The Shelter: Book 1, The Beginning (12 page)

“I will be. I love you.”

Fred and I leave on our clandestine trip to acquire additional guns. I got the name of a gun supplier from a friend of a friend of a friend. We exchanged messages through daily changed burner phones, we exchanged the numbers through encrypted emails. The contact informed me he could fill my order, as long as I agreed to a few conditions such as paying in gold or silver and doing the transaction in person. Each of us agreed to come to the exchange position with only one other person. I agreed to his demands because I had no choice. The meet and exchange was to take place in San Antonio, Texas, Fred and I swapped driving every three hours which allowed us to make the trip in 15 hours straight. We didn’t want to spend the night anywhere with the amount of gold we were carrying. The exchange went off without a hitch. Our seller was very happy with the gold coins. I was very happy to be the new owner of two cases of US Army M4s (12 fully automatic assault rifles). One case of 6 fully automatic Uzi 9mm submachine guns and silencers for the rifles and Uzis. My big surprise was the seller was able to get us two RPG rocket launchers and 8 missiles, plus twenty-five hand grenades. He also had 50,000 rounds of 5.56 and 30,000 rounds of 9mm ammo. I asked for more, but that was all he could supply at this time. He told me, demand for weapons was the highest he’d ever seen, the reason he agreed to sell me anything was I offered to pay him in gold. We returned home 16 hours after leaving San Antonio, keeping our speed to just under the speed limit the entire drive home. The last thing we needed was to get busted with a truck full of illegal weapons. Our seller made his way back to Mexico. He promised to contact me if he was able to acquire additional weapons. On the way home, I converted an additional two million dollars into gold and silver. I was lucky to do so because the next day the Federal Government issued new tax rules that taxed all purchases of precious metals. Bars or coins with an excise tax of 20% of the value of the transaction. The stock market fell an additional 650 points before it was closed early for ‘technical reasons’ with the announcement of the excise tax. Fred asked me, “Are you taking a huge hit in the market crash?”

Laughing, I respond, “Nope, I never trusted the market. I invested in gold, silver and four farms. Do you think the farms will be a good investment?”

Fred smiles while nodding his agreement, “Best investment you ever made. Jay, why the automatic weapons and all of the trenches? Do you really think we’re going to have to fight the people around us?”

“When people realize we have four working farms with food and fuel, I’m sure we’re going to be close to the top of their places to visit. What really worries me is the people who installed our tanks will blab about them. When the government money stops, and it will stop, people are going to go crazy. When they get hungry enough, they’ll kill for a gallon of fuel thinking the fuel will take them to a place they can find food. We’re a farm, they’ll assume we have both food and fuel. Which makes me 100% sure they going to attack us. Even if we had nothing, the rumor we do will be enough to drive them to attack us. The trenches will make it easier for us to go house to house without being seen. The trenches will provide us some cover when the attack comes. The automatic weapons will be force multipliers. The M4s will allow us to put down a lot of lead in a short time. I’m hoping they confuse the invaders enough that they won’t know how few of us there really are. We have to learn to use automatic weapons which will rise to the right when fired. I have some new handguards and bipods to hold the rifles steady when we’re firing. I would have loved to get a couple M249s or other machine guns, but my contact didn’t have any. I bought a lot of small lasers which I plan to mount on sticks we’ll stick around the trench in places we aren’t in. The attackers will see the lasers, they’ll think the lasers are us holding our weapons. Hopefully, they’ll attack the lasers. The silencers will make it harder for them to figure out where we are. I also have two FLIR night vision handheld binoculars which will enable us to see them, hopefully before they see us.”

Fred looks over to me, “Jay, I’m worried that you’re convinced we’re going to have to fight. You remember, none of us have experience fighting. If we get invaded by large numbers of people, there’s a good chance we’re going to be overrun. What do we do then?”

Before I can answer, Fred says, “Cop car behind us, been there for a few miles.”

“How fast are you driving?”

“I’m within one or two MPH of the speed limit, sometimes under, sometimes over, never more than two over.”

“He must be confused, he’s not used to seeing someone on this deserted road going the speed limit. Just keep it up and don’t look nervous.”

“How the hell do I not look nervous? We’re carrying a truckload of automatic weapons.”

“Just chill, we’ll be fine.”

“Shit, his lights just came on.”

“Put on your right blinker and start to move to the shoulder.”

Before Fred can move to the shoulder, the police car zooms around us, speeding up. “Fred, I’d say, today is your lucky day. He must have gotten a call. He won’t be back for us. As far as he knows we didn’t break any laws. He most likely thought we were carrying drugs. I bet he called in our plates, the truck rental company told him they rented the truck to a farmer and he must have assumed we are carrying equipment for the farms. Fred, getting back to your question, I have a really out of the box idea. I’m working on a plan for a large underground shelter. Rich and Jill are going to have their barn rebuild like yours, I’m thinking of having a large underground shelter dug under the barn. We can dig tunnel entrances to the shelter from each of our homes. If we get overrun, we run into the shelter and hide until the attackers move on or they fight among themselves to the point we can come out and defeat them.”

“With all of the defenses you outlined, do you really think we’re going to need the shelter?”

“Fred, I’d rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it. If I can get my kids to come down and stay with us, the shelter is going to have to be large enough to hold all of us. Plus, it’s going to need storage space for supplies to keep all of us going as long as it takes.”

