Tom thought for a minute. “You’re right, of course, but that much activity won’t go unnoticed. Will it?”
Jerry rubbed his jaw and shifted from foot to foot. “No, but we can’t hide in a cave scavenging forever. We either have to find a place where no one can ever find us, or kill all the bad people trying to take away our freedom.”
Tom knew it would soon be nut-cutting time, and a decision would have to be made. Do they stay and fight or run and hide? “Jerry, you nailed the dilemma.”
***
Kate flew the drone to Ashland’s north end following Highway 5 and then flew over to Highway 99. Jackie and Kate took turns watching the gang members transferring anhydrous ammonia from the sizeable agricultural tank to small cans. This made them confident the gang was using the buildings to make Methamphetamine.
Kate said, “How people could do something so vile in normal times, much less these days is unfathomable. Let’s eliminate this vermin and create our distraction.”
An hour later, two drones flew over the northern building the gangs used to process drugs. Kate pushed the button to activate the servo to drop the first bomb. The five-pound bomb exploded on contact with the roof and blew out all of the windows. The second bomb was a gallon jug of napalm, which exploded when it hit a steel girder protruding from the gaping hole in the roof. Fire rained down into the building and onto any survivors.
Jackie dropped her two bombs on an empty building close to a hotel where most gang members lived. The explosions rocked the air and received the attention Tom thought would happen. Most of the gang members on the southern end of the city flocked toward the north to counter what they thought was another attack by the vigilantes. The south end of the city was unprotected. Tom felt safe spending most of the day scavenging the train cars.
***
The auger’s mouth slid under the railcar chute, and Jerry hitched the auger’s driveshaft to the tractor’s PTO. The farm truck was in place, and Jerry started the tractor and moved the lever to start the PTO turning. “Open the grain chute just enough to keep the auger’s hopper full. Let’s rock and roll!”
While Jerry’s crew loaded the grain into their trucks, Tom’s team began checking the other rail cars for anything useable. Most of the boxcars were loaded with raw materials for manufacturing and would come in handy in five to ten years, but not now. Several refrigerated cars had been opened and stunk so bad, Tom had to close the doors himself because his team wouldn’t go near the cars until the doors were closed.
“You’re a bunch of pussies,” Tom said, and then gagged.
The next two dozen cars had everything from cheap Chinese-made toys to housewares no one needed. Tom had just about given up when Rick called out. “Bingo! Tom, get over here now!”
“What’s got your panties in a wad? What did you find?”
“Here, try this on for size.”
The railcar was full of outdoor and sportsman clothing. The Gortex jacket had an inner jacket that kept the wearer warm down to minus thirty degrees. Rick said, “I’ll bet we find pants and some winter socks.”
Tom said, “This is great, but I thought maybe you’d found a rail car full of ammunition.”
“Sorry. Warm clothing will have to do for now.”
Tom quipped. “You’d better find some in women’s sizes or risk the wrath of every lady back at the ranch.”
Later, Rick made Tom happy by finding the bullet reloading equipment and supplies to reload all of the popular ammo in the railcar's far end. The other end had camping and archery supplies. The rest of the railcars didn’t have anything their team couldn’t live without, except one of the last cars they opened. It had books; thousands of books of all types filled the car. Tom brought the teams back several times until they were snowed in for the winter to go through the books. He knew there wouldn’t be any more printed for a long time and didn’t want any knowledge to be lost.
It was midnight when they started filling the first truck with the grain. It was full in fifty minutes. They kept the auger running and filled all three of their trucks before leaving for the night. They returned three more times before the first snow. They didn’t dare drive anywhere after the first snow since it would be impossible to keep someone from following the tracks back to the ranch or caves.
Tom’s most significant issue was driving the trucks down to the cave and loading the grain into one of the side tunnels. The trucks made it to within fifty yards of the cave’s entrance with incredible difficulty. The grain had to be hauled into the cave in gunnysacks. That was backbreaking work and wore everyone down. Even the kids pitched in and helped carry small bags. Tom wasn’t sure if Sam knew about the cave, so he made sure she and Lucy stayed at the ranch, even though he would have loved to see her lifting the heavy bags.
The real problem became apparent a week later when the rats ran rampant in the cave. There weren’t any bins to store the grain. The rats and mice had a field day. Fat mice and rats could barely walk until Jackie, June, and Granny caught enough house cats to get rid of the vermin explosion.
The cats solved the vermin problem, and Tom asked Granny B to take a bunch of them to the ranch and the Community.
*
Chapter 29
The stranded train
The use of drones for the overhead watch was responsible for saving Tom’s team more than four times from impending peril. The drones
