299 Days: The 17th Irregulars

Chapter 176 Walk-Ons

The meeting started with Rich calling on Al VanDorn, and Kate Henley, who helped keep track of the coming and goings of non-residents into Pierce Point. Kate was in her fifties, smart and quiet. Part of her job was to verify if a person was really a Pierce Point resident who hadn’t been able to get there until then, and was showing up for the first time since the Collapse. That was pretty easy.

The harder part of her job was handling requests from strangers coming to the gate who wanted to live in Pierce Point. Kate and Al would interview the stranger and see if he or she had some skills or equipment that could be contributed or, if they were leeches instead. They would make a recommendation to the community and the residents would vote on it at a Grange meeting. So far, there hadn’t been any votes on letting people in because no one worth considering for admission had come to the gate. There were plenty of strangers who had come to the gate, but they were clearly not worth even asking the residents about; most seemed like drifters and petty criminals.

“We’re seeing something new now,” Al said. “A spike in strangers coming to the gate who might be decent candidates for admission,” Al said. It had been over two months since the Collapse and the flow of decent people at the gate was just now spiking? Grant wondered. Then he realized what had taken people so long to start coming out to the country to try to find a place. The long walk, for one. The roadblocks, for another. He assumed that as long as there was enough in the stores to survive and the FCards were flowing, people wouldn’t come. But now they were.

Maybe the government increasingly wasn’t able to get enough in the stores, Grant thought. Maybe the crime was getting too awful. Maybe the government was starting to take away FCards from “trouble makers.” That would make sense. He had a hunch that many of the people out in the country who were trying to find a place to go were political troublemakers, which meant Patriots. They were very likely Grant’s kind of people. People who could become fighters. People with no other way to eat and nothing left to lose.

He felt a little guilty about taking advantage of hungry people, but he had to think about the survival of his community, and he wanted skilled people for Special Forces Ted’s unit that was forming up. Besides, if these people had their FCards taken away by the Loyalists, Grant was doing them a favor by feeding them, and likely getting some fighters in return. Everyone was better off, except the government, which was fine with him.

“Most of the recent ones seem like decent people,” Al said. “We’re interviewing them and we will have some recommendations for you tomorrow.”

“What do you do with them before you let them in?” someone asked.

“We let them camp across the road from the entrance,” Al answered. “We give them water.”

“Are they being checked for diseases?” another person asked.

“If we think they’re worth consideration for admittance then we will have the medical people look at them,” Al said.

Grant didn’t say it out loud, because he didn’t want to alarm people, but checking for diseases would become even more important as the weather got colder and diseases would become rampant when malnutrition started to weaken people’s immune systems.

“Why are we even thinking about letting people in?” someone asked. That started a long, and important, discussion.

“Because it’s our Christian duty,” a man said, and quoted some verse of the Bible.

“Not everyone here is a Christian,” Grant said. “Not everyone is motivated by that,” he added. Grant could speak with authority on that because, while he was a Christian, he was not exactly advocating the opening of the gate to let every poor soul in. A topic as critical as the standards for admitting new people to Pierce Point needed to be broadly agreed upon; it couldn’t be limited to either Christians or non-Christians.

“Forget the Christian part,” a woman said, “we need to take in anyone we can. It’s the right thing to do.”

“Anyone?” another woman asked. “They can just come in here and eat our food? I don’t think so.”

“Yeah,” a man added. “I work fourteen hours a day in my garden and hunting. I’m just supposed to hand some stranger my food because he managed to walk to the gate? Are you kidding me?”

“Maybe we just give some drug addicts all the food in the semi,” another woman said sarcastically. “Why in the world would we do that?”

“Are you going to turn away a starving child?” the first woman asked.

It was silent for a moment as people thought about this. While it was quiet, Grant thought about how he wanted to agree with those who wanted to help everyone. As a Christian, he wanted to take in everyone; he honestly did. He even wanted Loyalists to live, as long as they weren’t in a position to do bad things. People would be judged for what they did — or didn’t do — to help others during this terrible time, but it wouldn’t be by a human like Grant. He knew he was obligated to help everyone he could.

Could. Grant was supposed to help everyone he could. Well, what did that mean? He was limited to what he was able do as a practical matter. His ability to help people was severely limited.

Grant had the deep and unshakable feeling that he was being tested by the outside thought. He was being tested throughout the Collapse to see how he reacted. If, say, a semi load of food were put in his lap, would he share it or sell it? Would he squander it by handing it out, or would he lead the community to only use the food when they needed it most? It was that kind of test. Will the example Grant set inspire others to do good things? That was a test, too. Grant felt arrogant for thinking he was part of some cosmic test, but he just knew he was being tested.

The scarcity and limited options were a test, Grant came to realize. These conditions were intentional. He didn’t understand why, but he accepted that things were unfolding according to a plan. A big plan; the biggest plan.

Grant knew that it wasn’t possible to help everyone who needed it. Not in this sinful, fallen world. Many of the people needing help—like the grasshoppers—were wholly or partially to blame for their predicament. They could have prepared. The signs were there when twenty-five pounds of beans were $13 before the Collapse. They could have said no to “free” stuff from the government.

Blaming people for their predicaments, Grant realized, wasn’t universally true. What about the little kids who were hungry, sick, had been beaten, or lost their parents? What had they done to deserve this? He didn’t have an answer for that, which troubled him.

You will need some of the strangers coming to you.

Grant felt his arms break out in goose bumps while sitting there at the Grange meeting. He had that amazingly calm feeling he experienced before when he realized who the outside thought was and what it meant. Grant knew that he couldn’t lose with what he was doing. He had help; he had the biggest help possible. Grant just soaked in the calm he was feeling. It was like nothing in this world.

