Shadows Of Sanity And Survival (Old Preppers Die Hard Book 3) (15 page)

8

A MEETING OF THE MINDS

“So how many people exactly did you end up deciding that you wanted to bring with us to the meeting with the churches?”” Dump asked as Farley gathered his goods up.

“I figure since its sort of a gathering of all the clans as it were, that we would bring counting me, 9 people. That’s more than a big enough showing of manpower from us as a representation and is also a manageable size force for us to field if we run into any trouble coming or going to the meet.” Farley declared.

“So what’s the deal with the meeting place? I know of that old out of the way church you mentioned that they want to meet at. I had thought it was pretty much abandoned or sitting empty all these years.” Dump stated referring to an old white clapboard affair that had probably had served a small community for a 100 years before eventually disinterest or lack of a fulltime preacher had let it fall into disuse except for on certain occasions with long time residents.

“That’s the place where the churches all could agree upon and so it was decided to gather there. Some folks in the county called it common finding ground and its distant from where any fighting or raiding has been going on so its figured to be pretty safe and away from prying eyes or ears. They are saying one of the rules for the meeting is no carrying guns into the church, but knives are allowed inside. That notion of disarming isn’t flying too well with folks so we see when we get there. I don’t like the thought of getting disarmed these days either. I don’t care if it’s only for a little bit even if people say it’s the respectful and Christian right thing to do. The way I feel about it is that I am not going to church to attend a service. What I am doing here is going to a war meeting or community defense rally of sorts and as far as I am concerned a devil may well be lurking outside the doors of that church that needs shooting and I just soon keep my weapons near at hand.” Farley said hotly not relishing the notion of giving up his gun for any reason.

Oh they had plenty of scouts and militia on the outside to guard the meeting and your groups personal lieutenants were welcome to join that force or just hang out side the church as an armed rabble if they wanted to. However who ever was speaking for the group inside the church was to be armed with nothing more than their knives they normally carried.

Farley was threatening to wear his big old Cold Steel Gladius Machete to the meeting. You didn’t see him with it often but it was handy for chopping sugar cane, clearing a honeysuckle vine patch etc and he just loved fooling around with it in general

“Go ahead and wear it if you want to! Why not? I got the biggest Bowie blade I could find to wear. You probably won’t be the only one that might be thinking of wearing a sword to the meeting. I will hold your gun for you outside if need be but I would rather be inside listening to what goes on..” Dump said regarding Farley.

“Hell I would much rather have your big heathen self in there also, you speak for the majority of our little force although the other folks going to be present have no idea how big or small of a group we actually are.” Farley declared.

“I plan on keeping it that way too. I told the Lazarus boys just to stick to themselves and don’t talk to strangers much. Did you tell Becky the same? That girl worries me sometimes.” Dump said gravely.

“Yea I told her, then I told her some more. She has her instructions all laid out and I stressed to her no talking to the preacher’s much as one of the most important rules to observe. I sure wish you could have come up with a couple more females for us to bring along to this discussion as part of our makeup but it is what is.” Farley said referring to what he called his war parties organization.

He had six strong men with him plus Becky and two sixteen year old boys with their old retired Marine uncle playing patriarch to that clan attending. They carried 3 shotguns, 9 plus pistols visible, 2 lever action 30-30 rifles, a scoped 270 deer rifle, two AR 15s and an AK47 model plus his scoped 9mm carbine as their defensive armaments. Nice show of force.

Not a bad showing at all standing by him to represent his little lake tribe. No sir`eee! They looked very capable and resolved, as well as mean and dangerous if need be. The mix of people they had chosen for their delegation spoke volumes as to what they wanted to represent and what other bands of folks might think of them as a force. Farley and Charlie had a long talk about just because we were all talking about forming a militia together now didn’t mean there might not be spies present or everyone stay friendly afterwards.

Farley had considered for awhile that they should look like a couple generations of tight knit lake dwellers. You know the kind; they live miles from the lake but spend a lot of their time at it. Country folks, lucky enough a couple generations ago to have had a dam built somewhere close by to their small acreage and ended up a few miles from the waterfront in forested land. He had gone in for the mix of ages and backgrounds of everybody to appear more diverse than they were in governance and defense. Anyway he applied some SWATS" (Scientific Wild Ass Theories) to the initial impression the group would make and meet some folks doing the same. Hopefully it wouldn’t turn into a rooster show and maybe since it was being held in a church everyone would keep their grudges to themselves until the got back home.

There was bound to be some kind of friction going on between the various groups competing for food and other resources in limited terrains. Farley hoped like hell that he wouldn’t have the bad luck to run into anyone that specifically had it in for him at the meeting. Hell for that matter there still was the fact he might be maybe recognized or suspected of a past misdeed that he may or may not have committed. He was sure he might have shared some smoke and lead with somebody present, he had fired some rounds in self defense or anger several times over the last 6 months. Whether he was accountable for somebody not being present remained to be seen.

Reverend Jim eventually wandered over with his little band of what Farley snidely referred too as his “merry men” because they always seemed to be smiling and agreeing with the pastor about everything. That they wore suits and ties in their personal opinion that meant that they took their job seriously and wanted to be identified as such.

