THE COLLAPSE: Seeking Refuge (12 page)

The two men had invited Stephen to tag along with them as they worked their way toward the bridge, but Stephen declined.  It was too far away, and he wanted to get back to his family.  Stephen informed the men that Fish wasn’t alone, and that he had a German shepherd with him that just so happened to be a prior military working dog.  The men both agreed that was “pretty cool”, but still chose to find him anyway.

Stephen bid the two patrolmen farewell and good luck, and asked them if they could relay a message to Fish.  Stephen conveyed the importance of speaking with Fish as soon as possible.  The two men had asked why it was so important, but since Carrie had mentioned that Hal’s wife was cheating with a night shift beach team member, it possibly could have been either of the two men, so he just told them that it was a private family matter, and that it was urgent.

Once Stephen was back on the forest trail and far enough away from the beach, he clicked the flashlight back on and went back to camp.

*****

Back at site 199, Stephen arrived to see that a fire had been made and the Kays were sitting in camp chairs nearby, their faces illuminated by the firelight.  Tarra had cleaned the birds and they sat upon the picnic table in one of the buckets, ready to cook.  Stephen was pleasantly surprised to see how much meat was retained after Tarra’s workmanship.  She had learned how to prepare animals for cooking from her grandfather, who began teaching her at a very young age.  He did it not just for Tarra’s sake, but also to spite Tarra’s mother who had abandoned the old ways and replaced them with drugs, booze and men.  Tarra had just about followed in her mother’s footsteps during her twenties until she met Stephen.

Wolf was gone, he had disappeared to find out if his mother wanted to join them for a seagull supper (which, of course, wouldn’t be
just
seagull).  Tarra had told Stephen that she wasn’t sure if Wolf was coming back or not, and to go ahead with seasoning the meat so they could get them on the fire.  Stephen got the impression that Tarra was quite hungry indeed! 

The birds were cooked directly on the built-in steel cooking grate above the fire pit.  Stephen wanted the smoke from the Alder wood he had secured from his woodcutters earlier in the day to flavor the meat as much as possible.  He was a tad apprehensive about eating seagull, but since he had eaten nothing since the cheese and crackers at lunch, his hunger forced him to be just as adventurous as the Kays naturally were.

As the birds roasted on the fire, Stephen occasionally turned them with a pair of metal tongs as he and his wife chit-chatted about the day’s events.

Tarra asked, “Is it even worth it?  I mean…being here.  We’re dealing with all this drama and I still don’t even feel safe!”

“I think so,” Stephen answered after flipping the birds another quarter turn, “we’re a lot safer here than at home.”

“Are we really, though?  Anything can happen here.  Just because we have trees all around us doesn’t mean we’re safe.  There were bad people already implanted here before we even arrived.  That creep Larry Paulson, for example,” Tarra said. 

Stephen thought for a moment, then replied, “I told you I’m going to take care of the Larry Paulson issue.  Just give this place a chance.  Couple more days, at least.  If you’re still not satisfied, we’ll pack it up and head out.  I’ll leave it up to you.”

Tarra sighed as she stared at the seagulls on the grill, “Maybe you’re right, babe.  I just didn’t like all the drama today with Julia and Sydney, and who knows what Hal is up to right now.  You know my #1 drama rule, right?”

“Yeah,” Stephen laughed, “drama is awesome, just as long as it isn’t
yours
.”

“Yes!” Tarra howled, and threw back her head.

Katrina spoke up, anxious to join the adults’ conversation, “Mommy, you looked like a movie hero today when you jumped in the road to save Dakota.”

Tarra took that as an extreme compliment.  The power of one of her daughters mentioning her in the same sentence as the word “hero” suddenly reaffirmed her dedication to The Park.  She decided that she could tough it out as long as it took.  After all, a hero’s work is never finished.

Minutes flew by as the birds continued to roast, the Alder smoke continuing to work its magic deep into the seabirds’ oily flesh.  The Alexander family was enveloped by the smell of well-seasoned, fire-seared fresh meat.  Juices exuded from the semi-crusted skin of Wolf’s seagulls, creating an image of dark, glistening ghosts of odd-shaped chickens in the evening firelight.  Maybe the gulls wouldn’t be so bad after all. 

By the time the birds were ready to eat, Wolf and his mother still had not reported for supper.  The Alexanders ate the gulls by themselves.  Most of the bird wasn’t delicious, but it wasn’t terrible either.  Edible.  Edible was the best word to describe it.  However, the seagull breasts were a different story.  They weren’t half bad at all!

A good portion of the birds were destroyed by the Alexanders when Fish and Pharaoh finally arrived at site 199.  Only a pair of greasy thighs cooled down by the chilly night’s air remained on the metal camping plate at the picnic table.

