Avenging Home (17 page)

Perez gave him a dismissive wave. “Yeah, yeah.” Smiling, he added, “Wouldn’t be hard right now.”

Perez extracted himself from the truck and slung his weapon as he trudged towards the clinic. I followed Sarge into the armory to talk to Sheffield. We ran into Livingston first and told him we needed to talk. Livingston pointed us towards the conference room and went off to find the Captain. Sarge and I went in, and I dropped into a chair. Sarge, of course, went to the head of the table and took a seat.

I was shaking my head. “You just can’t stop screwing with him, can you?”

Sarge swiveled the chair back and forth. “It’s only right that the smartest man in the room be sitting here.”

I was shaking my head when Sheffield and Livingston came into the room. “What’s up, guys?” Sheffield asked as he took a seat. I was surprised he didn’t say anything about the seating arrangement, considering the earlier pissing contest between these two.

“We need to come up with a plan to hit those assholes at the Elk’s Camp. My guys did some recon out there, so we know where everything is. This is going to take a coordinated effort to get rid of these guys,” Sarge said.

Sheffield was drumming his fingers on the table. “How many people do they have?”

“Over a hundred.”

“Holy shit,” Livingston said. Then he looked at Sheffield. “I don’t like those numbers.”

“No doubt it’s going to be a hell of a fight, but we’ve got to do it. They shot up the market in Altoona and bombed the one here. They’ve hit us a couple of times. We have to take them out,” Sarge said.

Sheffield nodded. “We do. But I don’t want to lose half my people doing it.”

“Nor do I, Captain. I want to bring Mike and Ted up here and go over the lay of the land and come up with a plan. I’ve got some ideas, but we need to talk about it,” Sarge said.

“We definitely need to discuss it,” Sheffield said.

Perez made his way to the clinic and walked in. He found Doc and asked where Jamie was. Doc looked at him. “You still look like shit. Come in here and let me check you out.”

“Fuck it, Doc. I’m fine. Believe it or not, I’m better than I was. I just want to check on Jamie.”

Doc eyed him for a minute before giving up. He knew Perez wouldn’t cooperate. “Alright. But if you start to feel worse, let me know. Come on. She’s over here.”

Doc led Perez over to a curtained treatment area. Jamie was sitting up in a bed and smiled when she saw Perez.

“Hey, Poppie!” She said with a smile on her face.

“Ola chica. How are you feeling?” Perez asked.

Jamie shrugged and lifted the gown she wore to expose a bandage around her abdomen. “Not bad, considering. These docs here are pretty damn good.”

“Good. I’d hate to have to shoot a bunch of doctors.”

Jamie smiled. “You here to take me home?”

“If you’re ready, I’m willing,” Perez replied and sniffed loudly.

Jamie cocked her head to the side. “You look like hell. You alright?”

Perez chuckled. “Thanks for noticing. I’m fine. Just been sick.”

“So you want me to come home to take care of you, huh?” Jamie asked with a smile.

Perez shrugged. “Somebody’s got to do it.”

Doc cleared his throat. “You should stay here another day or two.”

Jamie looked at him. “Why? They’re not doing anything to me. I can sit at home as good as I can sit here.”

Perez looked at Doc. “Yeah. Besides, you’ll be there.”

“Whatever. I’m ready to get the hell out of here anyway.”

“Okay. We’ll get the guys up here and start working out a plan,” Sarge said.

“Let’s move on to the farm. We need labor. Have you guys talked to anyone around here?” I asked.

Livingston shook his head. “No. We were leaving that up to Cecil for the most part.”

“Cecil said he wasn’t having any luck. We need people out in the fields if we want to grow any food over there,” I replied.

“I guess we need to wander over to the park and see if we can get any volunteers,” Sarge said.

Looking at Sheffield, I asked, “You got a bullhorn?”

“Actually, we do,” Livingston replied, and left the room.

“You going to go over and see if you can those people to work out in the sun breaking their backs for no pay?” Sheffield asked.

I threw my hands up. “How do these people expect to eat? We’re going to grow this food for everyone. And if you don’t contribute, you won’t eat.”

Sheffield drummed the table with his fingers again and smiled. “Good luck with that.”

Livingston returned with the bullhorn and set it on the table. Sarge picked it up and hit the trigger, speaking into it. “Does it work?” The thing was loud and caused everyone to flinch. Sheffield gave him a look and shook his head.

I picked up the bullhorn and walked out. Sarge followed me, muttering something about
I gotta see this.
I walked down to the park and up onto the stage of the clam shell. The park was crowded with people either offering trades or looking for them. Plus, there was the usual assortment of people just hanging out. I guess with no job and nothing to do, a lot of people just didn’t know what to do with themselves.

Looking at the bullhorn, I said, “Here goes nothing.” and I pulled the speaker trigger.

“Hey, folks. Can I get your attention for a minute?” I gave people a minute to wander closer, or as was the case with a number of them, at least turn their heads. “We’re starting to plant crops outside of town. We’ve got a big section of land tilled and plowed and we’re ready to start planting. But we need help. This food is for all of us, so all of us need to pitch in. If you would please step up over here, we can get transportation and the like organized.”

I waited to see what sort of response I would get. I was met with silence as the crowd looked around at their fellows. They did move closer and start to mumble amongst themselves. After a minute, a man stepped up.

“So what do we get out of it?” He asked.

“You get food. How about not starving to death?” I replied.

“Well, seems like this farm would happen with me or without me. If I didn’t work, I could just wait for someone else to do it and then still get my share, couldn’t I?”

“What share? You wouldn’t have a share.” Keying the horn again, I said, “If you do not contribute to the farm, you will not be given food. There is no freeloading. You wanna eat, you work.”

