Going Home (15 page)

Thad tore open an MRE package containing a big chocolate mint cookie and broke it in half. He handed one-half to Nathan and the other to Brenda, who gave it to Zack. “Thank you,” she said.

“Thanks for doing this for us,” Robert said. “We haven’t had much to eat. It’s been hard. I mean, what the hell happened? Do you guys know?”

“No one does for sure, but it sure has put us in one hell of a spot,” I replied.

“Where are you guys going?” Jess asked.

“We live just the other side of Perry. We were in Chiefland when everything went out. We hung around there for a couple of days till things got out of hand, and we left.” Robert was staring into the fire.

“What happened there?” I had to ask, as we were heading that way.

“It was okay at first. Things were kinda normal. You could get food an’ all if you had cash. But we ran out of money pretty quickly, and then people started thinking this may be some big deal and started to get weird. Then the looting started. The Walmart was trashed. The police tried to stop it. It was stupid; people were taking TVs and Blu Ray players; it was just stupid. I mean they were taking everything, but seeing someone running out with a flat-screen under the circumstances was stupid. The cops tried to stop it, and then someone started shooting. Only like three cops were there, but when the shooting started, it was bad. There were people piled up at the front door. They were just gunned down.”

“The cops just shot ’em?” Jess asked.

“Once the shooting started, it was nuts. We saw a cop get hit, so someone was shooting at them. It was bad. After that, people went ape shit. They declared martial law in town. You couldn’t be on the streets. We didn’t have a place to stay, so it was leave, or they would put you in the high school gym. I just wanted to get home, so we left. We got lucky and got a ride in an old army truck. This old guy was driving it down the road and picked us up and took us to the turnoff to Steinhatchee. That’s where he was headed. We started walking after that,” Robert said.

The rice was done cooking, so I dumped the stew into it and stirred it up. Using the pot clamp, I set it down in front of them and put two spoons in. “You guys eat your fill. Don’t worry about us; y’all eat.”

They were a little embarrassed to eat in front of us; the boys, though, were not. We let them eat; it was obvious they were hungry. The two boys ate more than I thought a kid could.

Thad stood up. “If you folks will excuse me, I need to tend to nature real quick.” He caught my eye and gave me a nod that said, “Come with me.”

I stood up, “Me too, Thad.” We walked over out of earshot and out of the light of the fire.

“Morgan, I don’t know about you, but I think we should let them stay here tonight. I feel bad for their kids.” He had his hands on his hips.

“I feel for ’em too, Thad, but we can’t save everyone. You do know that, right?”

He gave me a look that screamed, “No shit!” “I know that, but they are here. And I can’t send ’em away. The little one reminds me of my boy, an’ if it was my wife and boy out there, I would hope someone would help them. Look at it as a deposit in the Karma bank, Morgan.”

He had me there. I would hope someone would help my wife and girls too. And after what had happened in the last few days, I could use a deposit in that bank for damn sure.

“Okay, Thad, they can stay. But look, we gotta be careful. They were almost on top of us before I saw them. We need to do better at OPSEC. If they were some kind of Zombies, they would have had our ass.” I was laying it out to him now.

“I understand. We need to be more careful, but what the hell is OPSEC?” He had a quizzical look on his face.

“Operational security. Keeping our asses alive,” I replied.

“OPSEC, zombies, that pack full of crazy shit, is there anything you don’t have in there?” He was smiling again.

“Yeah, a ride home,” I said with a grin.

“You one weird dude, Morgan,” Thad said, shaking his head.

“I’ll take that as a compliment.” We walked back over to the fire. Jess and Brenda were talking, and Robert was adding wood to the fire. They had eaten all they wanted; there was little left, so we let Jess finish that. For a chick with a pretty good figure, she had an appetite. We offered the family the use of our shelter for the night.

“That’s very nice, but you’ve already done a lot for us. We couldn’t impose.” Brenda spoke up quickly.

“Come on now, Brenda, let’s not be impolite. These nice folks have offered us a safe place to sleep. Think of the boys,” Robert replied.

“Well, they have already given us so much, more than anyone else has. I think they have done more than enough for us. We should go back,” Brenda came back.