Yup! Farley had to go and ask about that right off, wasn’t often he saw a starched white shirt and got curious about how those boys were managing to keep up appearances so well. Dang every time he saw them over the last few months they had themselves a fresh shirt and a crisp crease in their pants.

The men proudly said their wives did that bit of laundry and ironing for them. Farley laughed politely with them when they bragged about using a gas powered electric generator to run the clothing irons off of while the whole time wondering what kind of idiots had he teamed up with?

“Hell it was their gas and maybe they had a lot more than Farley had thought might be available. No, he found out they were limited on times run but had gotten their daily routine of running a generator to charge some batteries down pat.

“There is no way that they running steam irons on batteries, I got to ask them what exactly they are doing. Sounds interesting.” Farley mused before listening intently to the group.

Farley and his group listened and questioned the reverends speech to them about moving to his town and possibly joining the congregation if they felt like it but it wasn’t required for about 20 minutes. Farley and Dump didn’t much like the sound of it but they were pleasant and polite.

“Preacher now I think you know that isn’t what I am saying at all. We would be very happy to help you all out all we can if you need to take a stand against that scum headed your way, or maybe even if we all get together we would more than consider going and hitting them in force all at once. I was just saying that we aren’t going to be thinking anything about doing that garrison BS you brought up. We got our own homes and gardens to tend and defend. Look we got a few two way radios and you all are going to see about how we can all relay messages and warnings together so just depend on that deterrent for now if they make a major move your way. You call we will come.” Farley said hotly because he was getting tired of him and his seconds trying to get him and some of his tribe to serve what they called “guard shifts” over next to town for room and board.

“I got a suggestion if you don’t mind trading for services and bartering for some armed guards. Could be in your case I guess we can call them mercenaries because you want to maybe go up against an army. You got some good food growing over there in your area it sounds like might need some hands for gardening and guarding on the larger farms. We ourselves lack that resource of food security but we have some extra man power that might want to be hired out by the tribe or just come on their own to do some work for pay. They will bring their guns with them and be available if the need arises to play sentry or soldier.” Dump suggested.

“I don’t understand. We already said earlier that we would try providing good food and lodging in town already for anyone wanting to help defend the community. Food is still very scarce and getting scarcer and we got to ration accordingly, that’s giving them some pay of a sort.” Reverend Jim stated objecting.

“I understand that, but you got to still feed your soldiers per se. Some people got families that don’t want to leave home and move towards what they consider is trouble. Also you are going to find folks like money or trading any surplus their labor can provide. It’s all well and good for you to want to raise your little force based on a spiritual or community patriotic basis but that doesn’t fly if your wanting people to abandon what they got for no profit to help you in your fight. Now hold on now! You got to hear me out further to catch my points. I agree that it’s everyone’s security problem now and not just yours, but not everyone is going to want to see it that particular way. A lot of people are just as content to hunker down and hide in place wherever they are currently at and come out only when the danger passes. Besides tribalism is rampant now, you ever try to tell someone that they are on your hunting grounds?

Such a thing didn’t exist before the collapse unless you’re talking about the owners of private hunting land. I had to privatize a few hundred acres of I don’t know whose land just for my own and others survival. That’s another thing some folks don’t respect borders at all when it comes down to finding themselves or their families something to eat and they are more than willing to contest you for the rights. A lot of times when you meet someone there is no words exchanged except maybe warnings to keep yours or theirs distance or to just go away or be shot. There are lots of unresolved feuds and sometimes out right wars going on out there over resources or fishing grounds even. Turf wars don’t start just at your door over here; they start at everyone’s house the moment they think about venturing out of it and leaving something unprotected.  The population is over stressed, under fed and scared of their own shadows. Trigger happy isn’t the word for it. Most people that are left alive now live barely a hand to mouth existence that doesn’t think much more about anything else except waking up tomorrow to find more to eat or defend what they got and where they are at. There are people I am sure that not only would want to take you up on that offer of bed and board for shared protection but would bless you for it. Hell most folks would be much better off in the long run and actually desperately need such an arrangement.  But we ourselves aren’t that bad off or scared to want to join up.” Dump said before Farley interjected.

“I notice that you invited the police to come along to this little party.” Farley said noting what looked like a swat raid coming up the road with various law enforcement agencies vehicles represented. There were six vehicles in all. The sheriff’s car was leading a few State trooper cars, a couple city police vehicles and the Fire Departments Chiefs truck.

“They are part of this, just like everyone else. Before you go objecting too much about them not doing anything anymore, let me advise you that my parish provides what we can to them for protection and patrolling. They are sort of their own tribe you might say. It’s kind of a weird limbo they find themselves in, legally speaking they remain empowered. No one except us pays them anything however and what used to be the county and little town’s governments are basically dissolved. Governance is based on providing for the needs of the people, we are trying to reestablish some form of civilization that can support those needs. You really should reconsider moving into the vacant houses around us and help restart things, when there is money available we will work something out maybe, but for now community food and community labor is the only work and reward system that we have.’ Reverend Ike said patiently.