“Ah! That’s why the freeze dried food.”

“Yes, in case we’re driven from our homes we need to eat.”

Fred shakes his head, “I never worried about security or home invasions before. I have the shotgun for hunting and just in case someone tried to steal my animals. I’m really worried that you think it’s going to get so bad we might have to leave our homes. I never thought I’d see the day when we living outside of Nashville think we’re going to have to fight our neighbors.”

“Fred, they won’t be our neighbors, they’ll be criminals or people so hungry they’ll think nothing of killing us for a meal. I’m hoping we can hold off any attack but Fred, what happens if we get hit by a force of hundreds or even a thousand? Even with automatic weapons we would be overrun. Each layer of defense is designed to slow the attackers down and thin their numbers before they reach us. In the worse case, the defenses will buy us time to escape into the shelter. We need a place to hide until they leave, which hopefully they will when the supplies they find are used up. The refugees are going to be like waves of locusts stripping the land clean. I only hope we have time to build the shelter before we need it. I’d also like to find more people we know and can trust. Seventeen people aren’t enough to defend what we have.”

“Jay, why just one shelter? Why not build one behind your house and one in the middle field which is equal distance from all of our homes?”

“Interesting idea. I’ll have to see how long it’ll take to build. By the way, I ordered some personal defense items for us.”

“Personal defense items?”

“Kevlar helmets and armored vests. Congress is about to outlaw the ownership of armored vests and helmets for any non-military and non-police. I called a couple of companies and bought what I could. I hope they ship everything I ordered.”

“Will they work?”

“I pray we never have to find out. They aren’t like the vests the police wear, these use thick metal plates, one in the front, one in the back, and two small ones on the sides. They are rated to stop all handgun and 5.56 rounds which the police use. They may save our lives when we have to bail.”

“Jay, this brings up a question I almost hate to ask, what are you going to do if nothing happens? You’ve most likely spent $5million on your home, our farms, new barns, new equipment, weapons, food, fuel tanks and fuel. That’s a lot of money, isn’t Lacy going to skin you alive?”

Laughing, “Fred, we had nothing before we won the lottery. Lacy would have lost her job putting us into the group of those living on the government dole. We now own our house outright, we own a couple of year’s worth of food and fuel, we own three farms, and a ton of weapons. Plus, we still have over $20 million left. Fred, I pray every day I’m wrong, my gut says it’s going to be much worse than I think. I keep trying to think of what else we may need to keep us alive for the next few years if we don’t have any outside help.”

“What else do you think we need?”

“I’d love to have a doctor or an RN in our group. I’ve stocked OTC medications and many prescription medications which I got in Canada and Mexico. But if someone comes down really sick or gets wounded, we’re going to need a doctor. A first aid book isn’t going to cut it.”

“I’ll contact our local doctor, he’s a small sole provider, he lives about five miles from us.”

“I thought all of the small doctor practices closed up due to Obamacare.”

“Most did, Dr. Basco refused to, he’s sixty-eight. He said he’s always practiced his way and the government can be damned, he’s not going to change.”

“Jay, what else can we do to keep what’s ours?”

“The new barns are fire-proof, we should make sure all of the farming equipment is kept locked inside every night. When the locusts leave, we’re going to need the equipment to start over. I’ve ordered sprinklers to be installed in the other’s homes. Once the shelter is built, I want to move most of our stored crops into it.”

“I’ll talk to the others when we get home. I’ll remind the others not to leave anything outside overnight. We’re not used to having to think about security. Portland hasn’t had any serious crime in many years. Jay, one idea I’ve been thinking about is cutting a trench on one or both sides of the barbwire to stop a car or pickup from driving through the barbwire.”

“I like it, thanks.”

“Jay, where are you going to get the sheet steel to cover the driveway trenches?”

“Local company in town sells sheets of steel up to one inch thick. That’s too heavy for our need. I plan to buy some ½ inch thick to cover the driveway trenches. We’ll drill holes in the corners so we can tie a rope to them, we’ll drag them open and closed with the tractor or pickups. I want to see about lining some of our home walls with the ½ steel plate, it should make the walls bulletproof.”

“How long have you been planning for this?”

“A couple of months. Anyone looking at the current situation could see the economy is going to crater. The election in Greece was the match that lit the fuse.”

“Jay, how long do you think it’ll be before the meltdown happens?”

“Look at today’s announcement of the excise tax. That’s a sign the government is panicking. The markets dropped over 50% of their value in three days and are still falling, unemployment is over 11% and increasing, it’s only a matter of time before it all comes apart. The EU fell apart in less than three months.”

While we’re driving home, the news channel reports the President is closing the stock markets for two weeks to allow calmer heads to prevail. The President hopes traders calm down and don’t pour gasoline on a burning fire causing it to burn out of control. The President also announced that he was going to help the recently unemployed by expanding the welfare programs to provide a safety net under those who recently lost their jobs. To pay for the increase in the welfare programs, he’s increasing the taxes on the 1% to 40% of all income over $500,000 a year.

“Is this going to have a big impact on our plans?”

“I hope not, I need to see the details of the new taxes and when it starts. Our money isn’t really considered income per say, plus we moved a lot of our money offshore or into hard assets. I wonder if Congress will sit still and allow him to raise taxes, the President doesn’t have the authority to set taxes.”