Apocalypse in the Homeland: The Adventures of John Harris (2 page)

✼

Chapter 2

The air was so cold it burned his nostrils with each breath and his moustache and beard were covered in frost. The sky was crystal clear and the sun danced off the snow. So much for global warming, it was late April and winter still had a grip on the land.

The crosshairs were steady and in the middle of the woman’s forehead. His hands were steady, he took a deep breath and he gently squeezed the trigger on the Ruger American .17 caliber rifle. It made almost no noise due to the homemade silencer and the bullet struck its target as it always had in the past. The woman quietly slumped down in her chair while he worked the bolt three more times. All four of the people were dead before anyone in their camp knew they were under fire.

John took a deep breath and killed six more before slinking back behind the ridge and repositioning himself a hundred yards to the west of the camp. He raised his field glasses and saw chaos in the camp. He also saw Joe, Imelda and Eric moving in to rescue the children and the few living adults. He fired five more times with the same results. He was deadly accurate at a hundred and fifty yards and the small caliber ammo didn’t make a huge mess by blowing brains all over the place. He was sick the first couple of times that he killed these human predators, but when they captured the camps and saw the abused and tortured kids and adults John started to like killing the scum. He had killed hundreds over the past two months as his team helped Eric reclaim Wyoming from the gangs, thugs and small time dictators who wanted to practice their perversions without regards to their victims.

Even Beth couldn’t stop him from going out by himself to hunt down and kill these miserable excuses of human garbage. They had always been in the communities, but with no police to keep them in line they had taken over communities and villages all over the country. The ISA had all but eliminated these thugs from inside its borders, but much of the country was lawless like back in the early 1800’s. John was on a mission to exterminate as many as possible until the ISA found him and his team.

John gathered his pack and his M4 and headed into the settlement. Several of the people pointed at him and others yelled out their thanks to the man who had freed them from their captures.

He heard one man say to his kids, “There goes the Lone Wolf. He strikes down the bad guys and helps the good guys.”

John was deep in thought as he rounded the corner of an old hardware store when he heard, “John, these people worship you. I thought being President of the ISA was enough to give you a big head, but this is getting ridiculous.”

John looked to his left and saw Steve laughing at him and telling Janet to bow in 'The Lone Wolf’s' presence. Steve was still hobbling around with a cane due to breaking his leg when their plane crashed several months ago. Several of John’s team had been wounded, but John led them to Eric’s home and they spent the winter with him and his granddaughter, Billy.

“Steve, what are you doing out here away from the cabin? You’ll freeze your balls off and Janet will blame me somehow.”

“I was getting cabin fever and besides, they needed someone to help teach these people how to defend themselves so we won’t have to save them from the next group of thugs that happens along. Are you coming back with us this afternoon, or are you going to do some more hunting today?”

“I’m going out for a couple of days. Joe, Imelda and I are going to scout out Cody. We’ve all heard that several gangs are harassing the city and it’s time to check them out and neutralize them. There is an airport there and perhaps I can find a plane to fly us out of this freezer.”

“So you’re not going head hunting?”

“Of course I am. I’ll stand off, find out who the bad guys are and pick them off before they know what hit them. Joe and Imelda will scout the town and determine how much help we’ll need to liberate the town.”

“And what happens if a bunch of them attack and over run ya’ll?"

“They can try. We are loaded for bear and I hope they try. We could get rid of all of them in one fight.”

“Damn, John, I think you are starting to believe those stories about the Lone Wolf being able to kill the enemy, but can’t be killed. Son, a bullet will kill you just like the rest of us.”

“Steve, the trick is to not let the bad guys lay their sights on you. Keep your powder dry and I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

***

Cody, Wyoming was incorporated in 1901 and was only 50 miles from Yellowstone National Park. The area was developed by Buffalo Bill Cody and he founded the town along with some investor friends. The town had 10,000 people before TSHTF and John hoped that many had survived due to the town’s remote location.

The drive over to Cody on highway 14 was just 28 miles, but it took most of the remainder of the day. There had been no traffic on the road and the snow was several feet thick. The going was slow, but the old Dodge Power Wagon plowed through the snow with ease. They stopped every two miles so John could use a telescope to check out the road ahead for ambushes and recent activity. All he saw was snow and more snow.

Their plan was to stop for the night about a mile outside of Cody and stay in an abandoned house. Then, before daylight, they would sneak into town and determine how many gang members were in the area and how well they were armed.

“John, how long do you think it will take for the Navy to find us? I’m glad we're helping out, but this snow is getting old and I’m tired of deer and rabbit.”

Imelda added, “I want a steak and Jim to hold me. Let’s go home when the snow melts.”

“Joe, I don’t think they will ever find us. I believe we will have to either fly or drive back home if we want to get there. We are hundreds of miles from where they would expect to find us and they can’t waste fuel and manpower looking forever. I’m hoping to find a plane large enough to make a flight to Dallas to get help. Cody has a small airport and there could be some functioning planes.”

“We’re burning daylight. Fire the old Dodge up.”

They made it to the outskirts of Cody just a little after 4:00 and the sun was setting. They found an abandoned ranch house about a mile east of the airport, parked the truck in a barn and ate cold food that night. They didn’t want to take a chance on being discovered this early in their mission. As usual, they took turns at guard duty until 3:00 a.m. when John woke the other two.

