Dark Days Rough Roads (35 page)

Roger
asked, “What’s the form for? What info do they want?”

Rich
responded. “They want to know the names, ages and sex of everyone staying here.
They want to know if we have running vehicles, what kind, how much food and
water we have and what kind of guns and ammunition are here. It asks about
generators, fire wood…”

“Stop Dad,
I’ve heard enough. When do they want the form back?”

Rich
said, “It’s written down that they will pick it up the day after tomorrow.”

Roger
thought for a moment, then spoke, “Ok, listen up. It’s not that safe outside
right now. I’m not sure if they do or not, but assume you have someone watching
you. It might be the militia or might be someone else close by that they have
watching you. They are probably taking notes on your every move. Do not answer
any questions, do not talk to anyone, understand?”

Rich
said, “Yes, anything else?”

Roger
told him, “Ya, as hard as it’s going to be, you need to add a third person to
the security watch.”

He looked
over at Blake, who was shaking his head.

“Not
good,” he said.

Haliday
dialed in his radio to the same frequency. “Keep listening Blake.” Haliday
pulled out his maps. “Gotta find some place to hide.” He kept looking around
and referencing his notes. “Let’s see, ok, got it, this is the best chance we
have right now.

“Let’s go
Blake. Time to go to school, the old Freidberger school to be exact. This place
is very old, very unoccupied. No one has probably been there for years. It’s as
rundown as you can get and we can hide there for now. It was left to rot out
and crumble with no money to restore it. We just need to get out of the woods
if that’s where they’re looking for us.”

They
would wait it out until it was dark outside. Then they would make the move to
the old schoolhouse. In the meantime they ate. Their food was getting very low.
They each had an MRE left. Haliday had a couple bags of soup mix and a few
other small items. They could get through the night and tomorrow, after that
they were going to start to get hungry. He wished he would have taken a .22lr
so he could hunt a squirrel or rabbit, but he hadn’t counted on being out this
long at all.

They sat
there and listened to the radio. These guys had pretty much pulled out all of
the stops. Haliday figured that they had about 12 vehicles on the road and
looking for them. If their area was roughly 35X50 miles, that was 1,750 square
miles. That was one big area to cover. The only problem was that only about 10
percent was wooded. The rest was flat barren land for the crops. They had to
have extra eyes out there as well. They were probably giving food to the people
in exchange for them watching the area.

They were
definitely pissed for sure. They wanted them badly. They didn’t have any idea
who they were looking for, other than guys on bikes. Even though the
description of the bikes varied, they would be gunning for anyone found on one.
They had gotten into quite the pickle here. It was only 1800hrs, but already
completely dark out.

“Blake, I
hate to say this, but we only have about a mile to go if that and I think it’s
going to be in our best interest to push the bikes.” Blake wasn’t happy about
that but he agreed. They pushed the bikes along through the woods and across an
open field. Haliday worked his way up to the road. He looked around and then
worked his way back to Blake.

“We have
a little problem Blake, someone must have bought the land, the school is still
there but so is a house. I’m going to go back and check out the house.” He
ripped out some long weeds and covered up Blake and the bikes. “Wait here,
don’t move at all.” He went back and watched the house for a while. It looked
empty. He crossed the road and got a better look. The garage door was slightly
open and he peeked inside. Nothing in there.

He went
inside the garage and walked up to the door. He collapsed the stock on his AR
and got ready to enter. He noticed the door here had been opened as well. He
felt along the jamb and sure enough it had been forced open. He turned his
flashlight on and placed his thumb on the activation switch ready to light it
up. He slowly opened the door and went inside.

This was
a small mudroom. You came in from the field, took your boots and stuff off here
before entering the main house. He entered the main house and listened. He
didn’t hear anything at all. He activated his flashlight and swept it around
quickly. He had been in the funnel of death. When you stand in the doorway you
were at the small end of a funnel. Anyone in the room could concentrate fire to
that point easily. It made you feel uneasy.

This
place had been ransacked. Blake called on the radio, and it was hard to hear
him, “We have company.” Haliday flipped the light off and ducked into a closet,
but left the door half open just like it was. He heard the vehicle pull in. A
couple of car doors opened and closed. He noticed the flashlight shine through
the windows.

He heard
the doors to the house open and saw the light bouncing around off the walls. He
heard the voices talking. “Looks like this place hasn’t been touched since the
last time we checked it. Call it in.”

“Let’s
check the schoolhouse first.”

“Forget
it, It’ll probably fall on us.” The men left and Haliday just stood there. He
heard the vehicle start and then leave.

“Papa 4
bravo we checked Delta 30 and both were empty. Doesn’t look like anyone has
been in there since it was last looted. We’re heading out to Delta 31.” It was
just a matter of about three minutes when he heard them again. “Papa 4 bravo
we’re out at Delta 31.” He waited. This must be the house next door. Just about
an eighth of a mile away. Same routine for the next half hour. They were moving
along this main road checking it along the way.

He
switched frequencies again. “Blake you there?” There wasn’t any answer. “Blake
you out there?” No answer. Haliday went outside and made his way over to where
Blake was. “Why didn’t you answer me?”

“My radio
went dead. I forgot to change the battery.” Haliday only had two batteries for
each radio; he put them on a small charger connected to his bike.

He had
connected a small inverter to the battery of his bike and the charger to that.
It did a good job, but the past two days had been so busy the batteries were
almost shot and needed a good charging. They hadn’t really had the time for
that. He called the group and told them they would be off radio for a while.
“We’ll check in every two hours for a minute and that’s it. We have to charge
the batteries.”

