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It took us five days to make the trip from Knoxville to Virginia. Over that time, we settled into a routine. Throughout the day, as we counted down the miles, we tended to Nutmeg, scavenged for food and supplies for ourselves, and talked. I did my best to describe my place, my dreams for making it better, and did my best to let Kayla know that since it was her place now, too, she could accept or reject any or all of my proposals.
The most important part of the journey was that as the days passed, I grew stronger. After the second day, my blurry vision cleared up. It wasn’t a hundred percent, but I was now at the point where I could tell the difference between a person and a tree at farther than thirty yards. The third day, I finally felt strong and steady enough to move around without the cane. My muscles still had some stiffness in them, but I worked through those by walking alongside Nutmeg for small stretches at a time.
On day four, we found a fully stocked medic’s kit inside an abandoned ambulance. Inside were several items, but of most interest to me were the sterile gauze pads and tape to apply them. When we settled in for the night, I sat back while Kayla removed the dressing the doctor had applied. I expected the stitches to look big and clumsy like when Dr. Frankenstein put his monster together, but instead they looked perfectly spaced, each tied into a little knot. The area around the wound had returned to my skin’s normal color, so I assumed the antibiotics had done the trick. Kayla suggested we leave the stiches in until we got home, so she smeared them with a topical antibiotic and covered them with a fresh gauze pad.
My heart lifted when I spotted the highway sign that was a few hundred yards from my driveway. My spirits lifted too, and I could have jumped out of the wagon and carried Kayla and Nutmeg the rest of the way, only based on the amount of joy I felt to be finally home.
“The road’s a little rough, so we’ll have to go slow up the driveway,” I said to Kayla. “When we make the turn, you’ll have to stop. I’ll need to get out and move the tree.”
“A tree?” she asked.
“Yeah. We keep it across the driveway to discourage unwanted visitors. It’s on a pulley system, so it will take me only a minute to get it out of the way.”
Kayla nodded, turned in where I told her, and stopped.
“Wait, this isn’t right,” I said.
“What?” she asked.
I jumped down from the wagon and walked eight feet up the driveway where the tree should have been. Spotting something on the ground, I squatted and ran my fingers through a shallow pile of sawdust. I looked over at the side of the lane, and sure enough, the large tree trunk we used as a diversion was cut up into multiple pieces and pushed out of the way.
“Stay here with Nutmeg,” I said when I returned to the wagon. I retrieved the rifle from the wagon and checked the magazine. I had only three cartridges left, but they’d have to do.
“Baker, what’s going on?” Kayla asked.
“I’m not sure yet, but something is wrong. Please, stay here. I’ll be back within a half hour.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. In fact, don’t stay here. Up the road that way is a small roadside picnic area. I’ll meet you up there. It’s not far, a tenth of a mile at the most.”
Kayla stared at me without moving or speaking.
“Go. Please. I’ll be there in a bit.”
Without a word, she gave Nutmeg a flip of the reins, and they were on their way.
After they moved up the road, I started my walk up the driveway. I stayed at the center, working hard to avoid any leaves or brittle branches that would give away my footfalls. When I got to the junction where I needed to decide whether to go into the valley to my place, or up the mountain to check on Pops, I gave it a minute’s thought and turned right to ascend the mountain.
When the house came into view, I expected Frank and Dino to come running up, and I hoped that they’d remembered me and threatened to kill me with licks instead of mauling me to pieces. Neither dog appeared. I moved closer to the house, stepped to the door, and pushed. It didn’t budge.
I rapped on the wood. “Pops? It’s me, Baker. Pops? You there?”
There was no answer. Not even the dogs barked. I went to the windows but couldn’t see through the curtains. Slowly, I made my way around the house, peeking into each window as I did. In each case, Pops had drawn the curtains, and I couldn’t look inside. When I arrived at the rear, the window was open.
“Pops? You in there?” I said.
“Baker?”
“Yeah. It’s me.”
A set of keys flew out the window and landed at my feet. Taking that as an invitation, I moved back to the front door, let myself in, and made my way to the bedroom.
“Holy shit, Pops, what happened?”
Pops laid in bed with his white shirt covered in dried blood. Tins of old food littered the floor, and the room smelled of spoiled meat, body odor, and human waste.
“We got squatters. Showed up about a week ago. I held them off here, but they moved in on your place.”
“How many?”
“Water?” Pops lifted his arm and pointed to the dresser. On it was a pail filled with water. I scooped out a cup and gave it to him. Once he’d wet his whistle, he seemed a little more alert.
“I don’t know how many. At least eight. I killed two myself. Afterward they dragged them bodies off and came back. When I barricaded myself in, they put a guard on me. He still there?”
