Book 1: Ch 6

Will this be our life from now on? Killing people, taking their stuff and running off with it? It’s like we’ve become wolves ourselves. It’s sad, no matter how you look at it. We did the training, the prepping, thousands of dollars sunk to avoid becoming an armed roaming gang. Yet here we are now.

The dirt road was dark, with the apparent lack of street lights and the forest canopy blocking the light of the moon. We drove on with our headlights off, compensating the lack of lighting by using our night vision equipment to see the road. The lack of depth perception forced us to travel slowly. Still, even with the unconventionality of it, it is much safer this way.

Thankfully, no one got wounded during the raid and we got off with some rifles and crates of stuff. We didn’t check what is inside yet, but we hope it would be worth it. Food, water, ammo, maybe clothes for us to blend with the locals. And I do wish the place this road leads is well worth the life we took to get there. It better be, it has to be.

I rolled down the window and peeked my head out. The cold breeze of the morning and the fresh air of the forest welcomed me as the light of the false dawn peeked out behind the distant mountains. Damn, I didn’t even notice we’ve been driving for a couple of hours now, the lack of interruptions and roadblocks must’ve meant that were in the safer area now. I reached over to my radio and pressed the send button giving an audible click, “Status check.” I said, holding it up to my mouth. The fact that the others hadn’t done so also means that they too haven’t noticed.

“Fuel’s low and the engine is heating up. That patch job just isn’t cutting it.” Nick said, following behind me in his truck, all shot and abused but still truckin’. Gotta give credit on the brand for that. Hell, it’s even shown around the world carrying around a dozen armed Taliban on the back and it’s always present in every modern conflict in the globe, from the wars in the Middle East, to bushfires in Africa.

“Mine’s half and I’m hungry.” Ron followed, riding last in line on his own. A pimped out truck fitted with a lift kit, engine snorkel, skid plates, a winch, off road tires, a supersized cup holder, and all the shebang. He had it all tricked out that everyone looking at the mechanical masterpiece would have their insecurities rise up and think of him as overcompensating. Which is not, he just had more disposable cash to spend on his toys. And thinking the situation we’re in right now, I think its money well spent. I do wish he put in some armor plates while he’s at it too, and maybe even a medium machinegun with tens of thousands of ammunition.

“I’m at half too.” I said to the radio, leaving the question of fuel unanswered. Once we use all our gas, the chance of refueling would be slim to none. So we better use them smart and use them well. There’s nothing much else to say and we kept our silence as we continued down the road, keeping an eye out for any potential hiding place. About an hour later, we came up on a shallow creek running past the dirt road. I stopped, causing the line to stop

I got out and surveyed upstream and saw it take a bend in the forest, hiding it from anyone using the road. It looked good enough and I turned my truck to follow the rocky creekbed. The truck rocked and rolled from the head sized rocks that litter the creek, and I could see the other two following me, their trucks doing the same rocking and rolling motion as they travelled along the length of the creek.

I then saw a shallow rise separating from the creek, it was free of trees and looked to dip after some distance. I flashed the hazard lights, signaling them to halt, and stopped the truck “I’m just going to check something” I said. The two gave two click of acknowledgement as I got out, soaking my boots and wetting my pants up to my shin, then jogged up the rise holding my rifle in ready. The grass looked to be eaten and I could see and assortment of dried manure scattered all around. The presence of water nearby and the open field makes this place the ideal feeding ground for any herbivore.

The clearing was wider than I first thought and I could see some game grazing on the far side of the clearing, about a hundred yards away. I took a knee and aimed my rifle, it was a pair of white tailed deer, a doe and its fawn. Both were both chewing on their own, unaware of the rifle pointed at them. I lowered my rifle, it’s not worth it. The gunshot would raise the attention of anybody nearby and the blood and entrails left of the dressing would attract predators and scavengers alike. Besides, we got a creek already nearby, eating fish won’t kill us.

I scouted the clearing a second time and saw a thick patch of trees on the far side of the clearing, perfect. That would be where we’ll park the trucks for the day.

I jogged back to our trucks and found Nick splashing some of the creek water into his engine, each splash would make a hissing sound along with steam rising. Ron was carrying around a cooler and is down to his boxers, which is also wet. He had a huge smile on his face and gave me a thumbs up. I gave an exaggerated nod and signaled for everyone to get in the trucks.

We topped the rise and parked on the designated patch of trees. We then cut some tall bushes and placed them on our trucks, camouflaging them from afar. All in all, I think we were in a well hidden spot.

I approached Nick, who was bent over the open hood of his truck and is refilling the radiator with creek water. He was using one of our filter pumps to clean the water first before putting it in. “How’s the truck? Do we need to call his family?” I said, delicately holding a flower I picked off on the side and laying it on top of the engine.

“It’ll run.” He replied. “As long as it gets a steady supply of fuel and water but I don’t see that happening.” He closed the hood and went to the back to filter some more creek water for consumption. “We might have to chop it up and feed it to the others but I hope it doesn’t come to that.”

“Then I hope it doesn’t. We still have some jerrycans with fuel on them so I guess it goes to you. Just keep it watered, well find a way around it.” I said, giving a gentle slap on his shoulder. He flinched, which reminded me of his wound. “Sorry, how’s the shoulder?”

“Its fine, the hole is all scabbed out now, and it doesn’t hurt as much whenever I move my arm. That was some fine job you did.” He said.

“It’s nothing big. All I needed to do is to bleed the pussy blood out of you and as of now, I think you’re about half a man now.” I said then nodded, leaving him to do his thing. Ron was setting up a fireplace and is starting to light up a fire, he had his cooler next to him and looked to be excited for something. “It almost feels like Christmas with that smile on your face.” I said as I sat next to him.