Until now, I had been perfectly at ease with these folks. Suddenly my stomach was falling. I did not like the tone of the conversation between these two. “Back to where, Brenda? I thought you guys were walking when you came across us?”

“We were, but we had found a place for the night before coming across you guys. When we smelled the food, we came in.” Robert looked like he meant what he said, but I still didn’t feel good about it.

I looked over at Thad and raised my eyebrows, kind of a “What now?” look. He was sitting on the ground with his knees up and his folded hands resting on them; he opened his palms and kind of shrugged. “You folks understand we are naturally a little cautious,” Thad said.

“Of course; we all are. I tell you what; I’ll sit watch. I don’t have a weapon, but if I hear anything, I’ll wake you guys up. It’s the least we can do for all you’ve done,” Robert said.

“I appreciate the offer, Robert, but we’ll keep watch. You guys sleep.” I wasn’t about to let this guy stand watch over me while I slept.

“No, no, I insist. I’ll stand watch. You folks have been kind to us, and I want to repay the debt somehow.” Robert stood up to make his point.

“I don’t mind if he stands watch, Morgan. Him and Brenda are real nice. I think we can trust them,” Jess injected into the conversation.

“Thanks all the same, Robert, but you’re not standing any watch. And that’s final.” I stood up and looked across the fire at him.

“Easy, Morgan; you’re being an ass,” Jess came back at me; she was sitting beside Brenda, who was looking at the ground between her feet and saying nothing. Brenda’s lack of action only reinforced how I felt; this cheese had turned.

“You act like you don’t trust me, Morgan. Your friends are okay. I’m starting to get a little offended,” Robert said, making his play now.

“I don’t give a damn if you’re offended. You’re welcome to stay here, but you’ll sleep, and I’ll stand watch.”

“I agree with ya, Morgan. Brenda, you folks are welcome, but we take care of our own security.” Thad had stood up beside me. Jess, however, was not on board.

“You guys are being rude. They haven’t done anything to us. I can see why he’s offended.” Now Jess was on her feet. The only person not in this conversation was Brenda; she was still staring at the ground.

“Brenda, what do you think you should do?” I was looking down at her. She didn’t look up, didn’t react. “Brenda?”

She looked up and looked at all of us. “I think it’s a hard life, an’ we have to make hard decisions. Robert, I think we should move on. They done enough for us.” Wearily she stood, and took the boys by the hand. “Come on, boys, these nice folks have done enough for us. Thank you for everything.” With that she turned and started to walk off into the darkness.

“You gonna send my wife an’ kids out into the cold of night?” The light from the fire dancing off his face gave Robert a sinister appearance.

“Time you move on, Robert. Best catch up with your family.” Thad reached down and hefted the shotgun from the tree it was leaning against.

“All right; after all, I ain’t got a gun.” He looked at Jess. “You want to come with us? These two seem like assholes.” Jess looked at him and then at us. Thad met her eyes and slightly shook his head from side to side. She looked afraid, confused, maybe uncertain.

Stepping forward I told Robert, “You need to go now. I’m not askin’; I’m tellin’.” Robert started to back away from the fire, the light fading down his face as he did.

After Robert was out of sight, we stood in silence for a moment around the fire. After giving it a couple of minutes, it was time to act. I told Thad and Jess to break camp; we needed to move quickly.

“What? Why do we need to move, and where are we going?” Jess was surprised.

“I don’t think they are alone, and I think they will be back with others,” I said quickly. “We need to hurry.”

“I think you’re right, Morgan. I think we were wrong about them. Let’s get moving,” Thad spoke up.

Jess reluctantly went along. We quickly took down the tarp. I stuffed it in my pack without folding it, along with the support lines. I asked Jess to wash the pot real quick. “Just give it a quick wash. In that pile of stuff I dumped out is a half sponge and a small bottle of dish soap. Wash it real quick, then set it by the fire to dry. Hurry up.”

Jess didn’t say anything; she started to do it. Thad grabbed the grill and set it by his pack. While I was closing my bag, I spotted my ditty bag full of “trap” supplies; it gave me an idea. I threw my big canteen to Jess. “Here, rinse out those two stew cans, just rinse the leftover out of them, and then throw ’em on the fire to dry.” She looked up but didn’t say anything, just picked up the cans and set to it.

