299 Days: The 17th Irregulars

Chapter 170 Grandma Did a Bad Thing

As she pulled into work, Tammy noticed two things. First, the clock in her car said she was late. Second, there was a new vehicle in the parking lot. It was a State Parks Department truck, which was odd. The nearest state park was a few miles away, but had been closed for over a year because of the budget cuts.

Tammy parked in her usual spot and got out, hurrying because she was late. Bill Stadler, the company manager came out and motioned for her to come over to him.

Bill was in his sixties, had glasses, and wore short-sleeved buttoned shirts during warm weather. He had a pocket protector and something not too many electrical engineers had: a way with people. He was one of the kindest people Tammy had ever met.

Bill looked nervous when he saw Tammy. He motioned for her to keep her voice down.

Tammy whispered, “Sorry, I’m late Bill. I hit the snooze…”

“Shhhh,” Bill said. That was unlike him to interrupt. This must be important.

He pointed at the state pickup truck. “The FC are here,” he said, referring to the Freedom Corps.

Oh crap. This wasn’t good. Their little power company had been left alone throughout the Collapse. Tammy had wondered how long they could continue to do things without any government interference. Not much longer, it appeared.

“What do they want?” She asked in a whisper.

“To take over,” Bill said. For the first time in the twenty or so years Tammy had known Bill, he looked pissed. He was defending his people and his beloved power company from those outsiders.

Bill explained that a man from the FC had come an hour earlier and told him that the government was going to take control of the power company. It was part of a plan, the FC man said, to “focus resources.” Bill interpreted that to mean cutting off power to areas of the county, or maybe the whole county.

Bill was not a political person. He was an electrical engineer by training and had taken a lot of management courses to become the manager of a little power company. He was very smart. Since before the Collapse, he could see where things were headed and wondered when the government would try to use utilities as a weapon. He kept telling himself that wouldn’t happen in America, although it was easy for the imagination to conjure up.

But, Bill was an engineer and realized how vital the electricity flowing through his company was to the wellbeing of the county. It was absolutely critical. Nothing could make people want to leave the rural areas more than cutting off the utilities. He figured the government knew this, too.

Bill kept coming back to the idea that, at some point, the government might try to take over the utility. They had taken over the highways and fueling stations. Hell, they had taken over everything else, hadn’t they?

Bill was like most Americans: an Undecided who was just trying to get by, but the more he saw of how the government was treating people—especially how they let the gangs run wild and how corrupt things were—the more he felt himself leaning toward the Patriots. He was an engineer, not a fighter, he kept telling himself. He was not a hero. But he kept returning to the idea that he had some control over a vital asset: electricity in his little county. He could not talk himself out of the logical conclusion that, at some point, his control over that asset might put him in conflict with the government. He really didn’t want to do that, but he loved this county and its people. He wouldn’t let them suffer like that.

“Tammy, you know what would happen if they take over,” Bill said, trusting Tammy like a sister. Bill never talked to her about politics, but had picked up on several signs that she was either a full-on Patriot or Patriot sympathizer. Bill was now risking jail or worse by talking this way, but he had to trust Tammy for his plan to work.

“Are you sure they want to take over?” Tammy asked Bill. She was hoping the FC was out just to give another one of those talks about keeping alert for terrorists: Ron Paul bumper stickers, Don’t Tread on Me flags, etc.

“Yes,” Bill said. “They told me. It’s part of some new program. He said some National Guard troops would be coming out later this afternoon along with a team of officials who would oversee the shut offs.” Bill looked terrified when he said “shut offs.” Those words scared him.

“Does he think we’ll just do that?” Tammy asked.

Bill nodded. “I told him we were all loyal. I told him we were committed to the recovery efforts.” Bill pointed to the FC sign in the parking lot that said “We support the Recovery.”

Bill continued, but lowered his voice now to a faint whisper and pointed to the FC man walking into the power company office. “He seems kind of stupid. He’s from Olympia where I think everyone just does what they’re told.” Bill looked at Tammy in the eyes and said, “We’re different out here.”

