Jernigan's War (15 page)

“Do you need to rest a few days, we’re chronically short of food other than corn; but, I can offer you some corn bread, we have an entire silo full of corn. We have fuel for tractors and tillers as we travel mostly by horse. We wound up with all the horses that the food stamp junkies didn’t eat.”

Dix nodded, “I appreciate the offer; but, I’d like to try and get up to their camp before dark. I don’t know if you have a short wave or have heard; the Chinese are landing. Our wonderful communist President has invited them in. I ran into them in New Orleans a week or so ago.”

“We’re working on a defense right now; the Chinese are already running into resistance. Saboteurs sunk one of their ships in the middle of the Mississippi river at New Orleans. Did you see anything?”

Dix chuckled to himself, “I thought I heard an explosion after I passed the city. I suggest you mine all the bridges around here so you can limit their movements, you might leave a main one up in order to channel them into one spot for ambush.”

Allen nodded, “I’ll pass on your suggestions.”

“Is there anything you know of that I need to avoid up the road?” Allen thought for a minute, “There is a group of folks about 40 miles up the road you’ll run in to. We have an agreement, you’ll need to put a piece of this yellow police tape on the front and back of your rig or they’ll shoot first.”

Dix tied the tape on and waved goodbye. As expected he was stopped about 40 miles further down the road. They were friendly enough and knew Pete and Lucy and in fact had been trading with them. Dix topped off his fuel and proceeded to the camp.

A one lane dirt road led up to the camp; it was located on about 1000 acres and was very isolated. Half way up the hill there were two posts, each had a human skull on top, a warning to whoever came this way. Dix was greeted by a big black lab barking through the metal gate.

Pete stepped out from behind a tree, “Lucy said you would probably come checking on us. Where’s the family?”

Tears welled up in Dix’s eyes, “They’re dead; all of them are dead. I’ve been fighting almost nonstop for the last few weeks.” Lucy came running up and threw her arms around him. Dix sobbed, “They’re all dead, and I couldn’t save them, even with all my preparations.”

Lucy held on tight, “How did you get away?”

Dix stared off into the distance, “I didn’t. I killed the raiders, chased them down and killed everyone I could find.”

Lucy gasped, “How many?”

“I don’t know I didn’t count. There were dozens, I just kept killing and chasing until I couldn’t find any more to chase and to kill. I went home, buried everyone and laid up until I was healed enough to travel.”

How badly were you hurt?”

Dix shrugged, “Just a cut and a bullet through my leg, it’s about healed now.”

Lucy said, “You’ll stay here with us.”

“I’ll stay a few days and rest up, but then I’ve got to go check on Uncle Bob and Uncle Joe.”

Lucy shook her head, “I don’t see how they could have survived, if they went through what we went through, I don’t think they could have stood the stress.”

Dix frowned, “Maybe our cousins helped them; otherwise, they couldn’t have fought off all the human predators.”

“You were absolutely right, when you said all the welfare folks would go crazy and boy did they!” Lucy continued. “We had to shoot three in the house, it was something everyday. We couldn’t even sleep, if it weren’t for the dog warning us, we’d be dead.”

Ben and Frank made friends with the big lab and were soon running around the yard as Dix and Pete walked out to the guard
post. “The Chinese are landing in New Orleans according to the shortwave. They are rounding up the healthy and killing the old and very young.”

Pete scowled, “They won’t be rounding us up, I already have two remote locations on the property set up as hidden bunkers; we’ve been working on them since we got here. We only had one set of intruders; a couple of their skulls are on those posts.”

Dix spent three days at the camp, he gave a lot of thought to staying, but at this point he realized he was going to war. He had absolutely nothing to lose, war was coming. He could either wait or take the fight to the people who caused this disaster.

Pete killed a large wild pig on the second day. They cooked him over a spit. The fellowship was great and Dix slept soundly the night through. Ben and Frank piled up next to him as usual. He ran his hand over the loose skin and felt their soft puppy fur. This was the first night that he slept without the horrible nightmares. Maybe it was the decision on what he had to do. He would head south and take the battle to New Orleans. There were ships to sink and bad guys to dispatch.

CHAPTER 15

THE JOURNEY SOUTH

T
he next morning he packed up and enjoyed some more pig. Lucy didn’t want Dix to leave and tried her best to get him to stay safe with them. Dix appreciated her trying; but, he had made up his mind.

He left them two cans of gasoline and the rest of his MRE’s. He had seven in his bugout bag. He had enough fuel in the four-wheeler and in the one can to make it back to the boat. He ran back through the two roadblocks without incident. The folks with all the corn gave him eight pones of corn bread in exchange for a half a box of .22’s. He ate one before he left. He stopped at the old barn and pulled off two long boards that he could use to get the four-wheeler back on the boat.

The boat was still floating and undisturbed. The river had dropped about a foot and that actually helped with the angle of the boat in relation to the bank. Dix tied the front and back of the boat so that it was positioned sideways to the bank. He took the boards and made a ramp over the side. He slowly drove the four-wheeler up the boards and over into the boat. He almost went over the handle bars when it dropped into the boat. An injury
here could be fatal even if it were minor. He unloaded the trailer and stowed everything on the boat. He then upended the trailer as before and tied it down on top of the four-wheeler. He was still running off the 12 gallon tank on his boat and had not had to get into the large 20 gallon tank. He swapped tanks so that in case he had to open up and run fast he wouldn’t have to worry about running out of gas at an inopportune moment. Topping off the oil in the oil reservoir, he loaded up Ben and Frank and headed downstream. He was feeling guilty about bringing them, where he was going they would be in danger too. He needed them as much for companionship as he did for their ability to help him stay alert. They both had a favorite stick to chew on as they lounged on the back deck.