“Rise and shine sleepyheads. We need to eat some good old deer jerky and hit the dusty, err snowy trail before sun up.”

“Daddy, can I stay home from school? I have female problems.”

“Imelda, get your ass out of bed or you’ll have John problems.”

She laughed and said, “No sympathy for a poor young girl today.”

“Look in the dictionary if you want sympathy. It is right there between shit and syphilis. Get moving.”

“Yes, Captain. I'm just moving slow this morning.”

They grabbed the rest of their gear from the truck and started circling south towards the airport so they could approach the hangers from the southeast. The plan was to go below the two lakes south of the airport and walk beside highway 120 until they arrived at the commercial hangers.

John made them stop several times to check for guards and they were always looking for trip wires and booby traps. The going was slow, but keeping below the radar was their best protection. They arrived at the highway 14 and 120 junction just before 5:30 a.m. and again, John had them stop and survey the airport and the area around it.

“I don’t see any activity at the airport or any of the hangers.”

“Hey, look towards town. I see some barely visible red dots.”

“Those are cigarettes. See that one dancing towards the other two. Everyone of their guards is smoking in the dark. A good way to get killed. There, see the glow get brighter! The SOB is taking a puff. Aim a foot or so below the glow and you hit them every time.”

“Now, John, they might be the good guys.”

“I doubt it. Let’s check out the hangers and see if there are any functioning planes.”

They snuck into the first hanger and saw two planes, both of which had their engines torn down to be serviced. There were several burned out planes between the hangers and several shot up cars. The next hanger had several old crop dusting planes. Three were the old Stearman biplanes with crop spraying equipment. Someone planned to restore the planes and sell them.

Just as they thought the place was empty, there was a clatter on the other side of one of the planes. John motioned for Joe to sneak around to the left while Imelda and he advanced from the right side. Something skittered across the floor and out a side door.

“I don’t know what it was, but it was short and moved fast.”

“Could have been a dog or a raccoon.”

“Look around; I think we disturbed someone’s hiding place.”

“Hey, look in the cockpit of the first plane. Someone has been living in here.”

The interior of the plane had several blankets and a treasure of can goods, candy bars, potato chip bags and canned drinks.

“Hey, my favorite candy bar,” said Imelda as she tore the wrapper off one of the treats."

“Damn, that’s so good.”

“Keep your eyes out for trouble. Whoever was here may come back with friends.”

“I think it might be a kid; there are a bunch of comic books and some small size clothes.”

“A kid with a gun can kill you just as quickly as an adult. Stay focused.”

John went back to examining the airplanes and found that two had perfect engines, but structural issues and another had a blown engine, but was otherwise sound.

“We need to replace this engine with one of those. These planes have large tanks to spray pesticide. I could reroute the lines and make them into spare gas tanks. Two of us could easily make it to Dallas. This is a major find. We need to clear this town of the thugs and get after fixing this plane."

***

“Beth, are you okay? This is the second morning that you have been throwing up,” said Billy as she watched from the porch.

“No, I’m fine. I think that cabbage soup is disagreeing with me this morning.”

Beth was upset that she and John hadn’t been careful during the first few weeks living without proper supplies. She was pregnant out in the sticks without any possibility of medical assistance. She hoped for a boy this time.

***

There were over 20 small hangers and 9 large ones along with the terminal to search. This took the rest of the day since they had to assume there was danger behind every door. The airport was deserted and except for the person living in the plane, they found no evidence of anyone else. They set up their base in the hanger with the three crop dusting planes. They chained the doors and set out to see what they could see from the airport tower before nightfall.

The tower wasn’t much of a tower, but it was tall enough to see over most of the buildings in town. They spotted over a hundred people going about their daily chores. The streets were plowed even though most traveled by horseback. The thugs were easy to identify since they had guns trained on the others every minute of the day. Most of the men on horseback were guards. There were numerous wagons heading north of the town and later coming back filled with coal. This explained the black smoke rolling out of most of the chimneys in town.

“We need to talk with some of the local people and see what is going on. The bad guys don’t appear to be as bad as what we’ve run into before. It’s hard to see if they are forcing these people to work or are just protecting them from invaders. Joe, after dark sneak down to one of the houses and see if you can listen in on any conversations. Imelda and I will try to find the guard’s barracks and see what they are talking about.”

They watched the guards come and go until sunset and noticed that they were all coming and going from a hotel west of the airport. They left the airport and infiltrated the city without being detected.

***

Joe tried several houses before he found one where he could hear the residents talking.

“We need the weather to break before we try to get away from here. Damn it, Jackie, you know that we’d be dead in less than a couple of days if we get caught out in the open.”

“Hon, we can’t keep Betty hidden forever. One of our neighbors might turn us in just to get more food. I couldn’t bear her being treated like the rest of the women.”

“I know, dear, but hang on for a week or two and we’ll try to head up towards Powell or Garland.”

***

Imelda placed her hand over John’s mouth and pointed at the door, which was opening slowly. They saw a young girl slipping out and gently closing the door. She walked past them heading across the street when the door burst open and a large man ran after her. She tried to outrun him, but lost the race. He grabbed her by the collar and slapped her twice.

“Bitch, you know better than to try to run away from me. I take good care of you. You are warm and well fed and only have to take care of me. You are going to get a beating and the next time I’ll break your leg so you can’t run. Now get in the fucking house and fix my supper. I’ll be there in a minute."