The Kays had jumped up from their chairs and filled Pharaoh’s plastic bowl with dog food.  One held the small LED lantern as the other poured.  Stephen offered the seagull legs to Fish, who exclaimed, “Hell yeah!” as he plopped down in a chair by the fire and furiously proceeded to eat.  All of the Alexander family winced as they witnessed Fish devour the cold meat down to the bone, including all the grisly parts.

“Dude, these are goooood!” Fish cried out with his mouth full.

“Glad you liked it,” Stephen laughed, glad to be rid of the last of the dark meat. 

As Fish finished the second piece, he declared, “I think I’m gonna have my little buddy get some more of these tomorrow.”

“You do that,” Stephen said, then changed the subject. “We need to talk to you about something serious.  You ready?”

“Sure,” Fish replied as he licked the seagull grease off all his fingers.

Stephen informed him of everything that had happened at Carrie’s site earlier that day.  He specifically mentioned that Hal Hollingsworth might approach him about one of the men on his night shift team.  Fish seemed rather upset about the infidelity.

“I’d be pissed, too!” Fish said. “I only met two of my guys today, they caught up with me on my way back from looking for Alexis.  I couldn’t find that bitch nowhere, and for some reason I don’t think she was even at the bridge.  Anyway, I told them to round up the rest of the team and meet me at nine o’clock.  I needed some time to come eat and stuff first, ya know?”

Stephen cautioned, “Don’t make it look obvious that you are on a witch hunt.  You know how the rumor mill goes, it might not even be true.  Play it cool.  Just be on the lookout for Hal, he might approach you and ask you to do something that goes against better judgment.”

“I hear ya,” Fish agreed, but Stephen wondered if Fish even
had
better judgment when it came to issues as sensitive as this.  Probably not.  So, Stephen added something.

“If you don’t know what to do, come see me first.  Wake me up if you have to, I don’t care what time it is, okay?”

Fish nodded and said, “Roger that.”

Chapter 7

Fish and his dog met the night shift team at nine o’clock as expected.  As a good leader, Fish provided them with his mission statement and safety policy.  He also disparaged the use of much-needed ammunition on warning shots, contrary to what Alexis had formerly ordered the teams to do.  Instead, he wanted them to use their “instinct” before firing off any shots.  Basically, his bottom line was that if the boat wasn’t imminently approaching the beach, don’t fire.  All of the men agreed with him, and they seemed like good guys to Fish.  He was initially convinced that none of them could be the culprit in the scandal that Stephen had laid out to him at the seagull supper.  Or could they?  He had better listen to Stephen and keep a sharp mind about it, regardless of his first impression.

The men explained to Fish that they usually patrolled in groups of two or more, which Fish wholeheartedly agreed with.  He even reinforced their mantra of safety in numbers by making it mandatory, even though it covered less ground at times.  He did mention, however, that
he
was exempt from his own “buddy policy” since he was the team leader and needed to move about the beach freely.  He also had a radio and Pharaoh, so he was never truly alone anyway.

At the end of the meeting, the night shift dispersed in groups of twos and threes in different directions.  Fish decided to join two patrollers that were headed west toward the beach parking lot.  Their names were Clay and Bryan, two fit-looking guys in their mid-twenties that Fish pegged as good friends prior to The Collapse, judging by their interactions with each other.  Fish thought that the two might have been active duty navy.  Clay was armed with what resembled a service 9mm pistol, and Bryan had a long rifle of some type (there wasn’t enough light to distinguish what gauge it was, and Fish didn’t want to embarrass himself by asking).  The gun had a sleek design, and was equipped with a huge scope. It was a very beautiful weapon indeed.  Fish was positive that Bryan was the type of guy that took his shooting very seriously. 

The three men made small talk for a few minutes as they walked, but Fish’s curiosity finally got the best of him and he blurted, “So…are you guys navy or what?”

The two friends looked at each other apprehensively as if they were hiding something.  Clay spoke first, “What does that matter?”

“I’m just curious, that’s all,” Fish said. “I was a First Class before all the shit went down.  Pretty damn close to retiring, too.  I guess that’ll never happen now!”

The two men seemed relieved at Fish’s statement and relaxed.  Bryan conceded, “I was a Third Class, airframer type.”

Clay added, “Me too, same squadron.” 

“Hey, that’s cool.  It’s nice to be around some fellow squids, ain’t it?” Fish stated.

“Yeah, kind of,” Bryan said, adjusting his rifle to a more comfortable position, “but Claudine and William aren’t big fans of military folks.”