I shook my head. “I didn’t notice anyone. Where are Frank and Dino?”
“I don’t know. They ran off when the shooting started.”
“Can you get up?”
“No, son, I’m spent. I’m surprised I lasted this long. But I’ll tell you this, you want your land back, you’re going to have to fight for it. Be careful though, these are bad people. I found out they were killing folks in town, and I thought they’d never find us here, but I was wrong.”
“I don’t have enough ammo,” I said.
Pops struggled to smile but managed one. “I got that covered. Go into the outhouse and lift the lid. Underneath you’ll find a switch. Flip it to the left and pull up on the handle. You’ll know what to do from there.”
“What...”
“Baker, get going. You got lots to do. I’ll still be here when you’re done.”
I wanted to say something else, or do something to make him more comfortable, but he waved me off. On the way out, I locked the front door and shoved the house keys in my pocket. I headed for the ancient outhouse, opened the wood door with the half-moon on it, and stepped in. The smell gave me a punch in the face that made me think Muhammad Ali or Mike Tyson had hit me in the nose. I tried not to breathe as I lifted the toilet seat and felt along the front of the wood box that made up the seat for the switch. I found it, flipped it, and lifted it as instructed. To my surprise, the entire unit lifted easily until it hit the roof and clicked into place. When the seat and muck had been, there was a stainless-steel ladder that led into the pit.
When I got to the bottom of the shaft, I found a light switch and flipped it up. LED lights came on, illuminating the secret vault that showed my neighbor was a good old-fashioned doomsday prepper. Within the room were shelves stuffed with food, supplies, water, and everything else someone needed to live long term after a nuclear war, a zombie apocalypse, or any other event. In addition to all the supplies were an impressive array of firearms, ammunition, and explosives I didn’t trust myself to use.
I traded my old rifle in for an upgrade, complete with a sniper scope and a suppressor, and found three extra magazines and a set of binoculars that I put into a small canvas bag. I selected two revolvers and ammo for each and added them to the bag, along with three grenades that were clearly labeled as stun only, and a large Bowie knife. Satisfied I had enough to get started, I climbed the ladder, put the outhouse back in order, and headed down the trail to my house. A hundred yards before it came into view, I slipped into the woods and moved from tree to tree until my house was in my sights. I dug out the binoculars, dropped to one knee, and scanned my property. I stayed in that position for perhaps forty minutes, and in that time, I spotted four men and a woman, although I had no way of determining who might be in the house, barn, or any of the mobile homes.
When I picked up footsteps behind me, I slowly turned, and since I didn’t have the foresight to pull a pistol from my bag, I stayed still, hoping whoever it was would walk right past me.
“Hey!” I whispered when I noticed Kayla strolling right down the driveway.
She stopped when she heard me and looked in my direction. I waved her over, and she joined me by the tree.
“What’s going on? Where have you been?” she asked.
“We’ve got squatters. I’ve seen five, but there may be more.”
“What are we going to do?” Kayla asked.
I didn’t answer, and instead passed her a look that answered for me.
“Oh,” she said. “Okay. I’m with you, you know that. Do you have a plan?”
“Surprisingly, I do. I plan to move in as close as I can get and then shoot anyone I see.”
“What if they hold up in the house?”
I grinned. “I’ve got a plan for that, too. Let’s get closer to the house. Try to walk softly.”
With me leading the way, we moved farther down the driveway and tucked ourselves underneath the boughs of a large pine tree. From where we were, the house, one of the mobile homes, and most of the pastureland was well within view. I couldn’t view the barn, but I’d take what I could get. I handed Kayla the binoculars and asked her to alert me when she saw someone. The first person she spotted was an overweight man walking slowly to the far side of my property where the stream was. I raised the rifle, ready to shoot while the man was still within my range.
“If you use that, the shot will alert everyone in the house. Are you ready to take that on?” Kayla asked.
I understood her point and handed her the rifle.
“Cover me.”
From the bag, I extracted the knife, checked to see if anyone might see me, then started jogging toward the man. I wasn’t moving fast, but neither was he, so I covered half of the distance between us in just over a minute. Then I slowed to a fast walk, hoping to silence my approach as much as possible.
I knew once he got to the creek, he would need to climb down the three-foot bank to the water, and I wanted him to be down there when I attacked. Of course, my plan would be immediately foiled if he looked back, or if someone else spotted me from the house, but it was a chance I had to take.
Even at a fast walk, I closed the distance to the man, and got close enough to listen to him humming a song I didn’t recognize. I was fifteen feet behind him when I stopped as he did. He swore, then half-slipped, half-lumbered down the bank. I thought he’d look back, but he headed toward the water, which was only a foot away.
I got the knife ready and moved to the bank.
