Holding Their Own: The Salt War (20 page)

He often mused that he would have never applied for Special Forces if he’d known of the boredom, been aware of the monotony. The tedium, and its mind-numbing effect, was increased exponentially as a result of the intensive training and discipline imposed on the teams.

Nick thought “the teams,” were men of action, trained specialists in the science of violence, death, and destruction. And they were.

But those duties seemed minimal compared to the countless hours spent doing nothing, much of that time requiring the utmost restraint and non-action.

Rising up on one elbow, he peered down into the barn’s central area, cautious that his movement didn’t draw the human eye. There were only two men still inside the structure, the rest having moved out hours ago to scour the forest in search of his skin.

How many times had he carefully peeked through a jungle canopy, hoping to catch a glimpse without being spotted? He’d lost count of the desert washes that had hidden his body, forgotten more of the spider holes, dugouts, trap doors, and ghillie suits than he could remember. They were all used to conceal his presence, so much of his lifetime’s work spent where he wasn’t wanted – or expected.

Silently, he smiled, thinking back to a miserably muddy, excessively cold hole in the Afghan mountains. A buzzing barn fly reminded him of a camel spider, the six-inch beastie deciding to visit his hide in the Syrian Desert.
Those monsters have pinchers that can take off a man’s finger
, he remembered.
Maybe the hay loft isn’t so bad.

The dichotomy was a strain for men like Nick. They were immersed in the finest training available, instructed, drilled, and tutored in the art of ultimate violence. Each man was skilled to a high degree in the application of firearms, explosives, sabotage, and maneuver. Physical prowess was required to make the cut, the ability to endure extreme hardship, mental duress, and grueling standards of personal discipline all being minimum requirements.

Yet, the finest, most highly trained killing machines available spent copious amounts of time hiding, stalking, sneaking, and remaining as absolutely still as they possibly could. It was torture of a nature, a necessary evil that most accepted, but never embraced.  

As time wore on, Nick’s restlessness continued to build, forcing the big man to resort to mental games of distraction. Images of Diana and Kevin were always near the surface of his conscious mind, his occupational downtime leading to the usual wonderings of what his loved ones were doing, how their days were progressing, and if they were thinking about him.

His thoughts of Kevin were especially poignant, his only son now carrying a rifle in harm’s way, probably no less than a few miles from his present position. He tried to redirect that negative energy, but didn’t succeed. If something happened to Kevin, he knew it would be a struggle to remain on the reservation.

With an extreme effort, he pushed it aside, entertaining himself by guessing the time of day from the scarce shadows within view. He made a serious attempt to eavesdrop on the limited conversations nearby. Tried to catch up on his sleep. Nibbled on the salted beef from his pack.

A ray of sunlight brought him back to the job at hand, the narrow slice of light finding a small gap in the planks that comprised the barn’s wall.
About two hours of daylight left
, he judged. The men hunting him in the woods would soon be returning, moaning and tired, bitching about yet another day of fruitless activity. The thought made Nick smile.

He then had an interesting idea, a concept that could make his new friends from Cartersville adore him even more.

There was only one man in the barn turned command center, an older gentlemen who seemed to be enjoying his afternoon nap. Nick listened carefully for several minutes, trying to determine if there was anyone else nearby. He heard only the occasional bird and buzzing insect.

He repacked and shouldered his ruck carefully, eyes darting between the main door and the snoring gent below.

A last minute idea popped into the operator’s head. Taking his Shemagh from around his neck, he quickly folded the square cloth into a triangle and then began wrapping it around his face and head, Palestinian style. When he’d finished, only a small slit reveled any part of his face, an inch-wide opening for exposing an assassin’s eyes.

Down the ladder he stepped, gradually letting his weight settle on each rung, hoping to avoid squeaks and creaks. The solid, packed earth ground felt good under his boots. It was only four steps to the sleeping man, Nick’s knife drawn and carried low to thrust. He gave the dozing occupant a rude awakening.

With one large hand, his cupped the poor fellow around the mouth, jerking up and back with unbelievable force, tipping chair and man over, and pinning both to the floor.

Nick was just above his victim’s shocked face, staring though his cotton mask with steely, green eyes that promised death. For a moment, the big man thought about screaming “Allahu Akbar,” the traditional Islamic battle cry, but decided his new friend’s heart probably couldn’t handle it.
Bishop would do it
, he decided. 

The barn-keeper must have thought terrorists had invaded the Texas countryside, his face growing instantly pale as he peered up into the nightmare hovering just above his nose. Nick’s voice did little to settle the man’s heart rate, growling low and harsh. “Make a sound and I separate your head from your body,” he stated.