The man smiled. “That’s what I wanted to hear. I’m in.”

And with that, several others came to the edge of the stage and said they wanted to work as well. There were still many out there that made no move to offer up their labor, and they began to congregate and talk amongst themselves. After a moment, one of the group stepped forward.

“How can you expect us to spend every day working on this farm? We still gotta eat. It’ll be months before any of those crops are ready. How are we going to feed ourselves today?”

Using the bullhorn again, I answered the man. “No one needs to be out there every day. Two or three days a week for a few hours will get it done if everyone pitches in. We’re not wanting to work anyone like a slave. But the simple fact is we need people in the fields; and if everyone just does a little, then we can get a lot done. We’ll provide transportation out and back and water kegs at the farm.”

The statement was met with more nods and even more people came up and offered to help. There were still a few holdouts, but there always will be. Hell, if you were giving away sacks of money, someone would complain they were too heavy.

Sarge stepped up and crossed his arms. “That went way better than I thought it would.”

I laughed. “No shit. I didn’t expect it to be this easy.”

Keying the horn again, I said, “Anyone going to the farm needs to be at the armory at seven tomorrow morning. We’ll have trucks ready to take you, and get your names and info then.”

As we walked off the stage, Sarge started to laugh. I looked at him and asked what he thought was so funny. He slapped his leg. “There’s going to a damn mob at the armory in the morning. Sheffield’s going to be pissed.”

It made me laugh. “Yeah, he probably will be. Let’s go tell him so he can’t say we didn’t warn him.”

We were mobbed with people when we came off the stage. Questions were hurled at us by a dozen or so people. I put my hands up. “We’ll try and answer your questions tomorrow. Just know that this is for all of us.”

We pushed through the crowd and made our way back to the armory. I saw Livingston as we came through the gate, and called him over.

“You’re going to have a crowd here in the morning about seven. We need to have trucks ready to take people to the farm. You also need to establish the security detail for them while they’re out there. I don’t think we need overnight security yet; but when crops start coming up, we’ll need it for sure.”

Livingston looked over at the park. “Wow. I didn’t think you’d get any takers.”

“Hunger will do that to a man,” Sarge said.

Livingston smiled. “If they’re hungry, maybe they’ll work then.”

“They’re going to have to,” I said.

Livingston nodded. “I’ll get it put together. We’ll be ready.”

We left and headed to the clinic to check on Jamie. We were intercepted by Shane with the PD. “Hey, Morgan. I got a guy over here that I need to talk to you about.”

“This your murderer?” I asked.

“Yeah. What are we supposed to do with him?”

“Hang him!” Sarge shouted.

“Probably.” I said. “But let’s go over and talk to him.”

As we walked, he told me what he knew of the situation. The guy was drunk and his girlfriend ended up dead. No one is sure exactly how, but she had bruises on her face and marks on her neck like she’d been choked. His family brought him to the station to keep her family from killing him.

“Sounds like a good time,” Sarge said.

As we got closer to the station, I saw three people standing out front talking to Sean Meador, Shane’s second in command of the police.

“This is Dave Rosa’s mom,” Sean said.

Looking at her, I said. “And Dave is the guy that killed the girl?”

“It’s not his fault! He was drunk; and if that man wasn’t selling liquor over there, he wouldn’t have been drunk—,” she started to protest. But I cut her off.

Holding up my hand, I asked, “Did he kill her?”

She’d paused, but picked right back up. “Yes he did, but he was drunk…..“ I cut her off again.

“And what do you think that has to do with this?”

She stared at me for a moment before taking off again. “If he wasn’t drunk, it wouldn’t have happened. He didn’t mean to do it. Dave’s a good boy an…..“

I stopped her once again. I was getting a little pissed with her argument. “Look, drunk or not, he killed someone and has to pay for that. Unlike before, there is no
not guilty by reason of insanity or drunkenness,”
I said - the last part with a heavy dose of sarcasm.

Even back in the Before, I was so damned tired of people committing horrible ass crimes and being able to walk away from them relatively unscathed because of a bunch of bleeding hearts. If a dog killed someone, for whatever reason, it would be put down. If a bear or some other predator were to kill a person, it would be hunted to the ends of the Earth and put down. But for some reason, our thinking had changed. It was deemed better to keep some people confined for the rest of their lives. Or worse yet, to actually be released back into society after committing these horrible crimes.

Pointing towards the market, she started again. “But if that man wasn’t selling liquor…..“ I’d had enough.

I stepped towards her and shouted. “Your son will accept responsibility for what he’s done! And the man selling liquor isn’t an issue anymore, now is he?”

She immediately cowed away from me, which was fine with me. Looking at Shane, I jerked my head and he followed me towards the door to the PD. As I walked away, a young man that was with the woman, and as yet, hadn’t said a word, spoke up.

“You kill my brother, and you won’t be able to close your eyes, ever.”

I spun on my heels and headed straight for him. He glared at me as I approached. I could see the hate on his face, and I could also tell that at the moment he meant what he said. As I got closer to him he stepped forward with his chest pumped up. He was young, maybe sixteen, and obviously foolish. Once close enough to him, I slammed the butt of my carbine into his nose. It busted like a ripe grape, and a geyser of blood flowed from it as he collapsed.

His mother moved towards me and I drew my pistol as I stepped forward, the kid now on the ground. I pointed the pistol at the woman and shouted. “Back off!” She froze in her tracks and took a step back. I grabbed the kid by his shirt and lifted him from the ground.

Jamming the pistol in his face with as much calm as I could muster, I said, “Just like your brother has to take responsibility for his actions. You’re going to learn your words have consequences.” Looking at him, I asked, “You threatening me? You think you’re going to get me?”