“Hey,” I whispered.
When the man started turning around, I jumped from the bank; the knife held out in front of me. I caught the point of the knife right in his neck, two inches below his chin. With the mass of my full body weight behind me, he fell backward into the creek. I fell on top of him, and the knife sliced right through and became stuck in the creek bottom. I got off the man, who was still alive, arms flailing, trying to remove the knife, but he didn’t have the strength or the time. A few moments later, he stopped struggling. I had to place my foot on his chest to pull the knife free, then I wiped the blade on his pants, and let him bleed out where he lay.
I looked over the top of the bank, trying to determine if someone saw me. The house and barn remained quiet. I followed the stream until the barn blocked the view of the house, then I jumped up on the bank and ran to the barn. When I reached the front, I realized the padlocks were still fully engaged and figured they hadn’t yet found my hiding spot for the keys, but I didn’t have them either, so all the resources I had in the barn weren’t available to me. I was about to head back to Kayla when I saw a light come on in the mobile home.
I worked my way to the mobile home and peered into the window. There, in my bed on which I slept while I cleaned out the main house, one of the men and the woman I saw were busy getting busy. I left them, then checked the windows of the house. Inside my house, I spotted one man in the kitchen and two in the living room. Once I finished my reconnaissance, I returned to Kayla’s side.
“There are two inside the mobile home bedroom and three in the main house,” I said.
“Okay. What’s the plan?”
I reached into the bag for the handgun. “My plan is to take out the two making whoopie in my bed, and then we’ll clean out the house. There’s a chance the ones in the house will catch me, so cover the front door, okay?”
Kayla readied the rifle and took up a position, and I ran from the tree to the mobile home.
I suspected the door would be unlocked, and I was right. Off to my left was a pile of decorative throw pillows I hadn’t discarded yet, so I grabbed the top one from the pile and tiptoed to the bedroom. That door was wide open, and before me, the couple was in the missionary position; the man pumping away with all he had. I took a deep breath, stepped into the room and in two smooth motions, placed the pillow on the back of the man’s back, pressed the barrel into the pillow, and pulled the trigger. The man jerked, gave the woman one last thrust that was more of a spasm, then laid still. I trained the gun on the woman next, but the life had already passed from her eyes.
I backtracked from the mobile home and had just gotten out of the door when a burly man exited my house. Armed, he aimed at me, and I aimed at him. We both pulled our triggers at the same time, and both of us missed our respective targets. He took a step off the porch with a second man on his heels. The big guy aimed at me again, then spun like a ballerina when Kayla hit him in the shoulder. His friend fired at me, then grabbed his buddy by the shirt and dragged him back inside. I ran back to Kayla.
“Are you hit?” she asked.
“No. Why?”
“Your shirt’s full of blood.”
I looked down. She was right. “It’s not mine. Okay, new plan.” I reached into the bag and withdrew two of the grenades. “I’m going to toss these into the window and wait for them to come out.”
“Isn’t there a back door?”
“Yes.”
“Will we be able to cover each door between the two of us?” she asked.
“I don’t think we need to. What would you do if you were hanging out in the front and two grenades came in the window?”
“Go out the back?”
I nodded. “That’s what I would do, too.”
“What do you want me to do?” she asked.
I handed her the grenades. “Can you give me a couple minutes to get to the back, then toss these through the front door?”
She took one from my hand. “Pull the pin and throw?”
“That would be my guess.”
Kayla grabbed the other grenade from my hand and left the tree cover. As soon as she did, I ran to the house and stopped at the corner where I’d have cover from the side of the house yet had a superb view of the back door. I counted off the seconds, and only got as far as eighty when I heard two loud booms, one after another, from inside the house. I got down on one knee and waited.
A second later, the man I originally saw in the kitchen came out first. He not only ran from the house, but turned right and rushed toward me. He was two feet away when he spotted me. I saw a gun in his hand, and he tried to raise it in a hurry, but I shot him twice in the chest before he had a chance. By the time he fell, the man I’d wounded ran from the kitchen. He made it three yards, then tripped over his own feet and tumbled into the grass. He rolled over, spotted me, and held out his hands to show me they were empty.
“Don’t move!” I shouted at him.
He stayed still as a statue while I crept toward him, wondering where the third man was. As I peered in the kitchen window, I heard two shots from the front of the house.
“Kayla!” I yelled.
I ran around the house and stopped when I got around the corner. The third man I expected to come rushing from the house stood on the porch, then fell. Kayla was already on the ground ten feet from me. I ran to her, dropped to my knees, and took her head in my hands.
“Kayla? Kayla?” I put my fingers against her neck and found a pulse. Then she took a deep breath and opened her eyes.
“That asshole shot me.”
