The McClane Apocalypse Book 4 (58 page)

Reagan chuckles softly and says, “I
don’t know that he’s changed all that much. He’s just a geeky
twenty-year-old.”

Paige laughs and replies,
“A geeky
twenty-year-
old who can apparently shoot
very well!”

“Oh, yeah,” Reagan concurs.
“He’s a
crackshot
, that kid. The guys talk about
it all the time how good of a shot he is, even though he is a
dork.”

“Really? The guys talk about Simon?
That’s good. I’m glad he’s had them to look after him and teach
him.”

Reagan smiles. “He’s a good
kid. Sam’s a good
kid
, too.”

“Yeah, she’s great. I suppose with
everything that’s been happening and also trying to adjust to
living on your farm that I missed it, this thing between Simon and
Sam.”

“It’s no big deal,” Reagan says.
“They’re both still young. I wouldn’t get too excited about it.
Simon sure as hell isn’t about to act on it. Hell, Simon probably
doesn’t even know.”

Paige nods, but her mouth tightens
into a thin line as if she isn’t happy to be hearing this tale of
romance and young, budding love. Perhaps she is bitter toward that
sentiment as Reagan had once been.

“Do you know if he feels the same?”
she asks.

Paige readjusts her baggy brown
t-shirt, also borrowed, and Reagan notices that she has a light
sprinkling of freckles on her shoulder that match the ones on her
nose and cheeks.

“I don’t know. Well, I
guess that’s not really
true
,” Reagan amends. She doesn’t get to
elaborate because Grandpa and Mr. Oberholtz join them a second
later.

Three hours later they are
all in the town hall, which used to house the mayor’s office and
the police force and the local court system. The building was only
built about seven years ago, so other than the dust and cobwebs,
it’s still fairly new and holding together well without the benefit
of maintenance. It has the largest meeting area in the
criminal
courtroom
on the second floor, and the men and some of the
townspeople have set up additional folding chairs they’d found in
the basement.

Plans for finishing the wall are laid
out on display, and plenty more volunteers come forward to offer
their services to help on the build. The condo community, although
not technically contained within the city limits or the new walls,
is also present and being represented by Condo Paul.

John and Derek discuss a
need for a twenty-four hour a day patrol and guard system on the
wall and inside of it, as well. One of the former deputies has been
sworn in as the new sheriff, done by a unanimous vote about a year
ago. The town’s former sheriff was murdered in his home while he
slept at the beginning of the apocalypse. The people in the
town
thought that
it was likely a grudge murder from someone he’d arrested in the
past. They’d wanted Derek to fill the vacated position of
the
new
sheriff, but the idea of going to town every day and being
away from the farm hadn’t appealed to him. The new sheriff and his
new deputies will take on the city’s patrols for the time being
until men and women can be trained thoroughly. Some of these people
used to be tax preparers, computer programmers and lawyers,
soccer
moms
and homemakers, not gun-slinging guards and the security force
of an entire town.

“The harvest season will be
here before we know it. Our garden is already in,” one of the men
from
an outlying farm states
as he stands. “I can’t manage the harvest on my
own anymore, not since my boy died last year. I figured what with
everyone needing
food,
I’d plant double this year to help out. But I’ll
need help come harvest time. I put in a field of corn and squash,
too.”

Grandpa jumps in to intervene, “Hank,
everything will get worked out. We’ll get you the help you need. It
was a generous thing to do planting extra, to think of others like
that. I’m sure that some of the people here could help in exchange
for some food or crop, or meat if you can spare it.”

Immediately two of the women and many
more of the men in the room raise their hands. It’s been this way
for the past two years since they’d become more involved in their
little community.

Mr. Jefferson, the town
pharmacist, had helped bring in a field of corn last year by hand.
He’d
told
Reagan a while back, when she’d treated his
ten-year-old
daughter for a cut that had required stitches, that his hands
had blistered for weeks after that laborious task. He hadn’t really
been complaining. He’d said how grateful they were for the bushels
of corn that they’d
been
able to can and eat throughout the last winter.
Everyone is like this now. They work together and help the farmers
in the surrounding areas in exchange for a share of the crop to
keep their families alive. It’s a barter and trade system that has
worked successfully so far. Grandpa and Simon have also been
working with him on compounding herbals.

The Reynolds and the
Johnson families have even donated milk cows to a few people for
trade items that they needed. Some of the men in town cut firewood
for those who can’t in exchange for things that they don’t have
like canned goods or dried meat or fruit leathers. Minus the lack
of security, their town is starting to turn the corner for the
better and Reagan is glad for it. For too long people had been
afraid
to even come
out of their homes, out of hiding. They’d
been
distrustful
of everyone, even each other. Hell, even Mrs. Crestwich, the former
owner of the town’s only bakery, has said that if things continue
improving the way that they are, she may be able to re-open her old
bakery again with the right power source by next year.
Reagan’s
fairly
certain
that one’s just a pipe
dream. But everyone needs something to aim toward.

She’s zoned out thinking
about how good a
doughnut
would taste about now when an argument erupts. One
of the men from the new neighborhood as they have labeled it, or
sector five, is angry about something. The new neighborhood is over
on the other side of town. John had told her that when he and Kelly
had gone there one night looking for the parts for Grandpa’s
ultrasound machine they went to investigate gunshots near the stat
care clinic. The neighborhood had still been under construction
before the fall, which has now been mostly finished, or as finished
as they could make six of the homes out there. Thus the name the
new neighborhood. To call anything about
it
new is quite the exaggeration
indeed. Most of the homes were finished using parts and supplies
looted from abandoned
homes
and hardware stores from many different
counties
. There
are thirteen families living in those six homes, but at least they
have a source of water out there and can ban together to help one
another.