Fish looked at Bryan, confused by his statement.

Clay explained, “We brought our wives to The Park before they arrived.  When they got here, the Probsts began interviewing people.  Claudine had a mob squad with her at all times in the beginning.”

Bryan nodded as Clay spoke.  Fish was baffled about this new revelation.  He had thought Claudine and William were just harmless, friendly, middle-aged ex-politicians.

After a moment, Clay continued with, “They questioned us pretty hard core before allowing us to stay here.”

“Wait, what?” Fish interrupted.  “What do you mean by that?  Have they kicked people out of here?”

Clay nodded while exclaiming, “Yeah man, tons!”

“Yup,” Bryan concurred, supporting his buddy.  Then he added, “Anyone they felt might become a problem was booted.  If you were military and didn’t have a family here, your head was on the chopping block.  They were paranoid of people being affiliated with that AWOL compound in Oak Harbor, mostly.”

“That makes sense,” Fish nodded.

Now that the navy ice was broken, the trio became quite comfortable with each other.  Fish regaled the two younger guys with some of his crazier stories while visiting ports in far-away lands.  Unfortunately, Fish’s stories were a bit too interesting, because they didn’t notice two blobs of darkness approaching the beach until it was almost too late. 

They were half way from one lighted beach warning sign to another when Bryan stopped the group with his arm, saying, “Guys, what is that?”  He pointed to the sea, and sure enough, in the starlight were two dark rectangular figures slowly approaching the beach.  They were boats.  No motors were heard, but they were definitely boats, and they were definitely too close for comfort.

“Shit!” Fish shouted. “Fall back!”

The beacher trio retreated to the rear of the beach and took cover behind large logs of driftwood.  Fish put his hand on Pharaoh’s back and gently pushed downward, which signaled the dog to lay down.

“Do you think they saw us?  Should we fire?” Bryan asked Fish while readying his long rifle.  Fish was curious to see how good of a shot the guy was with that bad-ass gun, but he didn’t want to give up their position.  Not right away.  Maybe the boaters were just looky-loos.  No use wasting ammo on that.

“No, not yet,” Fish ordered, “we need to spread out, first.”

Fish remained in place as Clay and Bryan moved away from him and set up new positions amongst the driftwood.  Once the two had found suitable cover, Fish took his M-4 off his back and aimed at the boats using the smooth log of driftwood to steady himself.  He could barely see Clay anymore to his left, since his dark skin and dark clothing blended in perfectly with the night.

“Stand by, let’s see what happens,” Fish spoke quietly to the two men as they watched.  The boats didn’t seem to be approaching anymore, they were just sitting there, waiting.  Fish didn’t like it, and neither did Clay or Bryan.

“I think we should pop ‘em,” Clay asserted in a whispery tone.

“Me too!” Bryan agreed.

“Wait,” Fish said, scanning the rest of the water. For some odd reason, he had a feeling that the two boats weren’t alone, and he was correct.  A third boat emerged from the watery darkness and joined the other two.  They formed a line, but were still just sitting there, waiting.

“Damnit,” Fish cursed softly, “I just thought of something.  They’re testing us aren’t they?”

“What do you mean?” Bryan whisper-asked.

Fish explained himself, “Normally, we would have shot at them by now.  That was Alexis’ policy…right?  Shoot at anything within 500 yards or so?”

“Yeah,” both men said at the same time.

Bryan excitedly added, “But now, they’re close enough that I can actually hit something.  I say we try it.”

Fish was no longer convinced that the people in the boats were simply looky-loos.  They could read the lit up “DO NOT LAND HERE” signs on the beach and knew better, so they must have been up to something else.  Fish didn’t want to be responsible for an incursion, especially since he just changed the warning shot policy without authorization from Alexis.  But the beachers were
his
people now, damnit!  He could do whatever he wanted with them, right?

“Fuck it, dude, take a shot. Maybe they’ll leave,” Fish told Bryan.

Fish couldn’t see it, but Bryan had smiled.  He peered into his scope for a moment, took aim, and then…

*KAPOW*

A wickedly loud blast erupted from the rifle and there was a painful yelp from one of the boats as if Bryan had hit someone!  Bryan continued to grin as he used the bolt-action to bring another round into the chamber, but suddenly there was indistinct shouting amongst the boats, and motors were heard being firing up.

Bryan was about to take another shot, but the sound of the motors meant that they were probably retreating.  It only took another second to notice what they were
really
up to.

Multiple gunshots were fired at Fish and his beachers as the three boats split up.  Two boats zoomed toward the parking lot, and the other one went toward the north beach.  All of the boats had powerful engines, and it didn’t take long to put distance between them and the patrollers.

