To Steal a March (Surviving the Fall 11)

“No. Just to hang back. Out of danger.”

“I don’t understand.” A confused frown passed over his face. “Are you saying you don’t want my help?”

“I want it, yes. But… your mother… she would—”

“My mother, my brother and my sister are chained together back at that place.” Mark’s voice remained relatively quiet, but his tone and facial expression changed completely. “They’re chained together with your wife, Mrs. Statler. The men in the truck in front of us want to do… terrible things to them all. And to other people. My mother would want me to do the right thing.” Mark hesitated as he stared through Jason, remembering back to when he watched his mother shoot the man who had been trying to break into their property. He snapped back to reality and shrugged Jason’s hand off of his shoulder.

“Even when the right thing is hard,” Mark finished with a defiant and definite tone, “we still have to do it. That’s why it’s the right thing.”

Jason’s internal struggle was complicated by the unexpected burst of maturity from Mark, and he didn’t know what to say. They knelt, quietly, as the trailer bumped and rocked along until the situation itself forced Jason to accept the inevitable. A slowing of the truck and trailer, then a motion to the left indicated that they were making the turn to the house.

“Fine. Just stay behind me and do what I tell you. Okay?”

Mark nodded and Jason slipped quietly to the back of the trailer. Taking a piece of old lumber from the floor, Jason quietly slipped it into the grooves running alongside both of the back doors, near the bottom. He then took the bungee cord and wrapped it around the wood before tying it off, creating a crude—but effective—bar for the doors.

“That’s your plan?” Mark whispered to Jason, befuddlement thick in his voice. “To keep them out of the trailer?”

Jason walked back up to Jason and knelt back down. “If you have to shoot fish in a barrel, you want them in the smallest, most compact barrel you can possibly get.”

Mark’s eyes lit up and a devious smirk spread across his lips. “So you want to gather them all at the back of the trailer before we let them know we’re here.”

“Exactly.” Jason nodded before shrugging off his pack and his rifle. He dug through his backpack before pulling out the shotgun shell trap he had proposed using as a distraction earlier. “Once they’re gathered, I’ll loosen the board and set this thing up. Once the doors open and this thing goes off, we go out there guns blazing.”

Mark gulped hard and looked at the pistol in his hand. “I’ll do my best.”

Jason put on his best smile and gave Mark a quick squeeze. “I know you will. Now get some more boxes stacked up to hide us behind while I get my rifle squared away.”

While Mark did as Jason requested, Jason gathered his meager assortment of spare magazines and triple-checked that his rifle was loaded with the safety off and one in the chamber. He had never been in war, nor had he ever been in a shootout until after the event. That didn’t matter, though. His wife’s life was in his hands and one of his friends’ children was sitting next to him trying to mentally prepare himself for what was to come.

The right thing was hard. But that didn’t matter. It still had to be done, no matter what.

Chapter 15

The Waters’ Homestead

Outside Ellisville, VA

While Mark and Jason couldn’t see the expressions on the faces of the men in the truck, if they had they might have enjoyed a hearty chuckle in spite of the gravity of the situation. Confusion reigned supreme as the five all leaned forward in their seats, staring at the home standing directly where they expected a pile of ash and bl

ackened debris. All of them started talking at once as they climbed out of the truck, their weapons loose in their hands as they spoke to and over each other, all of them trying to decipher what they were seeing.

Inside the trailer Mark and Jason kept their ears to the wall, listening to the muffled shouting and arguing as they tried to figure out when the group would start making their way toward the trailer. The voices slowly grew louder and easier to discern as the men walked back from examining the scorched patch at the front of the house.

“…sense why it didn’t catch. There was plenty of accelerant.”

“Maybe someone pissed it out. Who cares? We’ve got a house to ransack now. They had some nice looking plants in the basement; maybe we can get something fresh out of the place, eh?”

“I care. And so will Nealson.” The sound and reverberation of someone being pushed roughly against the trailer nearly caused Mark and Jason to fall over. “We need to call him and let him know about this. It could mean that someone survived the fire!”

“Nealson’s already beyond pissed. Did you see him with that one from the road?”

“You realize that was the one that they came and pulled out from the station base, right?”

“Well yeah, but everyone else is dead. So who cares?”

Another thud. “I told you that I do!”

A different voice, one that hadn’t been understandable, interrupted the argument. “Hey, check it out. They’ve got a ton of chickens down there and some other stuff, too. Barns are full of food for ‘em, too. We’re gonna have to make several trips to get everything!”