Fail State, page 12
part #2 of End of Days Series
She and Roxy both froze.
“Shit, Tammy, should we run?”
“Where to?’ Tammy shrugged. ‘And we’d lose the food. I’ll get the gun.”
She fetched it from the car.
The kids instantly noticed the change in the mood of the grown ups.
“Mommy, what’s happening?” little Jakey asked, running to Roxarne.
“Ain’t nothing, Jakey,” she assured him.
Bobby Junior got to his feet and stared into the gloom. For a moment he reminded Tammy of his father, achingly so. He had Robert’s fiercely handsome profile when he stood, jut-jawed like that.
But those looks had not been good for much beyond trouble.
“Take it easy, Bobby,” she warned. “In fact, you kids, get over by the car. Roxy and me will see to these folks.”
Bobby lead the other three little ones over to the Oldsmobile.
Both women watched as the vehicle came into view around the bend. It was a camper. Tammy let out a breath.
Maybe they were older folk, then.
But no, turned out it was just a very large camper with some stupidly fat guy at the wheel, and some skinny dude riding shotgun.
The camper pulled in behind them, close enough that they’d have a hard time getting out, and the kids who had been half hiding in the car, abandoned it to run back to their moms.
As the children sheltered behind their guardians, Tammy stood with her hands on her hips. The gun was tucked into the small of her back. The groundhog stew was starting to boil.
The skinny one got out of the camper, he was followed shortly by the fat fellow. It was the thin man who spoke first.
“Hey, don’t mean to interrupt y’all, we just needed a place to park for the night.”
Tammy replied. “Couldn’t get by the roadblock by Dryfork?”
The man frowned.
“Nah, we ain’t been that far yet, but thankee for lettin’ us know.” He smiled. “Cute kids.”
Bobby Jr. spoke up. “Don’t go askin’ for our food, cause we ain’t got any extra.”
“Bobby!” Tammy scolded, but without much heat in the scold.
He was right, though: the big fella looked like he could eat all of their stew and most of them before he was full.
The thin man put up his hands and grinned.
“I would not dream of such a thing.”
His grin got wider.
“In fact, we would be pleased to dine with y’all, if’n you would care to share some of our supplies. All we ask is good company. That ain’t so easy to come by these days.”
Tammy saw Roxy’s eyes go narrow. These guys would want something else for sure.
Her friend spoke quietly, but firmly. “Maybe we could work something out.”
The fat one smiled. He looked like a chunk of carved lard. He called into the camper’s door.
“Yo, Darrell, come on down. It’s dinner time.”
16
The tiny wooden hammer of power
The playing fields of Silverton had a name once. Mullan Park. Just over two hundred yards from end to end, the park was bounded on one side by a small, nameless rear lane that provided access for commercial deliveries to all the businesses on the northern half of Main Street. Carved out of a rare plot of level ground on the high side of town in 1861, and never developed for housing or commercial needs, the fields had endured as a public good thanks to the drawings of John Mullan Jr.
Explorer, soldier, civil servant and road builder, Mullan initially surveyed the site for the Northern Pacific Railroad, setting aside the small parcel of conveniently flat terrain for a railway goods yard that never materialized . Loggers built a camp, and then a village in the space cleared by the railway men, who never returned to lay their track through the dense alpine forest. Over time the park became a de facto commons, tended to by volunteers and used by all of Silverton’s private clubs and school students, for everything from kite-flying festivals to log-throwing competitions. In 1953 the State Supreme Court ruled that the land had been alienated from private ownership by 62 years non-payment of local government charges and was now the property of the County Council and through that Council, of the people of Silverton.
As Jonas Murdoch, Chad Moffat and Brad Rausch drove into town through the Cascade Gate, towing a bullet-holed Jeep behind Rausch’s truck, the once green and pleasant Mullan Park opened up to their right as a weird, almost medieval barrens tilled by bent-backed serfs in Nikes and baseball caps.
“Putting in the pumpkins today I reckon,” said Rausch as he manoeuvred the tow truck around the back of Doc Cornwell’s surgery, the last business on the northside of Main. “Too late for that, you ask me. Not that nobody ever does, of course.”
He punched the horn, scattering a work crew who’d been taking a break, leaning on their shovels. They hurried aside with scowls and muttered curse words, but Rausch had a free pass from the Emergency Committee allowing him to drive through the fields – as long as he stuck to the flagged path leading out to the barricade which sat about thirty yards in from the forest. The semicircular fortress wall of old cars, and some new ones salvaged by Rausch, enclosed the freshly planted fields, protecting them against intrusion or attack from the forest. It was a makeshift structure, but impressive nonetheless, and it could not have been assembled without his help.
“I’ll get out here,” Jonas said when they were behind the County offices. He could see a small group, gathered around a white board, probably taking instructions from Jacques Loubert on where to plant their pumpkin seeds. Loubert wore a straw hat with a comically wide brim and stood on a wooden table to address the volunteers. As Jonas alighted from Rausch’s truck, Loubert nodded to him, smiling in thanks for his earlier help with the generator.
Jonas winked back at the grinning idiot, before turning to Rausch in the cab on the tow truck.