He
swapped the batteries around and both radios were working for now. He turned
them off. “We can’t listen in Blake. We need to save the batteries for when we
need them. Without starting the bike I can’t charge them. Now let’s get over
there and get some sleep.” They rolled the bikes over the road and put them
behind the schoolhouse. They covered them up carefully to hide them, but still
made the place look untouched. A few handfuls of dirt and garbage helped with
that. They went inside, found a decent hiding place and got some rest.

It was
early in the morning and they were hungry, so they ate their last MRE. Both of
them had gotten quite a bit of rest. Haliday was still fairly sore from the
bruise on his abdomen from the airport shooting, not to mention pushing the
bike around. He popped open a bottle of Tylenol and popped a couple in his
mouth. Blake asked for a couple and he handed him the bottle.

Blake
took the cotton out and looked at Haliday; “I didn’t think they put cotton in
these anymore.”

“They
don’t, I do it so the bottle doesn’t rattle,” Haliday said. “Just in case I
have it on me, it’s not rattling around. Same with water, your canteen should
be full or empty so it doesn’t slosh around. No noise at all if possible. We
haven’t quite adhered to that discipline, but we need to start before we get
too lax.

“How are
you holding up Blake?”

“I’m
doing ok.”

“You
sure?”

“Ya. I
mean, I got sick while you were sleeping. I was thinking about the shootings
and everything.”

“Normal
response Blake, here’s some gum.”

“That’ll
help my stomach?”

“No,
it’ll help your breath. Take two or three sticks. Please.” They both laughed a
bit.

Blake
flipped the radio on and called the group. Kayla answered, “Hey Blake, you guys
all right?”

“Ya,
we’re fine. I mean everything considered and all I guess. Your dad wants to
know what’s going on there.”

“Ok, we
had four patrols drive by last night. One actually sat on the road for almost
half an hour. They were watching everything related to the house. We only
burned candles and didn’t use the generator at all. We’ve only had my uncle
David and Dawn go outside so they would be the only ones seen in case they were
watching from somewhere. This way they don’t know how many people are here.”

“Hey,
tell my dad we heard from my uncle Alan and his family. They are all ok and at
a friend’s house right now. They can’t make it here any time soon, but they are
all ok. They have a radio in the neighborhood that the guy has been letting
people use. He said they are going to be good for a few weeks or so.”

“Your dad
heard you Kayla, he’s listening in too.

“Here he
is now.”

Roger got
on the radio, “That was good news, kiddo, anybody else?” He was wondering about
his sister and her family in Texas and brother and his family in Missouri.

“No,
that’s it.” He had given them the frequency, but who knows if they still had it
or were able to get to a radio.

“Kayla,
how’s the group holding up?”

She
answered, “Everyone is ok. Bobby is ok, and his head looks good. Sarah is just
really quiet, kind of in her own world and everyone else is ok. We have been
eating limited rations since we are not real active, but everyone is making
sure they get a good balance of protein, carbs and vitamins.”

“Anything
on the militia?” he asked next.

“Well,
they still don’t know how many of you there really are, but they are changing
the estimate to about four guys on bikes. They don’t believe the trucks are
moving with you at all. They pretty much think they are hidden and camped out
or do not exist. They still think the plan is to raid their camp with all of
the stuff you guys are doing.”

“Ok,
listen; this is what I want you guys to do kiddo. Forget about that form. Don’t
bother doing anything with it at all. They might try to come up to the house.
Remember; be ready to shoot the bastards at all times. I’m pretty sure they
know people are there, just not how many yet. I don’t want to risk bringing the
bikes in yet, that would draw a shit storm for sure. But, we need a care
package.”

Blake
looked over at Haliday. “A care package?”

“Ya,
Blake, we have to avoid drawing any attention to the group right now. We have
to give it a few days to settle down if we can. But, we’ll need a few more
things in order to make it. Food for one, few more toys too. Kayla, write this
down, then I’ll tell you guys when and where meet us. Couple of you will have
to leave the house for about an hour or so.”

Haliday
gave her a complete list of resupply items. He would be swapping out his AR for
one with a 37mm launcher attached to it. He’d also be picking up his M24 Remmy.
Some more rounds, food of course, and a couple of other things along with some
fresh under clothing. They’d make the exchange and then get back to business.

It would
be easier to just head in and try and hold the fort, but with the plane or
planes bound to take flight eventually, the tracked vehicle and the way they
were running the area like they owned it all, he couldn’t let things happen
like that. They would have to even out the odds a bit more. Not just for them,
but this community as well.

If they
got a tighter grip on the whole community even more than they had now, this
whole area would be a wasteland. They had too much invested in their house and
land to have to move. If they did try and move again who knows what would
happen. It was just getting worse out there day by day. Haliday wondered how he
got tied up in this mess.

As they
were sitting there they heard a vehicle pull in by the house and stop. They heard
a couple of voices. Militia again. They waited and listened. Same old cursory
check but this one didn’t last long. He heard one guy say it was a waste
checking a house located right off the road. “Better safe than sorry,” the
other man replied. They checked quickly and then drove off.

After
about 15 minutes Haliday looked at his watch, called the group and asked them
if they were ready. The Cherokee from the group was heading out. They would
wait about another 15 minutes and then leave themselves. It was a long wait.
They dug the bikes out and headed to the meeting place.

As they
pulled up, they saw the Cherokee off to the side of the road. They saw Kayla
and David out there pacing back and forth. The signal was that if there was a
trap, they would just be standing still next to the car. They pulled up by the
Cherokee and got off the bikes. A quick round of hugs and some frantic hand off
of the resupply equipment. They didn’t want to be seen. This spot was blocked
by trees and no one could see them unless they were on the road and close by.