June
25, 2017
Yesterday
was really intense. We had been set up all night outside the church
at the courthouse, in the building on the church grounds and on the
rooftops of the neighboring buildings. We even had a couple of people
on the ground floor of those buildings, in case one or more of their
people tried to get inside to stop our people shooting at them. It
was a cold, uncomfortable night for all of us. We stayed in our
assigned spot, ate a cold dinner and waited.
We
didn't know if there would be a scout sent ahead of the group, so we
all had to stay out of sight and quiet. That way, if one came, we
could let them do their thing and return to the group, none the wiser
about our ambush. The plan was to only take out the scout, if there
was one, if they saw us or acted suspicious. We wanted them to think
there was nothing going on and come to the church as they planned.
That
night, I thought about everything that had happened since this all
started. I remembered our time in the cooler, cold the whole time.
Kind of like what I was feeling while waiting for the ambush. I
remembered sitting, huddled together for some warmth. I remembered
how it felt to finally get out of the cooler and be able to warm up.
Oh, how wonderful the canned foods tasted after weeks of only eating
vegetables and fruits, with a little bit of cheese thrown in from the
food I used to cut and make snack packs from.
I
thought about Jackie and Andrew and how I still regret leaving them
behind. I remembered securing the store and then making the decision
to go to the cabin. I curled up and thought about the time spent
securing and improving the cabin and the area around it. I fell
asleep thinking about what it could be in the future, years from now.
When
the sun started to come up, I spent some time sneaking from person to
person, to make sure everyone was OK and had whatever they needed. I
made sure to stay out of sight as much as possible and to move
quickly when I had to move between buildings. I was back in my
assigned spot within an hour and we continued to wait.
Around mid-morning, we all heard the sound of a motorcycle engine. Sure
enough, they'd sent a scout. He pulled up on his bike, all 300 pounds
and dressed in leather from head to toe. His hair stuck up at all
angles and it looked like he hadn't had a shower since this all
started. He got off the bike, barely looked around and walked inside
the church. He was only inside for a couple of minutes, then he got
back on his bike and rumbled away. He's wasn't much of a scout.
It
was only two hours or so before we heard a bunch of vehicles coming.
My hands started shaking and I had to take a few deep breathes to
help calm myself down. I stayed low and listened to the sounds of the
cars, trucks and RV's pulling up and parking between the courthouse
and the church. The plan called for us to wait until their people
were mostly out of the vehicles and then start shooting. We had barricaded the inside of the church doors, so they could't get in
there and make a stand.
The
last engine turned off and we waited while the sounds of doors
opening and closing started. People were starting to quietly talk as
they headed for the doors to the church. The plan was that Richard
and Brian were in positions where they could see the street below and
once the time was right, they would start the shooting, the rest of
us would follow.
I
know it was only a couple of minutes after the people down there
started getting out of the cars, but it felt like hours before the
first shot was fired. After that, I remember what happened in fits
and starts, like a series of pictures and short videos in my mind. I
remember standing up in a crouch, positioning my rifle to my shoulder
and using the adobe balcony railing to lean on and aim. I shot and
shot and shot, then reloaded and kept shooting. I saw the first guy I
shot fall down, dead. I moved on and watched another man die. By
then, they were trying to return fire, but we were in safer
positions: behind the adobe balcony of the courthouse, in the little
building, up on the roofs.
Some
of the men were pushing their women towards the church doors, but
quickly found out they couldn't get inside. They were sitting ducks
and were taken out until they were lying in a pile in front of the
door and on the stairs leading up to them. Others from their group
tried to get back in their vehicles or hide behind them. Once
everyone in the open had been shot down, we turned to the next part
of the plan and started to turn the vehicles into Swiss cheese. We
had made sure to bring enough ammo to make sure that no one could
survive in any of the cars, trucks or RV's.
Once
we turned the guns on the RV's, a couple of the women tried to make a
run for it. They must've been some of the ones who were helping their
captors, like Marco said. They had guns and tried to shot back. They
were killed within five steps of the RV they came out of.
The
shooting went on and on. I must've reloaded at least ten times before
the shooting started to taper off. Richard called for a cease fire,
and then we waited. The plan was to wait at least ten minutes and
watch to see if anything moved. If someone moved, then we would shoot
that one person. Once we were pretty sure everyone was dead. Then the
first group from our side would approach the vehicles, cautiously.
This group had one person from several of the locations we were set
up in. I was going from the courthouse, Richard from the roof of the
building to the right of the church, Brian from the building on the
left, Alex from the small building next to the church, Charlie from
the lower floor of the courthouse and Alice from one of the other
rooftops. We were coreagraphed so we all were about the same distance
away and approaching at the same speed.
No
one and nothing moved for the ten minutes and we all went through the
plan without a hitch. The six of us moved together through all the
bodies and made sure no one was just pretending to be dead. Then we
moved on to checking inside the vehicles, especially the RV's. When I
made my way into the first RV, I was surprised how many holes were
letting light into it. Blood was sprayed all over the inside, on the
walls, floor and ceiling. Bodies were laying all around. Women,
children and even a few armed men in each RV. They must've thought
that if anyone attacked them, they wouldn't shoot the women or RV's.
Then the men inside them could surprise and over power their
attackers. Good plan, they just didn't know how ruthless we could be.
I'm
not proud of what we did but it was necessary for our survival. We
killed all of them and then took anything that hadn't been completely
destroyed during the ambush. Not much was left, but they had guns and
ammo that had made it through better than food or almost anything
else. We left them where they lay, it would've taken too long to bury
them, we didn't want to leave a fire burning and couldn't stay long.
The gunfire would draw any undead near the church and courthouse
right to us. We were quick in taking what we could and were packed up
and gone withing fifteen minutes of the all clear being given by
Richard and Charlie.
Our
group headed back to the houses we had stayed in the day before,
where we had stashed some stuff we had found in the neighborhood
while we waited to get into position for the ambush. We all changed
clothes, since we'd gotten bloody searching the bodies for useful
stuff, then packed up the supplies and headed home, safer then we'd
been since we had learned of their group.
As a writer and artist, I appreciate
any readers and their comments. Thank you for taking the time to read
this blog. Please, come read the other blog I write for our artisan
collective, Raven's Castle Creations, on our website at
www.ravencastlecreations.com. It includes posts on art, the mythology
of symbols we use in our art, history and more! Also, come see the
art we produce in our Etsy store at
etsy.com/shop/RavenCastleCreations. Follow us on Twitter at
@ravencastleart and on Facebook at @ravencastlecreations.
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