With his eyes darting between Nick’s knife and the unblinking, fanatical stare, the older gent nodded a rapid agreement.

Before removing his hand-gag, the big man let his victim feel the point in his throat.

“When are the patrols coming back?”

“I… please… I,” muttered the terrified prisoner.

“When!” hissed Nick, pretending to be on the edge of homicidal rage.

“Dusk,” came the whimpered response.

“How many men are guarding the transports outside?”

Nick saw a flash of bewilderment pass behind his new friend’s eyes, the man more frightened of not knowing the answer than anything else.

“Transports?” came the honest question.

If he hadn’t been playing crazed-madman, Nick would have laughed at the situation. “Transports. The buses and trucks used to haul the men from Cartersville. How many men are guarding them?”

The guy started to nod his understanding, but the tip of Nick’s blade made him reconsider the expression. “Three I think, maybe four.”

“Okay, friend. Here’s what we’re going to do. I’m going to let you up, and we are going to stroll to the door. You are going to call to the guards, instruct them to come inside the barn. Tell them you just received some good news. Tell them anything you have to, but get them in here. Do you understand what I am telling you to do?”

“Yes.”

Nick raised up, pulling the much smaller fellow up by his shirt. Making sure his new acquaintance could clearly see the safety coming off his carbine, the big man waved his captive towards the door. “Fuck this up, and I will cut you in half. Do as I ask, and you’ll see your family tonight.”

After a few hesitant steps to the door, Nick listened as his instructions were followed to the letter. “Hey! Hey, you men! Come on inside. I just found out they’ve got him! We can all go home soon.”

Nick could hear the message being passed around outside as he motioned his captive to move away from the door. The prisoner did as he was told.

The sound of footfalls came from the entry, the first arrival finding Nick standing inside, rifle three inches from his head, finger on his lips. He grabbed the new arrival’s lever-action 30-30 and shoved him out of the opening.

The next two came in at the same time, one of them trying to be clever and raise his shotgun. Nick’s left fist knocked the poor fellow staggering into his mates.

“Any more?” the big man grumbled.

No one seemed to want to answer. “Hey guys, where did they catch him at?” a new voice just outside the threshold queried. The question never received a response.

Nick found himself with five severely frightened locals, all of them staring at him as if he were the devil just arrived from the gates of some Middle Eastern hell.  He also had collected quite the respectable stash of weaponry.

Covering the detainees with his carbine, Nick ordered one of them to toss the weapons outside the door. That task completed, he issued a final set of orders.

“I’m going to leave you guys inside of this barn. Come out, and I will shoot you. Make a ruckus, and I’ll set the place on fire and watch you all burn alive. Remain quiet, and you can all enjoy meatloaf at home with your wives and kids tonight.”

All five heads signaled their agreement with the plan, but then again, they didn’t really have any viable options.

Nick stepped outside, pulling the heavy wooden door shut, and then securing the latch with a small length of paracord.
That ought to hold them until I’m done,
he thought.

Most of the cars, buses, and pickups were parked in a relatively straight line. There were at least 50 vehicles. Deciding to “work” on every third unit, Nick began moving down the row, his knife visiting each fuel tank.

It seemed to take forever, moving along, rolling under the bumper, and issuing the fateful thrust.

After 20 minutes, he finally made it to the end of the line, the smell of petrol growing thicker in the air.

Again using a small length of paracord, he tied a handful of hay into a bundle, and then wrapped the torch onto a scrap piece of lumber he found lying along the route. After blowing to make the flames good and hot, Nick reversed his direction, pacing back along the line of leaking tanks, sticking his torch underneath each one until a whoosh sounded, and the fire began licking out from underneath.

With his arson now complete, Nick trotted off, needing to put some distance between his crime and the men who would be rushing back from the woods as soon as the smoke became visible.

After crossing a nearby field, he paused and looked back. It was an unusual sight, every third car in the long line appearing as a glowing red ball of fire. The first tank exploded just then, sending a column of red ash and yellow flame high into the sky. The two neighboring cars were burning just a few moments later.

“Now that is really going to piss them off,” Nick grunted. Without looking back, the big man swerved, jogging toward the setting sun.

Dr. Hanes pushed open the screen door leading to his back porch. Under one arm was an old medical reference, its yellowed, dog-eared pages indicating a life of toil from a time before the internet came to exist.

Like so much of his library,
The Forensic Guide to Poisons
was once again proving useful, the hardcopy tomes lining his office shelves in vogue since the collapse.

He casually meandered over to a bushel basket of potatoes, bending to lift one of the small tubers he had intended to plant for the last two weeks.