“I’ll see about getting us some more gas and diesel,” he said.
“Thanks. Diesel’s the bigger problem,” Rausch said. “Just so you know.”
Jonas nodded, and walked quickly past Loubert’s group and slipped into the County building through the rear entrance to the Sheriff’s station which adjoined it. He passed through Muller’s squad room and into the County annex via a discreet doorway behind the reception counter.
Dale Juntii was the first person he saw in the crowded room.
Dale smiled in his weird, almost lipless way when he caught sight of Jonas.
“Murdoch,” he said.
Jonas barely heard him over the uproar.
The connecting door from the sheriff's office opened into a large, featureless committee room that served as the meeting chamber for the County selectmen, twice a month under normal circumstances. The current circumstances being about a thousand fucking miles from normal, the Council, rebooted with a couple of extra members as the Emergency Committee, met in here every day. Often more than once.
Jonas had parlayed his note-taking skills from the Florida bar into an occasional role taking the minutes, a task which tended to fall to him when everything turned to shit. On those days, it was not unusual for the warring factions of the committee to draw on his proven skills as a mediator. Looked like he'd be taking some notes and mediating the shit out of this motherfucker today.
He almost smiled. Anything to add to the myth of his usefulness and indispensability.
Instead of letting his pleasure show for these blue pill fuckwits, however, Jonas furrowed his brows in theatrical concern. He caught sight of Selectwoman Bohenski across the room and she gestured helplessly, all but imploring him to do something about the fight which had erupted between Darren O’Shannassy’s faction and whoever was fronting for Dave Muller and Howard Wetsman today. The county Comptroller, Wetsman, did not like to inject himself into what he characterised as 'purely political contretemps'. Sheriff Muller had no such qualms, but he wasn't around. Muller made it his rule to walk the perimeter of the town at the change of shift for his deputies every day. No matter what. He was somewhere out on the edge of Silverton right now, checking on the defences and taking the temperature of the citizenry while he was at it.
He would totally put it like that, too. Sheriff Muller was a man who thought in terms of his ‘responsibilities to the citizenry’.
The pompous asshole.
Still, Jonas hadn't slipped sideways into the complicated power structure of Silverton by openly taking sides. He was still here and still welcome because of his jailhouse facility for playing one faction against another and not getting caught at it.
"What's going on?" he asked Dale . The ex-marine rolled his eyes. Unlike Jonas, Dale was not one for subversion or deceit. He preferred to go right at a problem.
“Fucking same old shit for a brand new day," he said. "Forward defence or fortress Silverton."
Fuck me, Jonas thought. This bullshit had been rolling since day one. Just another way for Muller and O’Shannassy to have at each other.
"Got it," he said.
He strode forward through the milling crowd. Dozens of people had squeezed themselves into the room. Assholes should be out sowing their fucking crops or something. It was hot in the room, with no power to run the air-conditioning. The county offices did have solar panels, and even a Tesla battery, but that precious supply of juice was strictly for first-order priorities, such as keeping the sheriff’s office walkie-talkies charged, and the town's dwindling supply of medications refrigerated.
The roaring mass of voices did not abate much as he took his place next to the chairman's seat at the head of the meeting table. But they shut the fuck up once he started banging the gavel and yelling at everybody to be quiet. Howard Wetsman gave him a look that floated somewhere between relief and apprehension, and he heard Darren O’Shannassy’s unmistakable growl cutting through under the receding tumult.
"It's about goddamn time."
Jonas banged the gavel another four or five times, just to establish that he was the boss of making all the noise around here, and once he sensed that he had control of the room, if only for a second, he projected his court room voice into the suspended commotion.
"Good morning to you all," he bellowed with bogus cheer. “I for one cannot wait to find out why everybody is in such a good mood today.”
A small ripple of laughter circled the room, not loud and sounding more relieved than amused. Jonas held up the gavel, arranging his face in a lopsided grin.
“As you can see, I have the tiny wooden hammer of power…”
He paused, scanning the entire room, letting his grin grow wider, before speaking again, putting just a little more grunt into his delivery.
“… And you do not.”
A few more, weak but appreciative chuckles. People were glad not to be in each other’s faces for a moment. They were also, he knew, quietly pleased that somebody had stepped up and taken charge.
“So do not make me swing the tiny hammer in defence of Robert’s Rules of Order and the dignity of this august chamber.”
He got some genuine smiles at that, as he gestured around the unremarkable meeting room with its spartan fit out and bare walls. There were no windows, or picture of the president or photographs of old Silverton to break up the institutional sameness.
“Alrighty then. Everyone sit down who can sit down, ladies and old timers get first dibs, and let’s try do that without any pushing or shoving.”
The room filled with the sounds of chairs scraping and banging together and the low mutter of people arranging themselves at last. There were far too many observers for everybody to have a seat, but most of the able-bodied men did move to the sides and back of the room, freeing up the limited seating for the older folks and a handful of moms with younger kids. Jonas took advantage of the moment to lean over to Howard Wetsman.
“Dude, lets get this party started. I’ll takes the minutes, if you like.”