Tammy interpreted that as some kind of code, like Bill wanted to do something drastic to prevent the FC from taking over. “What do you mean?” she asked.

Bill looked Tammy in the eyes again and said, “I mean we can’t let this happen.”

“How?” Tammy whispered.

Bill just stared at her, then he looked at the pistol in her shoulder holster and then he looked over at the FC man. Bill nodded slowly.

Oh, God. Kill him? Was this really happening?

Was there a choice? They couldn’t let the government shut off the power. But…were they supposed to murder someone and then have all the cops come out?

“You’re not suggesting…” Tammy whispered.

Bill slowly nodded.

Tammy thought about it. Things had been going too well. It was impossible to get through the Collapse and war, or whatever it was, without being directly involved in it. Was she going to let those corrupt bastards permanently destroy her county? Hell no. She had long ago told herself that she would die to protect her children. Well, this was her chance.

“How? How will we do this?” she whispered.

Bill looked around again to make sure no one was listening. “Here’s an idea,” he said in that faint whisper.

Tammy listened as Bill outlined idea for getting rid of the FC man. It was a good plan.

“Do I have to be part of it?” she asked, knowing the answer.

“Yes,” Bill said. “Can you think of another way?” Bill was a little hurt that Tammy, who he trusted so much, was trying to get out of this.

Tammy thought and thought. Her mind was racing. How to do this differently? How to do this without hurting anyone? She came up blank.

She paused. She was about to make the most important decision of her life.

“OK. I’m in,” she said, very quietly. She wasn’t proud of this, but also didn’t feel like she had much of a choice.

The next hour or so was the longest wait in her life. She knew what was going to happen and had to play along like she didn’t. She was trying so hard to act normal.

They were in the conference room with the FC man. He was a typical looking white-collar guy in his mid-forties. He had a pistol on his belt. He looked tired and never introduced himself to Tammy. He was kind of a dick and talked down to them a little.

It was pretty obvious he was not leveling with them. He would say that the shut-off would be temporary, but then said that trucks would come to take county residents to Olympia where the power would be more reliable. Why truck people out of the county if the shut-offs were just temporary? They had been living with intermittent power outage for weeks. Why, all of a sudden, did that mean depopulating the county? The story the FC man was telling was so laughable that it was insulting. Did he think they were stupid?

Yes, he did. And it showed.

Tammy and Bill and two of the younger electrical repairmen were in a conference room getting a “briefing” from the FC man. Bill motioned and the two repairmen left. Then, a few minutes later, Bill said to the FC man, “Tammy can take you out to the switching shed to show you where the master switch is.”

Bill pointed at Tammy. That was her cue. Her hands started to shake and she felt dizzy. It took a few seconds for her to regain her composure. She took several deep breaths. She had a job to do. Her family, and the whole county, was counting on them to prevent the shut-off.

Finally, she was calm. In fact, after the initial shakes, she amazed herself at how calm she was. It was only because so many people were counting on her.

“Sure, come on,” Tammy said. “The shed is just down the road. Can we take your truck?” she asked the FC man.

“Whatever,” he said like Tammy was wasting his time.

Tammy chuckled to herself; who would really think the master switch for turning off the power to a whole county would be in a shed a mile from the main building? This FC guy was either really stupid or just a robot doing what he was told.

Tammy left the room and Bill didn’t even look at her. He wasn’t going to give her a look that might tip off the FC man.

Tammy took the FC man out of the building and they got into his truck

“Which way?” he asked, a little curtly, like she should have been giving him better directions.

She pointed out of the parking lot and down the road, and he began following her direction.

“How far?” he asked impatiently.

“Oh, about half a mile,” Tammy said. “Then we turn off on Dearborn Road. Take a left on it.” Her heart was pounding. She was trying her best to be calm, but she was afraid she wasn’t pulling it off. It only took a minute to get to Dearborn Road. He turned left.

“How far now?” he asked.

“Just around this corner,” she said.

They turned the corner and there was a pickup truck in the road. It looked like they had broken down.

“Oh, great. Some hillbillies,” the FC man said. Tammy looked at his pistol. This wouldn’t be easy, but it had to be done.