“That’s right!” grinning, he reached over to the cooler next to him and flipped the lid open, revealing a trio of the fattest freshwater fish I’ve ever seen, all live and flopping. “Ho, ho, ho motherfucker. Now get yourself lost or something, I got this shit. Breakfast is in an hour.” he said, giving me a wink.

“Don’t worry Santa, I’ll be nice. I’ll make sure to bring you cookies so you don’t get your low blood sugar.” I replied then walked to the outside of the camp, I guess I’ll be doing the guard duty.

I did a patrol on the perimeter and only found some animal tracks, some for the white tailed deer I’ve seen from earlier and some rabbit droppings scattered here and there. I found no footprints or anything suggesting recent human traffic which is nice. Looks like I’ve chosen a real nice and secluded spot.

I went back to the camp and got myself a length of fishing line, and some of empty cans. I then went on another circle around our perimeter setting up tripwires tied to the cans filled with rocks to serve as noisemakers. Once tripped, it will make a whole lot of racket, giving us invaluable warning and time to prepare a welcome party for our guests.

That done, I walked back towards our camp and I could smell the fish cooking in the fire. Ron had the fishes impaled on sharpened sticks and is grilling it on the fire. “Smells good.” I said as I sat across him on the fire. I looked at Nick’s direction and found him bent over on his truck’s hood. “What’s Nick doing?” I asked. He’s been spending too much time fixing that radiator leak.

“He’s manually closing up the busted coils with a pair of pliers. Radiator seal kit won’t be able to fix a bullet hole so he’s just left with that I guess.”

“He looks to need some help though.” I said, looking at the struggling Nick.

“Nah, he’s just about done and so is this so how ‘bout we wait right here.” he replied, pausing and looked down and deep into the fire.

“You okay bro?” I asked, sensing something off about him.

“I’m fine” Ron dismissed, waiving his hand. “Last night’s just coming to catch up with me.”

“Want to take a look at the loot?” I asked, maybe that will liven him up. It’s not a birthday present but that’s the closest thing we have at the moment.

“Good idea.” Ron said as he took the fishes off the fire and set them aside to cool. He then went to his truck, leaving his rifle by the campfire. Leaving your rifle in this situation is risky, but I’m not going to call him out on that. Were all having our issues and its best if we avoid getting into each other’s skin as long as we could.

Ron came back holding a wooden crate on his hands, it looked to be heavy judging by the veins popping on his arms. He set it down with a thud and drew his heavy utility knife, a Ka-Bar, sliding the blade under the top cover and rocking it up and down. The lid loosened up with a creak and Ron did the same to the other side and took the lid off.

We looked inside and were welcomed with a familiar, but strange sight. It was an ammo can. But we’ve never seen something resembling both the can and the crate, and the writing is all wrong, so wrong that it looked to be a different letter script. Not Latin, Arabic, or Cyrillic, it looked to be alien and that left us both dumbstruck. There was one saving grace about it though, is the numbers, it says 7.62x54 and the sight of it was enough to give a smile to both our faces, more so than the number 2080 next to it.

Ron opened it with the knife and we could finally see a familiar sight. Bundles of individual rounds wrapped in paper and held by string. I reached in and unwrapped one, revealing the familiar glint of surplus ammunition, it was brass, not lacquered steel and the coloring of the bullet was alien to me, it was light blue and I’ve never seen one before. I shrugged, it doesn’t matter. Its ammo and we could use it.

Ron sat down and took a bundle for himself, gripping it tight in his fist making his knuckles turn white. He eased his grip after a while and let it drop back on the pile. He then stood and walked away from it, going to where he put the fishes and put them on what’s left of our paper plates. “Breakfast is ready.” He said just as I heard Nick’s footsteps come behind me.

“Smells good man, right on time too because I’m just about starving.” He said as he sat down be the fire. Ron handed him his breakfast and he nodded in thanks.

The three of us then ate our breakfast without a word with me and Nick flashing a glance all around from time to time. Nick the leaned over to me after a while and whispered, ‘What’s up with Ron, he looked… I don’t know, a little pissed off?’

Ron then looked up at Nick and met his eye, making Nick lean back for an imperceptible bit. “I’m a bit bummed out that the thing we got from killing all those men is a bunch of ammo. Like a fucking video game, rewarding us ammo for killing people so we could kill more. It’s like a fucking sick joke, and I don’t like it. Not one bit.”

“I don’t like it too bro,” I agreed “but it’s something we need either we like it or not. We’ll need every bit of everything if we want to continue living in this place. I’m sure we’ll find a safe place for all of us but until then… until then well do whatever we need to do.”

“I know… I know what to do. It’s just that I don’t like doing it, I don’t like not having a choice on any matter“ Ron sighed “it just makes me feel so helpless and stupid for some reason.”

“We didn’t have any choice about what we did. But those men, they chose to fucking block roads and ambush people, that earns them a bullet in my book.” Nick chimed, shoving a sizeable chunk in his mouth meeting Ron’s gaze up front.

The two looked at each other for a while. “That earns them a bullet in my book too,” Ron nodded “but I don’t think that’s the main problem here, it’s that I know well be doing this for a little while longer than any of us would want.” He paused “if you know what I’m sayin’”

Nick nodded and I breathed a quiet sigh of relief, pinching a nice chunk of fish and tossing it on my mouth. Reaching for a drink, I then heard the sound that I’d rather not hear on any occasion.

*CLACK* *CLACK* *CLACK*

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