“Shit!” Fish shouted as he got up from behind his log and ran down the beach toward the parking lot, spraying two short bursts of automatic fire toward the intruders.  The boats were too far away for Fish to be any kind of accurate, but he wanted the people in the boats to know that they were messing with automatic weaponry, should they really attempt to land.

“Horn!” Clay yelled, and pointed his air horn towards the campground.  He bleated three quick blasts, paused, and then bleated two more quick ones.  Three horns meant the west beach/parking lot area and two horns meant the north beach.  One long blast meant the beach near the bridge (east of the north beach), but he didn’t need to use that signal.

Bryan was at Fish and Pharaoh’s heels as they bounded through the rocky sand toward the parking lot.  They could see that the two boats were close to shore, but it was hard to tell how close.  Maybe they were looking for a suitable area to beach their crafts and assault the campground on foot, or maybe they were trying to find the boat landing in the darkness?  Fish tried to mentally calculate how many invaders could have loaded onto the boats for the invasion, and hoped it was less than what he dreaded it might actually be.  The boaters were likely one short, however, thanks to Bryan’s long rifle.  Fish needed to get there and stop them, fast!

Clay repeated the same succession of horn blasts and then took off to catch up with Fish and Bryan.  They were almost at the parking lot, and Clay had to put his wheels into the highest gear possible to join them, being careful, of course, not to twist an ankle on a large rock in the sand or a piece of driftwood in the low light.

As Fish and Bryan reached the parking lot, they heard gunshots in the distance behind them.  It must have been the other beachers exchanging fire with the third boat!  Yes!  The third boat was being intercepted!

Fish’s heart pounded as he commanded Bryan to take up a defensive position behind one of the vehicles in the parking lot.  Fish continued closer toward the boats, ducking down as he moved from vehicle to vehicle, ultimately choosing his own position behind a dark colored Chevy Tahoe.  He yanked the radio off his belt and spoke into it, “All stations, this is beach.  Shots fired, three watercraft inbound, one to north beach and two to the parking lot.  Interception in progress, stand by.”

Pharaoh wanted nothing more than to drive forward and carry out his duties as a loyal guard dog.  There were plenty of throats in those boats that needed to be ripped from their bodies, but the well-trained dog maintained control of his instinctual canine urges and heeled aside his master, awaiting further orders.

Fish brought his M-4 to port-arms and peeked around the side of the Tahoe.  One of the boats made a *shwish* sound as it beached itself on the wet sand.  Fish could not allow any of the infiltrators to land ashore, so he yelled to Bryan, “Open fire, get ‘em!”

Bryan hurriedly aimed at the beached boat in the darkness and pulled the trigger.  In his haste, he must not have connected with anyone, because two figures leapt from the boat and ran toward the vehicles in the parking lot.  Bryan’s position was now compromised, and he received gunfire from the remaining intruders in the boat, forcing him to squat down behind the car he was hiding behind for a moment to avoid being shot.

Fish saw the two men leave the boat and sprayed a volley of automatic fire just before they reached the vehicles in the parking lot.  He briefly wondered why only two people had left the watercraft, but swung himself around the Tahoe and laid down a solid volley of automatic fire toward the boat.  Screams were heard from the beached craft, as if he had hit multiple people! Fish then observed a man vaulting out of the boat.  He scurried to the front of the boat and pushed it back toward the ocean, the water up to his knees in the process. 

As the water-soaked pusher climbed back aboard, the boat’s motor roared into high gear and its bow lifted tremendously as it took off.  The assault was over.  Both boats were leaving.  Fish fired another short volley of automatic fire at the retreating boats, depleting his magazine.  He quickly replaced the empty mag with his spare, then focused his attention toward the two men that had jettisoned on foot and were hiding amongst the many vehicles in the parking lot.

Fish heard the two men scream as the boats departed, “What the fuck?  You can’t just leave us here!  Come back!”

As the abandoned invaders hollered to the retreating watercraft, Bryan took the opportunity to leave his position and join Fish at the Tahoe.

“There’s two of them,” Bryan huffed, nearly out of breath from all the activity.

“I know,” Fish concurred.

“What should we do?” Bryan asked, looking at Fish for answers.  After all, Fish was the older, more experienced war hero.

“Hold on, I have an idea,” Fish told him, then grasped Pharaoh by his collar.

The two boaters that had made it to the parking lot were trapped.  There was nowhere for them to go.  Fish and Bryan could easily pick them off no matter which direction they chose to retreat.  Their comrades in the boats had left them in a severely compromised situation.

Fish shook Pharaoh’s collar and yelled, “You want some, boy?  You want some, huh?”