“We want the same protection and take
of the food as everyone else here!” Mr. Hernandez
argues.

His first name is Jay, and Kelly
sometimes calls him Jay the jackass. They’ve had disputes with him
before. Reagan worries that her husband will stand up and shoot him
on the spot. She’s never too sure of what his reaction to things
like this will be. She squeezes his hand. He looks over at her and
rolls his eyes. Good, he’s in a pleasant mood. His grin takes her
breath away as usual.

“Mr. Hernandez,” Grandpa starts,
“you’ll be offered the same food source availability in exchange
for work. You know how the system works. You don’t just get
food.”

“We don’t always have as
much time to offer. We’ve been workin’ all spring trying to finish
the next house. We’ve had to go on runs for supplies. We have to
lug water from the lake over there. It’s all
time-consuming
work!”

“Then you need to come up
with some kind of
new
system, dude,” Kelly says tightly. “We told you
last fall to set up a wind turbine to power generate that water
source. It’s nobody’s fault that you guys didn’t get that
done.”

Jay the jackass glares angrily at
Kelly but decides not to push his luck there. Everyone in the
entire town fears Kelly. Reagan smirks. If they only knew that John
was the one they should fear and not Kelly, they wouldn’t walk
around shrinking back from the big guy.

“We want the same protection from the
wall,” Jay rebuts.

“You know that’s probably not going to
happen, Mr. Hernandez,” the new sheriff states. “We told you this
before. We can’t come that far with it before the bad winter
weather hits again. It’s just probably not going to happen. We’ll
have to start back up next spring.”

“Oh, bullshit!” Jay argues.

His wife tugs at his shirttail, but he
shirks her off.

“You’ll be responsible for your own
security for one more year, so start figuring it out,” Kelly
basically orders. “Set up patrols just like they’re going to do
here. Appoint guards. Work on gathering and training on
weapons.”

Reagan knows that he’s probably
getting impatient for this meeting to end so he can get home to
Hannah and his Mary, the second love of his life and also his teeny
shadow when he’s home on the farm. That munchkin is never going to
find a husband when she grows up someday. Her dad will always be
her greatest hero. Also, he’s likely never going to let her out of
his sight long enough to even attract a member of the opposite sex.
Reagan flinches from those funny thoughts because Jay the jackass
is still railing.

“If the people would’ve started out in
our sector instead of right here in the middle of the damn town,
they could’ve finished ours first and then the town’s wall in the
spring.”

Beside her, John stands. She’s not
about to tug at his shirt. Mr. Hernandez is always a pain in the
ass. Reagan could care less how John handles this. She, too, would
like to go home. Her back is tired from working all day at the
clinic.

“Look, you all want free medical
care?” John bellows at them.

Reagan almost cringes at his loud
tone. He’s not usually this quick to jump straight to anger, at
least not at a town meeting. His handsome, fun-loving smile is
gone. Some of the people from the town nod or shout out “yes” in
response to his question.

“Then we shore up the walls
around the town first. The clinic doesn’t get
protected, then
we don’t come
back to work in it!” he blares.

Reagan can tell that he’s tired. He’s
been working since dawn, first at the farm and then all day here in
town building a massive, tall and thick wall. Unfortunately most of
the people don’t know that he’s working double time. All of the men
from their farm are for the time being while they work at the farm
on their own planting and also come to town every day to work on
the wall. They also don’t know that the McClane Warriors are still
searching every night for the last four men who’d gotten away. They
are going on very few hours of sleep each night, and it’s coming to
a head for her dear husband.

“That clinic doesn’t get
enough protection,” he continues on at a slightly lower
decibel,
slightly
. “That’s the reason it was
attacked. You think I’m going to let my wife come here to work for
free for all of you when she could come to harm? Or Doc? Come on,
people! Who do you think is going to come here and offer free
health-care services once we stop? That’s right. Nobody! And with
good reason, too. Nobody wants to work while they have
to worry constantly
about getting shot. That should’ve never happened in the first
place. This wall should’ve been built two years ago. We let our
guards down, got complacent. That can never happen
again.”

Grandpa interrupts and lays
a hand
on
John’s shoulder since he’s right next to him, “John’s right,
folks, the wall must be built
around
the direct vicinity of the town
first and then continued outward later. The clinic must be
protected at all costs. You are welcome, Jay, to move the families
from your community into some of the empty homes here in town.
We’ve offered that before, but you turned it down. But if you want
the wall to continue all the way out to your neighborhood, then
you’ll either have to start that project yourself with your men or
you’ll have to wait until spring most likely.”

Derek stands next and says, “Look, for
some of you that haven’t been touched yet by some of the sicknesses
and diseases out there, you should consider yourselves lucky. One
of our own doctors got sick just this last spring. We are taking
huge risks to help everyone in this town, but if you don’t want
that help anymore then fine.”

Immediately everyone turns
on Jay Hernandez. They gripe and bitch at him until he becomes red
in the face. Reagan doesn’t know if it’s from embarrassment or
anger. She hopes it’s not for the latter reason. He’s already pissy
enough to deal with most of the time. He’s become somewhat of the
leader of his district, even though that sort of anarchy away from
the town was discouraged. Each district has a volunteer
spokesperson like Condo
Paul,
who can represent the needs of
their areas. But Jay behaves more like a dictator of his
small
district
. They need to work together. Having ten different mayors and
sheriffs would just complicate their growing community.