“Where we gonna go, Morgan? We need to get away from here, but it’s dark. I don’t think the road is the way to go.” Thad was looking out into the darkness toward the road, cradling the shotgun in his arms.

“Me neither, man. What we’ll do is go along the bay, out that way.” I pointed to the east into the woods. “We’ll follow along the edge of it but stay out under the pines. If we’re careful and pick up our feet and don’t stumble around, we won’t leave any tracks. They would have a hard time following us in the dark anyway.”

“These cans are dry, Morgan.” Jess looked dejected; it was obvious she wasn’t used to thinking about people as a threat.

“You okay there, Jess?” I asked as I pulled the ditty bag out of my pack.

“Yeah, it’s just, if you can’t trust a family with a couple of kids, who can you trust? How am I going to get home if everyone out there is out to get me?” She was staring into the fire.

“You can’t trust anyone, Jess; that’s why we’re together. That’s why we got to stay together,” Thad answered her.

“But that’s just it, we trust each other. We are helping each other. We can’t be the only ones like that,” she replied, still staring into the flames.

“We’re not. The world is still full of good people. The problem is we can’t tell who’s who.” I turned to Thad. “Give me a hand real quick. I want to do something to slow them down a little.” I stood and Thad followed me into the pines.

From the bag, I took out a roll of military trip wire. Finding a suitable sapling, I wrapped the end around the base about eight inches off the ground and stretched it out nearly twenty feet to another one. Using my knife, I jabbed a hole in the lid of the can and ran the wire through it and then wrapped it around the base of the second tree and tied it off tight.

“Oh, I see what you’re doing. Something to trip ’em up, make ’em think we know they’re coming.” Thad was standing over me, holding the shotty.

“Yeah, just so they’ll know we know what they’re up to.”

“Would work better if we had some rocks to put in the cans though.” Thad was right, but where the hell are we gonna get rocks?

“You gotta a pocket full of rocks? I damn sure don’t,” I said as I was cutting the wire. Then I thought about my pockets.

“Hey, you got any change?” I asked him as I stuffed my hand down into my own pocket.

“Yeah, I do. Good idea.” He pulled out a handful of change as I did the same. As quietly as I could, I placed the coins into the can. We repeated the process with the other can, covering an area about thirty or so yards from the front of our camp. We ran back over to the fire, where Jess was still sitting; she hadn’t moved.

“Should we put out the fire?” Thad asked.

I thought about it for a minute. “No, stoke it up with all the wood we have, an’ let’s go.” While Thad and Jess piled the remaining wood on the fire, I pulled the NVGs out of the pack. I worked quickly to close it up and then shouldered the pack and put the NVGs on. Thad and Jess both picked up their packs.

“What the hell is that?” Thad looked surprised at the rig on my head.

“Night vision. Follow me and remember, pick up your feet.” We started out in a line, with Thad bringing up the rear and me on point.

The bay continued to the east for a while and then started to curve south. We followed it until it started back to the west. This little bay was shaped like a big, fat thumb stuck out into the pines. Once we were on the other side, I could see the fire from our campsite without the goggles. I dropped to my knees, and the others did likewise. “Let’s stay here. We’ll crawl into the brush here and wait for first light. They aren’t about to come through there in the dark, and if they try, we’ll know about it long before they get here.”

It was incredibly dark out; the moon had been waning the last few nights and was now gone. We were close enough that I could see them nodding their heads in the dark. The ground on the edge of the swamp was damp, so I pulled my poncho out and spread it on the ground. Thad, seeing what I was doing, did the same.

“Jess, put your bag on here. We’ll take turns on watch tonight but from our bags right here. I don’t want to be moving around making any noise at all. Anyone need to use the head?” They just looked at me.

“The toilet, or rather, bush?” That they understood.

“I do, but I’m out of TP. Do you have any, Morgan?” Jess was unrolling her bag. I reached into the top of my pack and took out the Ziploc bag containing my roll. I had removed the tube to make it pack tighter.

“Here.” I tossed it onto her bag. “But go easy on it. It’s all I got.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Jess started to move off into the bush for a little privacy.

“This ground’s wet. What’r you gonna put your bag on?” Thad was unrolling his.