Holding the specimen up to the light, the physician squeezed the skin, taking careful note of its softness and color. The now-sprouting eyes were another positive indicator. He then used his fingernail to slice a small cut in the soft exterior peeling.

A slight tinge of green just under the skin made him smile. Returning the sample to the basket, he whispered, “That’s the ticket.”

After making his way back to a cluttered desk, he reopened the book and reread the page that had sent him on the potato quest.

He remembered his grandma’s warning when he had been just a lad and confirmed his suspicion with the manuscript. There was a toxin in potatoes. Called solanine, it only developed in the tubers’ eyes and green portions just under the skin of near-spoiled specimens. The poison would make anyone consuming it very, very ill.

Most spuds grown in North America had been genetically modified to remove the potential threat, but the doctor had joined the all-natural, non-GMO crowd a few years before everything had gone to hell.

He began reading the necessary dosages required, noting the milliliters that would cause symptoms ranging from a mild stomachache to vomiting and severe diarrhea. If too much solanine was ingested, death could occur.

Once satisfied with his calculations, the physician made his way to the kitchen. It took him several minutes of searching, eventually finding the lemon squeezer in a seldom accessed drawer.

A few minutes later, he was squeezing one of his potatoes, using pressure to milk the liquid from the mash. After three such samples had been drawn, he began spinning the beaker of cloudy liquid in tight, centrifuge-like circles.

His arm began to tire after a short time, but that was just fine. He turned up the oil lantern to its brightest setting, holding up the clear container and pushing his wire-rimmed glasses back to their most effective perch.

“So there is a separation,” he said, observing a small layer of green-colored liquid residing at the bottom of the beaker.

He verified his theory with a slide and microscope, the magnified image of the solanine matching the pictures in his guide. “Poison from spuds,” he whispered, rising from the scope’s eyepiece. “Who would have known?”

He closed his book and destroyed his notes. The potatoes’ remains were thrown out, the small amount of liquid in his beaker the only remaining evidence of his treachery.

“Time to recruit a co-conspirator,” he mused, slipping on his jacket and heading for the door.

He approached Victor’s booth with a neutral expression. “How do we get access to the security guard’s meals?” he asked bluntly.

Initially taken aback by the inquiry, Victor soon caught on. “Poison?” he whispered.

“Just to make them sick. They’ll think they have the flu or some other nasty crud. When they come and ask for my help, I’ll tell them they are all about to die. ‘Too bad we don’t have any antibiotics,’ I will say. The guards will spill the beans to save their own hides, and the secret will be out.”

Victor’s smile made it clear he understood. “They use the school’s cafeteria as a dining hall. That place is like a fortress though… no way we could get in there.”

“Maybe our new friends can help with that. They seem quite capable.”

“Can’t hurt to ask,” the shopkeeper responded.

“In the meantime, would you happen to have any lemon squeezers handy?”

Victor rubbed his chin, thinking about his friend’s odd request. “No, but I’ve got a Tofu press at home. Would that work?”

The physician threw the merchant a questioning glance, “A what?”

“Don’t ask,” responded Victor, waving off his friend’s next question. “I’ll send one of my helpers home to get it.”

“No,” came the firm reply. “You go by yourself. I want to keep this just between us in case something goes badly wrong.”

Grunting his agreement, Victor responded, “You’re right, of course. We wouldn’t want to trouble Stan with having to execute more than just the two of us.”

Gospel watched the twisting, serpentine queue of grumbling, dog-tired men trudge through the south gate. Turning to the chief, he said, “This Nick fellow is a demon. He didn’t kill anyone, yet the patrols seem to believe we got our asses kicked.”

“The bigger problem is that once retold, the gossip morphs into a tale completely different from the truth. One of my men overheard some rumblings today. He said that the stories are beginning to elevate our fugitive to an urban legend status. They are talking about him in the same terms as Bonnie and Clyde or John Dillinger, giving him the prestige of an outlaw folk hero,” replied the lawman.

Gospel understood and didn’t like it. “I’ll fix that later. For the time being, we have to raise morale. Look at these guys; they’re plodding along with their heads down, shuffling their feet, and hardly saying a word. I’m no military commander, but I sure as shit can see when an army is beaten and in retreat.”

“It’s more than just the physical exhaustion and lack of any success. I’ve heard some of them complaining that their families aren’t going to have enough to eat because they’re spending so much time on our manhunt. The reward you’re offering doesn’t seem real to them anymore. No one thinks they’re going to find the fugitive.”

The chief’s words resonated with Stan. He hadn’t encountered a problem like this in a long time. It reminded him of those early days, shortly after society had dropped off the proverbial cliff.

