Alea Jacta Est: A Novel of the Fall of America (Future History of America Book 1) (48 page)

Hoss shut
off his hog and coasted to a stop next to Brin’s SUV and dropped the
kickstand.  He pulled out some spare shells for the shotgun and dropped them in
one of the many pockets on his worn black leather vest and pulled the Viking
sword free of its scabbard.  The biker was surprised there was no
Hollywood-esque
schinng
of metal on metal.  The wooden scabbard gave
only a soft sigh as the blade was pulled free.

“Let’s
rock,” he grinned.  Looking over Erik, he whistled.  “Damn, man, you look like
Rambo—got yer sword, knife, gun and all that shit on your back…” the biker
chuckled. 

“Yeah, well
you look like something the dingo dragged in from
Mad Max
—with your
big-ass bike, the leather pants and vest, big ol’ shotgun and that Viking
sword,” Erik retorted.  Both men shared a quiet laugh, just what they needed to
break the tension.  They were about to enter the unknown.

“Okay Base,
we’re here.  Going inside to take a look, over,” Erik said into the radio.

“
Roger
that, Raiders…good luck.  Out
,” replied Ted’s voice.  Erik could imaging
Ted, Susan and Brin all huddled around the radio by the pool, listening for
signs of trouble.  He smiled.

Erik
stepped over a fast food wrapper and peered into the darkened crack that
represented the open fire door.  Seeing nothing but a few empty boxes spilled
on the ground, he turned back to Hoss. 

“Okay, I’ll
throw the door open, you cover it with the shotgun.  Ready?”

“Ready.”

Erik pulled
his pistol free, held it with both hands pointing down like Ted taught him,
removed the safety and took a breath before kicking the door open with his
foot.  It was the first time he mentally thanked himself for remembering to put
on his combat boots with the steel toes instead of the more lightweight and
breathable tennis shoes he normally wore with shorts.  He may have looked silly
with shorts and combat boots, but he felt they would keep his feet safe and
hold up better. 
Besides
, he told himself trying to ignore the odor from
his own body after a few days in Florida without a bath,
fashion doesn’t
exist anymore.  No one has that kind of luxury anymore…

Hoss saw
nothing inside and stepped through the door, scanning the room.  Erik had to
wait a few seconds for the big man to move out of his way so he could get in
behind him.  He held Hoss up for a few more seconds and explained to the biker
the benefits of military-style entry tactics. 

The small
room they were in looked more like a garbage heap than anything else.  Erik
scanned the area with his flashlight, a medium sized Mag-Lite.  There were
massive heaps of empty boxes and shrink wrap piled halfway to the twenty foot
high ceiling. 

They saw a
door directly across from them and moved cautiously forward.  The door was shut
but unlocked.  As before, Erik opened the door quickly while Hoss covered.  It
was some kind of receiving area for freight.  Dark, like the first room and
cavernous. Hoss swept through the door and turned immediately to the right,
allowing Erik to follow through and turn left, effectively covering the room in
a quarter the amount of time it took Hoss by himself.  They were greeted with
silence and darkness.  The two men quickly checked the place out with the
flashlight, finding nothing but more trash and neatly piled empty boxes and
packaging materials. 

“This
doesn’t look like looters work.  I bet this shit has been here since the lights
went out,” observed Hoss.  “Everything is opened neatly, just the same way,
with a knife.  Looters don’t take the time with that.”

“Doesn’t
even look like anyone’s been back here…” commented Erik as they slowly walked
their way through the cave-like room.  “I don’t see anything we can use…do you?”

“I’m sure
we can find a use for all this shit if we tried…like the cardboard boxes, they
might be good for storage or kindling…” replied Hoss, lifting a cut open
plastic wrap with the tip of his sawed off shotgun.  “This stuff…I don’t know.”

“Well, we’ll
make a note of it and tell Bernie.  Who knows what’s in these boxes,” Erik
said, scanning the high ceiling in the room.  “If he wants to come back and get
it, it doesn’t look like anyone else has taken an interest in it.  Looks like
down that way might be the store rooms.  Bernie can check it out.  Come on,
there’s the door out of here.  Doesn’t have a handle…it just swings.  Ready?”
asked Erik in a hushed voice as he took his position next to the door, pistol
ready.

