The Plan: How the Bug Out! War Began Read online

  “I’m anxious to try out the new lever-guns,” Trevor said as they pulled away.

  “You sure they’ll let us on the combat range this time?”

  “Yeah, already made reservations. These guns are okay since they shoot pistol rounds,” Trevor said. “They didn’t want us to beat the hell out of their targets with 30-30 rounds when we asked before.”

  “I think that’s a load of crap. They used to allow .223s on there, before the idiots in Sacramento passed the assault weapons ban.”

  “Well, a 30-30 carries a lot more punch in short range than a .223,” Trevor said. “It’s all about the weight of the bullet for short range. That’s why the inside range wouldn’t allow them. The owner told me that rifle rounds chew up his sheet metal back-stop too much.”

  “Look what we’ve come to in this damn state,” Seth said. “Can’t have guns that look like military weapons, so we have to go back to frigging nineteenth century lever-action rifles.”

  “It’s not so bad,” Trevor said.

  “What, the dweebs in Sacramento? Seriously?”

  “No, no, I meant the lever-action rifles,” Trevor said. “Was reading an article about using them for urban warfare. They’ve got some serious advantages.”

  “Like what?” Seth asked.

  “Weight and general handiness,” Trevor said. “Hell, the .44 mag Winchester I just bought is way lighter than an M4. That means it’s faster to bring to aim. It’s also harder to jamb, can fire at a high rate for a non-autoloader, and it has a ten-round magazine.”

  “They take too long to load,” Seth said.

  “Yes, it takes more time to shove rounds through that side loading gate one at a time, that’s true. But there are a couple of advantages there too, you know.”

  “Like what?” Seth asked.

  “Well, for one thing, you can easily top them off, unlike the magazine on an M-4. Use five rounds and have a few seconds? Shove five more rounds in. On a Winchester, you can even shove a round into the chamber through the top when it’s open. Remember that you have to carry all those clips with an auto-loader, and they take a long time to put cartridges in. With my Winchester, all I have to carry is the ammo.”

  “Yeah, okay, you’ve got a point,” Seth said, “but at the end of the day, no modern army uses lever-action rifles.”

  “Oh, I didn’t say they were my first choice,” Trevor said, “but they can work out, and you can get really good with them after some practice.”

  Seth shook his head and pulled over in front of a big split-level house. Angel’s smiling face greeted them as he waited on the sidewalk. He was slightly pudgy, with a round face and piercing eyes, medium length black hair hanging down almost to his eyes in the front. He went to the tail gate, opened it, and put his rifle and ammo in, then came around to the rear passenger side door.

  “Hey, Angel,” Seth said.

  “How’s it goin’?” he asked. “You guys are late.”

  “Only a little,” Trevor said. “My fault.”

  “No problem,” Angel said. “We’d just be waiting for Matt if you would’ve been on time.”

  “Well, there is that,” Seth said. He looked back at Angel and snickered. “He bringing his little brother?”

  “Nah, not this time,” Angel said. “You guys get to fire these things yet?”

  “No, been at work late every night this week,” Seth said. “Hope I like the feel.”

  “I took mine to the indoor range and fired off a box of ammo,” Trevor said. “Nice, but since it’s so light, it kicks pretty hard.”

  “Well, I didn’t have time,” Angel said. “My dad needed me to help out with one of the apartments. The last tenants really trashed the place. They took the damn toilet, too. We walk into the bathroom and there’s just a hole in the floor.”

  Trevor cracked up. “People are pigs.”

  “Seriously,” Angel said. “You should have seen the back door. They put peanut butter on the screen of the Bellaire window. I had to use a toothpick to get it out.”

  Trevor laughed again, looking at Seth, who snickered.

  “It’s not funny, man,” Angel said. “That was a pain in the ass.”

  “Why’d they do that, anyway?” Seth asked.

  “My dad asked them to pay rent,” Angel said.

  “Geez, remind me never to be a landlord,” Seth said.

  “It’s worth it. Most of the time your tenants aren’t assholes.”