He snapped back into the world of the here and now. It was time to get to work. Grant could see that food was the main issue, which was no surprise. That was a way to solve this problem, he thought. He decided to put his idea out to everyone for consideration.

“What if any person coming in had to be sponsored by a current resident?” Grant asked. “So if you want a person to come in, you have to feed him or her. The community is off the hook for them.”

Most people seemed to like the idea. In the discussion that followed, several people made the point that if a person were sponsored, and wouldn’t be a burden on the community, then there was no harm in letting them in. It would also prevent people from letting in too many people, because each sponsoring person had to provide for the new person.

“It prevents people being generous with other people’s money,” a man said. “We’ve seen too much of that in the past,” he added.

“OK,” the Bible-quoting man said, “but what about if no one can sponsor a person for whatever reason?”

“Skills,” Grant said. “If that person has skills we need, we could take them even if no one sponsors them. Their skill might be so valuable that we decide to feed them in exchange for the community getting their skill.”

“Like what?” some asked. “What kind of skills?”

“What if there is a person who knows how to run water systems?” Grant asked. “I’d love to have him or her out here in case anything happens to our well system and pump, that kind of thing.”

Most people seemed to like this idea, too.

Grant’s mind then switched to the topic of getting Special Forces Ted as many skilled people as possible. First dibs would go to Pierce Point, but there might be some skilled people, particular former military and law enforcement people, who could be a big asset to Ted.

Grant made a quick mental note to get to know Al. When walk-ons came, maybe Al could be in on the “Ted project” as the Team was calling it. Al could help divert walk-ons to the Ted project’s compound.

That would be hard to pull off. Lots of guards would see the new arrivals come, but then they would not be seen again for a while. Grant would have to think about how to do this. The first step was to get to know Al and be able to trust him.

When the debate wound down, Al said, “By the way, speaking of valuable skills, a resident returned today. He’s Randy Greene, and he’s had a cabin out here for years. He’s a podiatrist. You know, a foot doctor.”

The crowd murmured. As an actual resident, as opposed to a stranger, they had to let the foot doctor in. Besides, the residents liked the idea of more medical people, even if their feet didn’t hurt. Al continued, “Dr. Greene brought a truck load of gear with him, too. Now, he’s a resident so we let him in, but that’s the kind of thing I think Grant is talking about. So if Dr. Greene wasn’t a resident, but a stranger, we’d be considering letting in a person with medical skills and, as a bonus, a bunch of gear. He’d probably be the perfect type of person to welcome to Pierce Point, just for example.”

Grant was glad to hear Randy Greene, or “Doctor Greene,” as he insisted on being called, was back. Doctor Greene’s cabin was about six cabins down the beach from Grant’s. Grant had met him when he first got his cabin. Greene was a big hunter and fisherman, so that truck load of gear Al referred to was probably full of lots of good stuff. While a podiatrist had limited medical skills, they were medical skills, nonetheless.

For the next part of the meeting, Lisa gave a report. Grant hadn’t seen her all day. She was really warming up to her role as the community doctor and described how people were still dying from a lack of medication. Some people, like Mrs. Roth, died quickly from this. Others, who were less dependent on their medications, were dying more slowly. Now that America was over two months into the Collapse, many of these less-dependent people were starting to die.

Lisa named four people who had died in the past few days, all from a lack of medications. She also mentioned that a teenage girl who cut her hand while filleting fish had a bad infection. They had some antibiotics for the girl, but couldn’t use too much on just one person. Finally, she described some of the lingering problems from people not having their mental illness medications. The very medicine-dependent had gone insane early on, but now the less-dependent were, too. Two people were detained and would be up for a mental ward commitment trial tomorrow.

Grant knew that he wouldn’t be training with the Team tomorrow, at least, not until the commitment trials were done. The commitment trials were a top priority. Two people were being detained, perhaps for no reason, although if Lisa thought they needed to be committed, they almost certainly did. Another reason for Grant to miss training with the Team tomorrow was that he should probably get to know Al better. He could do that tomorrow along with the commitment trials. Training with the Team would have to wait. Grant had plenty of things to do at the Grange. He needed to accept that he wasn’t a twenty-something year old gun fighter. He had different skills and a different job.

At the end of the meeting, Ken Dolphson handed out the latest edition of the Pierce Point Patriot. The only stories in it were the obituaries. Grant would need to go to the funerals on Sunday after church. He hated doing that. It was so depressing, but he had a leadership role out there and needed to be at community events, like funerals.

The meeting broke up. Tired on their feet after a long day, the Team shuffled toward Mark’s black Silverado with the extended cab and Marine Corps bumper sticker that was outside waiting for them. Lisa got into the front cab. The Morrells got in the rear cab. The Team, including Grant, piled into the back of the truck.

The guys were tired so they didn’t say much. They were excited because it was nighttime, which was girlfriend time, although they were tired. Grant quietly wondered how much more activity they could take. Oh well. It was a good problem to have.

In the back of the truck with the largely silent guys, he had a chance to reflect on the day. It had been good and bad, like so many things out here. Good in the sense that they had an amazing crew of fighters and some great equipment and training. Lots of “coincidences” that made them much better off than almost everyone. That was good.

But, the day showed the bad things, too. People dying and going crazy just because they lacked simple medications. Life threatening infections that would be no big deal when there were plenty of antibiotics. And refugees with nowhere to go who were forced to camp out while some people decided if they can come in. Grant could only imagine what it was like in places that weren’t as organized as Pierce Point, like Frederickson, Olympia, and Seattle. Let alone Chicago, New York, and LA.

“Collapses suck,” Grant said. He had anticipated the Collapse and had been frustrated when it was so long in coming, but he didn’t enjoy it now that it had come.