“Go for
it,” said Hoss, shotgun at his hip and pointed towards the door.

Erik shoved
the door and rolled away as the door swished open.  Hoss saw nothing and before
the door could swish back he stepped through and moved to the right.  Erik
followed and cut to the left.  By the slight echo their footfalls were making,
both men realized they were in a sizeable room.  A dim light in the distance
ahead of them let them know they were actually in the store. 

“There’s
the front of the store,” whispered Erik.  “Listen, you can hear the seagulls
out in the parking lot.”

“Shit, man,
I don’t think there’s anyone in here,” mumbled Hoss.  It almost sounded like he
was disappointed.  The shotgun came up to rest on his shoulder but he was still
wary.

Erik
cautiously moved around the corner of a tipped over universal home gym.  “Well,
someone’s
been here.  This place looks like a bomb went off.”  He
scanned the store and his heart sank.  Trash was everywhere.  It seemed that a
few of the giant dividing walls used to separate the sections of the store had
been toppled.  Merchandise, most of it either damaged or partially opened, lay
strewn everywhere.  As they worked their way around the store they passed
through several areas where it appeared someone had lit fires. 

“Would you
look at this shit?” asked Hoss, incredulous.  The camping section was stripped
bare of tents and sleeping bags, as they expected, but most of the camping
equipment was still there.  Camp stoves, lanterns, fuel, light-sticks,
dehydrated foods and countless other goods were merely scattered across the
floor.  The dehydrated foods seemed to have been ripped open in frustration as
some of the stuff was on the floor and other packages were still sealed.

“Some fool
thought he could eat this stuff without water, I guess,” Erik said, examining a
bag of pasta and sauce that had chew marks on the foil wrapping.  Other
packages were sliced open with knives, but the food was still there, spilled
out and wasted. 

Hoss let
out a howl, “Damn, that stinks!  I don’t think there were only people here…big
pile of dog shit over here under the coolers.  That’s just nasty, man.”

Erik
laughed and grabbed a few packages at random and put them in his backpack. 
“Look at all the great stuff they left behind!” Erik said, eyes a-sparkle at
all the loot on the floor and still on the ransacked shelves.  “We can use most
of this…”

“Remember
we came here for
guns
, man…”

“Right,”
Erik said, shaking his head.  “We can load all this stuff in Brin’s car after
we’re done looking.  Let’s keep moving.”

The entire
shoe section was stripped bare.  There were even a few shell casings and some
spots of blood near the Nike displays.  Old tennis shoes, well worn and filthy,
were tossed here and there.  The shoes were liberated first it seemed.

“Dumbasses…why
would you steal tennis shoes when all hell was breaking loose in the world? 
Some people are so fucking
stupid!
” muttered Erik.

Hoss
chuckled, the noise echoing in the empty building.  “Look, they even took all
the rollerblade gear.”

As they
moved closer to the front of the ransacked store, Erik switched off the flashlight
to preserve the batteries.  The sunlight flooding in through the broken windows
and smashed down doors was more than enough by which to see.  They quickly
noticed that the clothing section—workout shorts, replica jerseys from hockey,
baseball, and football teams, sweatsuits, etc., all of it was pretty much
gone.   Some clothing items were on the floor where they had been trampled by
many feet.  Water stains from the frequent rains had ruined what clothing was
left on the racks.

“Looters
have no brains, I swear,” said Erik, clucking his tongue over the wasted
clothing.  Why people would steal sweatshirts and pants in south Florida in the
middle of August was beyond him.

They
quickly moved through the store, passing the exercise equipment and weight sets,
the golf department, basketball section—totally bare—baseball and other sports
until they reached the outdoorsman’s section.

“Here’s pay
dirt,” said Hoss.  “Let’s put the light on…”

Erik
flipped on the Mag-Lite again as they moved in, quickly checking the rows of
partially looted merchandise.  Most of the hunting gear was still in place. 
Camouflaged jackets, pants, shorts, shirts, gloves, everything—it was all
there.  The traditional woodlands cammo gear was okay.  The urban patterns, the
grays and blacks, were partially missing.  Moving on, the two men came to the
gun case. 