He honked the horn and stopped the truck. He yelled at the men in the pickup, “Hey, move!”

The men got out of their truck. They looked familiar. They were the repairmen, but were wearing different shirts and now had sunglasses. The FC man obviously didn’t recognize them from the conference room.

Tammy opened the door and sprinted out of the way. She ran as fast as she could. Away, away, away from there she kept thinking as she ran. She wanted to be as far away as possible because of the…

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

Because of the loud gun shots. Tammy hoped those were the repairmen’s guns going off and not an FC pistol.

Tammy got ahold of herself. She realized that she was a coward running away like that.

Missy. Tammy thought about her sweet, innocent little granddaughter Missy, who would grow up in a destroyed country if the power were shut off. She might not even live, because of what these bastards had done. Tammy stopped and turned around. She ran back toward the gun fire, suddenly wanting to be a part of this. She wanted to do something to change the horrible situation. She wanted to do her part. She ran up and saw the two repairmen with shotguns leveled at the FC truck. She saw a person in the truck slumped over. As she got closer, she saw some big holes punched in the driver’s side door of the truck. They had used rifled slugs, which had punched through the truck door, like a nail through a soda can. There was blood all over the inside of the windows of the truck. It looked like the FC man exploded.

Tammy saw the blood. She wished she hadn’t looked at it. She started to feel sick. They had killed a human being. Her mind started racing: she didn’t know for sure that the FC man was a bad person. Maybe he wasn’t there to shut off the power. Maybe he didn’t have to die. Maybe he had kids like she did. Maybe they didn’t have to kill him. It was so final. If this were a mistake, she could never undo it.

“Let’s go,” one of the repairmen yelled.

The other repairman came over and they both ran to the FC truck. One of the repairmen ran back to their truck and got a can of spray paint. He sprayed a big red star on the FC truck and wrote “Red Brigade” on it.

The first repairman came over to Tammy and said to her, “OK, remember. The truck was stopped by two men. They had ski masks on. They made you get out and then they shot him. OK? We’re going to take off now. You just wander back to the office.” He didn’t even say good bye or look at her. They just got in their truck and they took off.

Tammy wanted to get out of there. She didn’t want to look at the FC truck again, or especially the bloody dead man in there. It was too disturbing. She realized she’d have this scene in her mind for years to come; likely the rest of her life. This “do-your-part-for-the-movement” thing was all fine and good, until you were looking at a dead man blown to pieces and you helped to do it. Tammy knew she’d have nightmares, but it had to be done. She would have worse nightmares if the power had been turned off.

Missy. This is for Missy; for her future. That’s what this is for, Tammy kept saying to herself as she ran back toward the office.

She got winded after running a while, so she started walking down the road. Walking? No, that wouldn’t be believable. She had to run. If she had really just been ambushed, but managed to escape and really wanted to summon help, she would run back to the office. She would sprint. She started to run. It was hard to keep running, but she had to make this convincing.

She only got a few hundred yards until she had to stop. She started walking again. Then she’d jog a little and walk some more. Pretty soon she was at the office. She started yelling when she got in the parking lot.

“They attacked us!” she screamed. “They shot him! They shot him!” Bill came running out, acting very surprised. He was surrounded by other employees who looked confused and scared.

She told the story to the crowd of her co-workers huddling around her at the entrance to the power company. The same simple story she’d been rehearsing on the way back to the office. She didn’t tell the part about the red star. She wouldn’t have known that because she just got out of the truck and ran. She heard the shots and kept running toward the office. That was the story. Everything was a blur.

“Someone call the police!” Bill yelled. That scared Tammy. She didn’t want anyone actually investigating this. Too bad; she was in it too far now.

“Send someone out to go see if he’s still alive!” Bill yelled. “And be careful. They still might be in the area.” Two trucks left the parking lot and headed out toward Dearborn Road.

About twenty minutes later, which seemed like twenty days, the two trucks came back to the office. “Terrorists!” one of drivers said. He described the red star and “Red Brigade” on the truck. He wasn’t in on the plan, so he really believed it.

