refugees?” Al said. “I saw them myself stacked against the barricade. Looks like those images of Saigon before the collapse. I’m assuming the main purpose of this meeting is to see how many we can take in.”
“How many?” Arnold Payne spat. He was in charge of food management and the very person John had expected to raise the first objection. “I’ve started going over the data we collected and it isn’t looking good. Collectively, we don’t have enough food to last more than two weeks and that’s with rationing. We take these people in, we’ll be signing a death warrant for everyone on Willow Creek.”
Al was nodding in agreement. So too was Susan. Her team was in charge of providing fresh water. The greater their water needs, the harder their jobs would be.
“More people might not be a terrible idea,” John told the group. “It means more hands to fetch water, more recruits for security.”
“More mouths to feed,” Arnold chanted.
“There may be ways to produce food,” John said.
“Does it involve eating squirrels?” Arnold offered with a heavy dose of sarcasm.
John shrugged the comment off. “Not at all. Each and every one of us has a lawn that isn’t doing a whole lot. If we strip away the grass, we can use that soil to grow crops. Potatoes, carrots, maybe even corn.”
Arnold burst out laughing. “It’s not a bad idea, John, but who’s going to strip all that grass away?”
“And the water demands will go through the roof. My team is stretched just making sure we have clean drinking water.”