If You Abuse it, You Lose it. -Thirty

Thirty

The seven young adults, because truth be told; they were not kids anymore, moved quickly and quietly towards the road. They could hear the group before they could see it. Coon, Katie, Kelley and Rhea pulled themselves up into trees and began to go from tree to tree. While Shane, Tommy and Fred spread out and hunkered down behind thick trunks. They were spread out, three on each side of the drive and only about 50 feet from where the FEMA group stopped. They could just make out each other but that was because they knew what to look for.

They could hear a conversation going on between two men standing in the road.

“They want to talk to you on the CB, sir.” said a man coming up from one of the vehicles.

“Tell them I’ll be right there.” returned the heavy set man that looked out of place in the clothes he was wearing. It was like they were too new for him and that he would have been much more comfortable in jeans and a t-shirt. His face was newly shaven with lighter skin where a beard once was.

Coon was getting a weird, not quite right feeling from this group. She didn’t think they really represented the government, but her experience with the government was limited to the one time that two agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms came to the farm to look for illegal guns. They had been really nice and had a good conversation with her grandfather before they glanced around the yard, declared no illegal guns found and then had left. They had declined a piece of pie and coffee from her Granny.

These men seemed to be very aggressive especially the one now speaking that seemed to be in charge.

“I’m telling you, no one will stop me. These hicks cannot stand up to our firepower. They’ll be meek and ‘let us help them’, hehehehehe!” He was speaking to another man that was standing next to him as the one who brought the message stepped back to the vehicle.

“Clyde, I have to agree that finding these beauties have made life easier.” the second man said as he motioned towards the convoy.

The two men continued talking but Coon couldn’t hear anymore since they had started walking away back towards the vehicles.

Coon signaled the others the sign for extreme danger, and the sign for untrustworthy. Fred had a small radio on him that he clicked four times, waited and then clicked two more (four clicks for more than twenty men and two clicks for two groups broke away from main group).

The adults had been waiting for the kids to check in and the simple clicks sprang them all into action. The wedding guests and party had already changed into more appropriate clothing. They broke into small groups and began to prepare to defend the farm and each other.

The kids stayed where they were and waited. The group on the road were getting restless until the first man “Clyde” began to loudly give orders assigning positions to the group of about 30 men.

“Ok, I just spoke to whom I’m assuming is their leader and they have agreed to send a small meet and greet party. I told them no more than four since I was worried about our security and how FEMA wasn’t being greeted with friendliness despite our well-meant intentions.”

That brought a few chuckles from the groups of men.

“I want five of you to go into the woods on that side of the drive and another five to go on the other side and set up an ambush. That way we’ll have an advantage if things don’t go our way and they won’t know exactly how many we are if things do go our way. We can still ambush them no matter if they cooperate or not. But we need to get in there if we are to take full advantage. So we are going to be ‘friendly’ to them.”

There were some snickers all around as ten of the men broke off the main group and began to walk towards the woods.

Coon signaled all the others and leaving Katie and Tommy in their positions to take out the leader if they needed to; the rest changed their positions to take out those headed for the woods.

Coon watched as the five men on her side of the road began to make themselves comfortable in various places that gave them a good view of the drive. They were only about five feet into the woods and Coon knew that she or the other kids would have no problem spotting them. She completely trusted that Kelley, Rhea and Fred would be able to handle the trouble on their side of the road. Since Tommy and Katie were on her side of the road and had stayed in position to use their sniper skills when the trouble began (and she was sure there was gonna be some trouble), she knew she would have to handle the five men on her side of the road by herself. She decided to get a head start and using her bow she notched an arrow and hit the closest one to her in the heart. He slid silently to the ground, the others didn’t even notice.

The kids had quietly taken out all but three when they heard someone coming down the drive from the farm.

The leader and two others met the vehicle from the farm right just before the end of the driveway. The Leader was confident that he had the upper hand, but Coon knew that the situation had changed for the “bad” guys.

She also knew that those from the farm could not know what the kids had overheard so she notched arrow that she tied a red ribbon on and let it fly.

Just as the Leader yelled “take them”, an arrow went through his neck and he began to gurgle on his own blood.

The three bad guys in the woods about jumped out of their skins, or would have if they hadn’t of died so quickly.

Kelley and Tommy began taking out those men that were left at the vehicles and the battle was over before those from the farm really knew what was going on.

They all went over all the vehicles and dead bodies and salvaged the weapons and anything else they could find. Then the kids were ordered to the house and the adults took care of the bodies.

It took a LONG week for the kids to come to grips with what had happened but they knew that they had done the right thing in protecting their family and loved ones. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind anymore that the kids were no longer kids.

The girls went to the hanging valley and some great connections were made.

Coon continued to teach and learn.

The farm became her home and she eventually moved her things there from both her cave and the cellar of her grandparents burnt home.

The young adults made many trips out into world, but they always came home. Yes, there were mishaps and some very close calls; but common sense and a deep sense of what was right and what was wrong drove these young ones to do what they could to not only find others who were honorable but to bring their country to a place that one could once again be proud of. And their children and children’s children made sure to pass on the story of Coon and her co-horts.