Dix was losing track of time, he knew spring was close as flower bulbs were trying to bloom. He almost reached for his cell phone to check the date before he remembered he no longer carried it. It didn’t much matter one way or the other, his mission wasn’t tied to a calendar or clock. His mission was simple. He was going to kill bad guys and destroy their equipment or steal it if possible.

He camped on the same sandbar that he slept on a week earlier. He pulled out his fishing rod and used a piece of pig liver that he kept from Pete’s slaughtered pig. He gave most of the liver to Ben and Frank, who made short work of it. He cast a small piece of liver on a hook into a deep hole near the far bank. He let it sit on bottom and waited. He had a small fire going behind him and the sun was going down. He was surprised when the line started running out. He gave it a jerk to set the hook and pulled in a nice two pound catfish. He fashioned a tennis racket shaped basket out of willow limbs so he could hold the fish over the fire. He gutted and skinned the fish and held it over the fire in the basket. It was crispy on one side and flakey on the other. The texture was interesting but it didn’t taste bad. The night was uneventful,
and the nightmares returned, which was no surprise. He was extremely lonely, especially in the morning. He missed his family, and he found that he wanted to get even with the people who were the cause of this. If he survived the coming battle with the Chinese communists, the next battle would be with the American communists.

The next day as Dix made it under the Natchez Trace Bridge he realized that there was a rope across the river. It snagged his boat and stopped him dead in the water. He still wore his pistol and had his AR15 strapped on his torso. It rode behind him under his jacket. He pulled out his Kbar knife and reached to cut the rope, bullets started hitting all around him. He dove behind the four wheeler and turned to see several men on the bridge. He rolled onto his back in the bottom of the boat and started shooting with the AR. He hit two of them, they fell forward off the bridge, and the other fell back. One landed dead on the back of the boat almost on top of Ben and Frank. They both jumped on the body growling and biting. For three month old puppies they were doing a good job.

The boat was leaking water through the bottom but it wasn’t anything the bilge pump couldn’t handle. He would have to try and patch it when he could get it out of the water. Dix cut the rope and let the boat drift down the river and kept an eye out on the bridge. The idiots couldn’t hit what they were shooting at. He rolled the dead man off the side of the boat after cleaning out his pockets of any gold or silver. He fired up the motor and ran on downstream past Port Gibson before stopping to rinse off the blood and puppies using a bucket and river water. Coming to a sandbar not far from the Mississippi River, Dix ran the boat up on it. He got out and used the butt of his Kbar and knocked the aluminum on the bottom of the boat back in shape where the bullets had passed through. He whittled plugs out of a piece of cypress and pounded them into the holes. He hammered them
in as far as he could, then trimmed the plugs off close. The plugs would swell once they were wet under the boat and would last until he could weld the aluminum. The boat had a double hull with foam filling; it wouldn’t sink, even if the bilge pump didn’t work. The problem was: it wouldn’t maneuver well if it had a lot of water in it.

He ran out into the river and back up to the cut where he hid the catamaran. It was just as he left it, he almost felt like he was coming home. He unloaded his gear and dumped off the camouflage and tied his fishing boat behind it. It was almost dark, so he decided to spend the night. No one could really sneak up on him here. They would have to come through the woods on his west side to approach and Ben and Frank would not miss the noise that would make. If they came from the river they would have to be in a motor boat.

The catamaran had a shower; so, Dix fired up the water heater and bathed. He took a pone of cornbread and mixed up some powdered milk to pour over it. It wasn’t especially good, but it was very filling and the dogs absolutely loved it. He spent the evening listening to the shortwave. The Chinese were still trying to remove the ship from blocking the port. They were forced to land at smaller ports and were meeting heavy resistance in some areas.

American troops under loyal commanders had seized control of the US government. A provisional government had been formed, their stated goals were to restore the constitution and free elections would be forthcoming once the foreigners were expelled. They had liberated several FEMA camps and replaced the prisoners with congressmen and any lobbyist they could identify. A number of governors and state representatives were also being rounded up.

One of the main problems facing the American troops was the lack of men, many of them had deserted and gone home to save their families. A lot of them had formed bands of raiders like the ones Dix had recently killed. Still others were in the local militias. The radio also said that a lingering major problem was the bandits that were still running loose, robbing, killing, and raping. And of course, there were the ones who agreed with the Communist President and still supported him. These were mostly still in the Washington area and were helping guard the old government with the help of the Chinese.

The Chinese were coming from the West Coast moving east and also from the Gulf Coast moving north. The short wave station would only broadcast about 3 minutes at a time before they moved. The old Federal employees in the FCC and in some of the loyal Federal police agencies were trying to shut the independent short wave stations down. The Feds were trying to keep the state media up and running. NPR never left the air. CNN stayed on until some Patriots hit their satellite uplinks and took out their broadcasting studios in three locations. After that they couldn’t get anyone to work.

Dix shut off the radio and tried to sleep, he was glad there was resistance besides himself. He had to decide if he would try to join a militia or go freelance. He looked in the mirror as he brushed his teeth. He didn’t recognize the man looking back. He had lost all the extra weight he had carried for years, he was wind burned and bearded and there were deep lines around his eyes. What would Mattie think if she could see him now? He thought about his mother and dad and wished he could see them just one more time. He cleaned Jake’s rifle and wiped down the Springfield. He broke down his Browning and cleaned the dust out of it. He also pulled out Jake’s Browning and cleaned it, he would always be ready. Sleep didn’t come easy.