The comptroller nodded gratefully. He had an RSI which forced him strap his right wrist when the pain flared up, and the wrist was wrapped in a dull, discoloured bandage this morning.
“So,” Jonas boomed out in his courtroom voice, “Do we have an agenda?”
“We do, but there is an item without notice we need to discuss,” Howard Wetsman replied.
Jonas looked to O’Shannassy, to see if this was some kind of power play, but the store owner nodded brusquely. He too was in favour of ditching the agenda for whatever exciting new development had forced itself onto the docket.
“The chair recognises Comptroller Wetsman,” he said loudly.
“Thank you,” said Wetsman, almost sighing before gathering himself and going on in a much louder voice for the benefit of the whole room. “At four-thirty-five this morning, we received a communication by radio from Fort Lewis. The army units there have been ordered by the president to pull back into their barracks and to secure those facilities for the duration of the emergency.”
The room exploded into turmoil, and Jonas had to hammer the gavel and roar “Quiet,” a few times before things calmed down again. Wetsman thanked him and went on.
“We don’t know whether this order was specific to Fort Lewis and Seattle, or whether it was a general directive for the whole country.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Darren O’Shannassy growled. Jonas cracked the gavel down, but only once.
“Sorry,” O’Shannassy said.
“Mister O’Shannassy is correct in one sense,” Howard Wetsman conceded. “What matters here is what happens here.”
And here, Jonas thought, it comes.
“And we need to hunker down,” a new voice boomed from the back of the room. “We’re on our own now.”
It was Sheriff Muller, back from his patrol.
Jonas only needed two heavy blows with the gavel to restore order to the room, which was a shame cos he was almost getting his wood on, banging away with that thing. But Sheriff Muller helped calm the room down with a quieter gesture, gently patting the air in front of him and repeating, “Settle down everyone, just settle down,” as he made his way to the conference table. Jonas took command of the room before anybody else could.
“Howard,” he asked, raising his voice. “You got any more details from the army guys? Any current information about the situation in the city? Maybe the military pulled back because the feds are getting things under control?”
Jonas didn’t believe that for a second. Didn’t want to believe it, truth be known. But he also knew he had to turn down the heat on this bubbling ass-casserole or risk a boil over. A simple query for more information was a good start, especially from Howard Wetsman. The county comptroller could make a three way in a hot tub sound duller than a double math class on a high summer’s morning.
Wetsman shook his head.
“I didn’t take the call. That was Deputy…”
He looked to Muller for help.
“Deputy Treacy was monitoring the radio room,” Muller said, projecting his voice to carry all the way to the back of the room. “Fort Lewis wasn’t calling around for a deep and meaningful encounter group session,” the Sheriff explained. “They were simply alerting all functioning state and local authorities that they would not be able to render further aid to the civil power. Bottom line, we have to look to our own defense.”
The angry buzz which greeted that was completely bipartisan.
“Let’s keep it nice, people,” Jonas called out. “The Chair recognises Darren O’Shannassy, who looks fit to burst with his need to constructively contribute to the public discourse.”
“We need to mobilise and meet this threat head on,” the store owner growled, and for him that really was about as constructive a contribution to the public discourse as you could hope for. At least with Dave Muller on the opposite side of any argument.
Half the room moaned. The other half cheered. Howard Wetsman rolled his eyes and Sheriff Muller grumbled, “What? You want to invade China, now?”
But only Jonas heard that. And maybe O’Shannassy himself.
“We don’t need to hear any more about what’s happening in Seattle or anywhere else,” O’Shannassy said. “We know everything we need to know. The army’s given up. We’re gonna have a million starving survivors coming at us from the city. We can’t hold out against those numbers. They will overrun us. We need to push out and meet them in the passes, where we can bottle them up. Hold them off.”
The cheering finally overcame the groaning and booing. Jonas banged the gavel and was about to call on Sheriff Muller to reply, but the big man was already on his feet, patting the air with his hands again, putting noticeably more volume and power into his command voice this time.
“That’s enough, that’s enough, just settle down,” he boomed out, and the hell of it was that they did. Until Muller spoke again.
“I agree with Mister O’Shannassy…”
The turmoil returned, this time as a tumbling roar of confusion.
Muller pitched his voice to be heard over the top of it.
“… Up to a point,” he bellowed. “Up to a point. Now hear me out.”
Jonas banged the gavel. Muller gestured for quiet. And even Darren O’Shannassy waved at a couple of his more vocal supporters to shut up.
Selectwoman Bohenski leapt to her feet and pleaded with the room.
“Please, can’t we just all be civil?”
O’Shannassy got back to his feet and bellowed, “Shut the fuck up. Everyone.”
Gasps and hissing answered him, but the explosive outburst had the effect of stunning the worst of the yammering fools into silence. Gradually, the room stilled itself. It was appreciably hotter and stuffier than when Jonas had arrived, and when the din finally died away he could hear the rustling of paper as some of the spectators tried to cool themselves with improvised fans.
“Sheriff,” Jonas said, nodding at him to go on.
“Thanks. It seems things have not improved in the city,” Muller said, “and likely will not improve any time soon.”