“Tell the police we have terrorists here!” Bill yelled. “Everyone, back in the office! They might be coming back for us!” He was so convincing.

Employees started running back into the office. People were running out to their trucks and grabbing rifles and shotguns to take with them into the office.

Everyone was hovering around Tammy. They were offering water, asking her what the terrorists looked like, and what kind of truck they had. What was the license plate? She couldn’t remember. “It all happened so fast,” she kept saying. Which was true.

Before the Collapse, the police would have been on the scene in a matter of minutes. Now, however, they probably wouldn’t even make it out there. A killing on the side of the road? Take a number. But, the call came in that “terrorists” had attacked. That got the attention of the police.

Lt. Bennington was the first to arrive. Terrorists? Oh wow. This was getting serious. He wanted to find them. He interviewed Tammy. She kept telling the same story. She said she needed to go home. Bennington said she wouldn’t be safe there. The terrorists might try to get her at her home. She needed to stay at the offices for a while. She’d be safe there. She knew that, if her story had been true, they would be right about that, so she had to play along.

Someone sent for Mark and he came, appearing very worried for her. She couldn’t tell him what had really happened. That was going to be extremely difficult for her. She knew she’d eventually cave; she couldn’t keep something like that from him. The day seemed to go on forever, until that evening when an agent of some kind came from Olympia. He wanted to know all about the terrorists. Tammy kept telling the same story. She was hoping she was telling it consistently. She didn’t want to slip up. She would get out of telling details by saying she needed a break and that it was too traumatic. She had already told the other police. Could she just have a break?

That night around dark, Bill came into the conference room where Tammy was and closed the door.

“You won’t believe this,” he said with a smile. A smile? What was there to smile about?

Tammy just stared at him. She was drained. Emotionally and mentally drained. She’d never had a day like this before.

“The Feds say that the FC man, who was named Arthur Durman, was acting on his own!” Bill said. “Can you believe it?”

“Huh?” Tammy asked. She did not see that coming.

“Yeah!” Bill said as he clapped his hands. “They say Durman was not authorized to come out here. They say the idea that they would turn off the power was crazy. They told me that the President would be going on TV tomorrow for his daily update to tell the country that rumors of the Feds cutting off power to rural and Southern areas was ‘terrorist’ propaganda.”

That didn’t make any sense to Tammy or Bill. A few days later, Patriot ham radio operators were getting the word out about the Utility Treaty. Then it made sense why the Feds claimed the FC man was acting on his own.

Tammy kept thinking about the Durman, the FC man. If only he would have just waited one day.

Oh well, Tammy later told herself. Durman had no business trying to cut off electricity to tens of thousands of people. He volunteered for that FC job. He got to wear a little helmet and drive a government truck. He had a job, and his FCards had lots of credits. Durman knew exactly what he was doing and he started to do it, anyway.

That night, around midnight, they let Tammy go. Mark took her home, and they didn’t talk at all. Tammy was all talked out. Mark’s presence and the silence comforted her.

Everyone had heard about this at the Pierce Point gate. They were quick to ask her how she was doing and told her that no strangers would get into Pierce Point. They were on the lookout for the Red Brigade. Tammy felt bad fooling them, too, but it had to be done. It was for their own good. If the government showed up with a tank and said they wanted to arrest Tammy, the guards would have to fight, and die, or turn her over. By lying, she was allowing them to avoid that.

Mark and Tammy came down Over Road. They were almost home. Gideon came out of the guard shack with his AK pointed in the general direction of the truck. He was making sure no one came through who might be after Tammy.

“Glad to see that you’re home safe and sound,” Gideon said. “Have a good night. You’re safe here, ma’am.”

Tammy started to cry. She was safe there. Thank God. But the real crying came when she walked into the house.

“Grandma!” Missy yelled. “You’re home!”

Tammy grabbed her granddaughter and hugged her so hard she thought she would snap the little girl in half.

Tammy cried and cried.

“Are you OK, Grandma?” Missy asked.

Tammy looked at Missy and said, “Oh, yeah, Grandma is OK.”

Tammy paused and thought, Grandma did a bad thing.