Those had been desperate times. The people of Cartersville had appeared much the same as the men marching past him now, shiftless, struggling, and without hope. He remembered thinking there was a vacuum of leadership, that the townspeople were nothing more than lost souls, wandering through life aimlessly. There wasn’t any direction, path, or plan. He had stepped in and filled the void.

Now, two years later, Stan firmly believed it was his vision and charisma that had filled the gap. Yes, the supplies available via the influx of truckers had helped, but he was convinced that his own personal magnetism had saved the day. After all, they didn’t call him Mr. Gospel for nothing.

An idea consumed his thoughts, a stone that would kill two, troublesome birds.

Turning to his lieutenant, he said, “We need to organize a party… a feast. We can use some of the trailer food, buy more from the market, and throw a real shindig in the square. Let’s have music, free meals, and of course, I’ll give a speech. It will be a church social on steroids.”

The concept surprised the chief, his eyebrow movement indicating he hadn’t expected anything like what his boss was suggesting. “Interesting,” he ventured. “You might just be on to something there.”

“Someone once said that an army marches on its stomach. Well, I believe a town does as well. We’ll have a celebration, make sure everyone in Cartersville knows society here is stable, and we’re making progress, despite this little setback from our friend Nick.”

“When do you want me to pass out the party invites?”

“As fast as we can organize it. Tomorrow evening would be best. I want to nip this wave of unrest right in the bud. I want to get things back to where they were before that asshole showed up and started spouting off about his Alliance. I’ll announce that we have word he’s headed on back from the cesspool he crawled out of… blah, blah, blah.”

The chief wanted to remind Stan that he’d suggested the exact same thing two days ago, but held his tongue. The man standing next to him had a delicate ego and was unpredictable when challenged. He kept his mouth shut, secretly happy that they were abandoning the ill-advised hunt for the single fugitive.

“Get your best men working on it,” the boss ordered. “I want this gala happening as soon as possible. You can access the treasury to buy whatever is available from the market. You have my leave to use whatever you need from the trucks. Make it a banquet to remember.”

“Yes, sir. I’m on it.”

Bishop had an idea.

Standing in the doorway of the small hut Rocco had assigned for quarters, he surveyed the comings and goings of the local villagers.

In reality, his mind was elsewhere, trying to solve the problem. He needed to reunite with Terri and Hunter, and that was going to be extremely difficult with a range war in progress.

While he had little doubt he could infiltrate the Culpepper ranch, Rocco had described the property as a maze of outbuildings, trailer homes, and other structures. “It’s like a small town,” the local leader had said. “There’s no telling where your wife and son are being held.”

“They have scouts and outposts surrounding the ranch,” Rocco claimed. “They move them all the time. Believe me, Señor, we have tried to raid the enemy camp several times, and carried back numerous bodies after each attempt.”

Bishop snorted, recalling the conversation, his confidence unaffected. There was an enormous difference between detecting a raiding party and identifying a lone, stealthy individual. He was sure he could get in, but then how would he find Terri?

And even if he could locate his wife and son, how would he get them out? While he loved Hunter more than anything on earth, the lad hadn’t exactly mastered noise discipline. One single cry, giggle, fart, or belch at the wrong time could spell trouble. If the boy were upset, his healthy lungs would let everyone know about it… everyone for miles.

Bishop had determined that a late night rescue was out of the question. That left only two alternatives – end the war, or negotiate with the Culpepper outfit.

Bartering for his wife’s release was fraught with peril. He didn’t possess much of value, and if the Salineros had any hint of the rank of his wife’s position within the Alliance, they might demand a hefty ransom. He wondered for a moment if Mr. Culpepper realized he had the leader of the free world staying at his hacienda.

Even if Bishop could strike a deal, he was sure Rocco and the Tejanos wouldn’t appreciate the Alliance strengthening their sworn enemy. Culpepper would likely want food, arms, or ammunition in exchange for his family. While Bishop had little doubt Diana and the council would pay practically any price, the ransom would increase the lethality and longevity of the Salineros’ effort. Not a good deal for his current hosts.

Bishop finished the mental round trip, ending up right back where he’d started. The only way to pull this off gracefully was to end the war. In his mind, that meant providing both sides with what they wanted. Silver, and a steady supply of food.

If all the fighting and killing were really over silver, why not provide the Tejanos with another source of the precious metal to keep their people healthy? That solution would allow the locals to thumb their noses at the dreaded Culpepper overlords and get on with peaceful coexistence.

The Texan knew there were plenty of silver coins throughout the Alliance. He was also well aware that precious metals had held little value in post-collapse civilization. You couldn’t eat, shoot, or stab with gold, so what was the use?