“Shit…that’s
what I thought.”  Erik said, looking at the smashed display.  All the rifles
and shotguns were missing.  The flashlight lit up the counter where bits of
glass were still twinkling in the light.  Emptied boxes of shotgun shells of
all sizes were strewn on the floor and counter.  A few shells were laying
around, dropped by the looters.  While Erik was examining the display cases,
Hoss moved around the counter.

“Hah!  Hand
me one of them glow-sticks you got from the camping aisle.”  When Erik fished
it out of his pocket, the biker snapped it to start the chemical reaction and
bent down behind the counter.  Erik could hear him rummaging around, tossing
things and making a bigger mess.

“What are
you doing down there?”

“Whoever
these people were…the looters, I mean…they didn’t do a good enough job.  They
didn’t think to open the shelves down below the counter.  See?” asked Hoss,
suddenly appearing from behind the counter like he worked there.  In his hand
were two boxes of 12-gauge 00 buck shot and a brick of .22 cartridges.

“How much
more is down there?”

“Hell
there’s all kinds of sizes and shots…I’d say maybe twenty, thirty boxes worth. 
Probably ten, fifteen bricks for the .22s. It ain’t much, but it’ll help
replace what we spent during the fight.”

“Damn
straight,” said Erik.  “Wait, what .22s?”

“These
.22s!” replied Hoss.  He stood up again from behind the counter, a Ruger 10/22
in each hand.  “There’s six of them down here—five with scopes, one without. 
All of them have little tags around the trigger guard that say they were used
as displays.  Don’t look too bad though.  I think this here little magazine,”
Hoss said, examining the one in his left hand and bringing the light stick
closer.  “I think that means it’s semi-auto or something.  But these,” he said
as he put the two rifles down and grabbed a third.  “These lever action Henry’s
don’t need anything.  I had one of these when I was a kid!  Load ‘em on Sunday
and shoot all week!”

“Well,
they’re not M-16s, but hell, a .22 can do some damage in the hands of someone
like Ted, I bet,” said Erik with a smile.  “I’ll grab a shopping cart from up
front, let’s start loading up.  We’ve been here a half hour already.”

After
cleaning out what was useable from the gun case, they quickly dumped a whole
range of sizes of camouflaged gear into their shopping cart.  Erik tossed in a
dozen or so pairs of binoculars that the looters didn’t care for.  They rounded
the last aisle in the section and Erik froze in his tracks, his flashlight
illuminating the Holy Grail.

“What is
it?” asked Hoss.

“Look!” 
Erik pointed with the white beam of light.  Straight ahead was another large
display case like the ones the long-guns were in.  This one held archery
equipment though.  It was broken, like the shotgun case, but there were still
nearly a dozen compound bows and a few crossbows and cases of arrows and bolts
stacked neatly in the display case.

“Sweeeeeet,”
whispered Hoss.  “But, uh…that shit ain’t much good against a shotgun.”

“Hoss, when
the ammo runs out, that bow and arrow will be more lethal than anything
else…’cept maybe a sword.  And it’s reusable.  Just retrieve the arrows!”

“Damn,
we’re back in the Middle Ages.  Camelot and all that shit,” muttered Hoss.  He
grinned.  “We even got a castle and a Duke!”

Twenty
minutes and two more shopping carts full of loot saw Erik and Hoss working
their way back to the rear of the store.  On the way through the stockroom,
Erik tossed some boxes on the overflowing carts to give the people back at the
complex some kind of idea of what they saw.  Maybe someone might have an idea
about using some more.

“Alright,
let’s get this shit loaded up and get out of here,” said Hoss.  “I’m getting
nervous.  It’s too quiet around here.”

Erik
readily agreed and after a cursory check to make sure the vehicles hadn’t been
tampered with, they loaded the shopping carts into Brin’s SUV, filling it about
halfway with all kinds of camping and hunting gear, including the bows and more
arrows than they could count.  Erik shut the clamshell rear door and grinned. 
“That was a helluva shopping trip, wouldn’t you say?”