  Seth pulled into the driveway of a mid-century one-story house and honked the horn. A young man with long blond hair and a thick blonde beard rushed out with rifle and ammo box in hand, big grin on his face. He got into the rear driver’s seat and slipped the rifle and ammo in the back. “Hey, losers,” he said. “Mind if I smoke?”

  “Yeah, what the hell,” Seth said. “You’re going to anyway.”

  Matt chuckled and opened his window a crack.

  “You don’t look so good,” Angel said, giving him a sidelong glance.

  “Got slammed with my uncle last night,” he said, cigarette moving in his mouth. He lit it up. “Damn gin knocks me for a loop.”

  Angel laughed. “Again?”

  “Yeah,” Matt said. He took a big drag, and blew the smoke out his window. “Good thing I was with him. He wanted to go to that dive bar in Downtown Torrance to pick up some chick. I took his keys away. Man, was he pissed.”

  “Why does your mom put up with that guy?” Trevor asked. “He’s got to be putting a bottle of gin away every day.”

  “He is,” Matt said, taking another drag on his cigarette. “It’s gonna kill him. My dad knows it, too. Only a matter of time. He told my mom he’d leave if she kicked Uncle Ned out.”

  “Would he?” Angel asked.

  “I doubt it, but mom thinks he might,” Matt said. “Ned supported the whole family after grandpa died. Raised my dad when grandma couldn’t cope. My dad thinks he owes him.”

  “He probably does,” Seth said. “I like the guy.”

  “I love him, but I wish he’d slow down on the boozing a little. We’ve got problems with addiction in my family. I look at him and it scares me.”

  “You think you’re gonna have problems like that?” Angel asked.

  “If I’m not careful,” Matt said. “Kaylee’s been bugging me about it. Made me promise that I’d only drink on the weekends.”

  Seth laughed. “Thursday night ain’t the weekend.”

  “What are you laughing about?” Matt said. “You made the same promise to Emma. We both know how well that’s been going.”

  Seth laughed again. “I know, look at us. Under the thumb of our women, and we ain’t even married yet.”

  They all laughed as Seth got onto the freeway, heading for the Inland Empire.

  “Hey Matt, I heard you had a little problem with Nathan,” Trevor said, glancing back at him.

  Matt laughed as he flipped his cigarette butt out the window. “Yeah, he got pissed, but he’ll cool down.”

  “What happened this time?” Angel asked.

  “Zoe,” he said, twinkle in his eye. “I kinda blew it.”

  “Wait, that’s the chick that you guys met at the coffee shop, right?” Trevor asked.

  “Yeah, her and Megan,” Matt said. “Megan’s pretty hot, but she has a boyfriend. Zoe not so much. She looks okay if she dresses right, but she’s dull looking. Dull to hang around with, too.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Seth said. “I think she’s kinda cute.”

  “Nathan likes her, but he’s never had a girlfriend. He doesn’t know how to handle her, and she’s losing interest fast.”

  “So we all know you nailed her,” Angel said. “Where and how?”

  “I wasn’t planning on it,” Matt said. “She needed a ride home because Megan flaked out on her. Her apartment is on the way to my place, so I took her. She wanted to talk, so we parked in that vacant lot off of 235th Street. One thing led to another.”

  Angel laughed. “You’re a horn dog. How’d
Nathan find out?”

  “The bitch told him,” Matt said. “She’s not too bright.”

  “Aren’t you afraid she’ll tell Kaylee?” Seth asked.

  “She doesn’t know Kaylee, and I’m gonna keep it that way,” Matt said.

  “Enough of this crap,” Trevor said. “What do you guys think about this scary stuff going on down at the border?”

  “What, you mean the plane crash?” Seth asked.

  “That wasn’t a crash,” Trevor said. “It was shot down. It’s all over the web.”

  Seth chuckled. “The news media changed that story, remember? They said it was a hoax. The plane went down due to a mechanical problem.”

  “And you believe that?” Trevor asked.

  “You guys ain’t gonna talk politics again, are you?” Matt asked. “I’d rather talk about chicks and guns.”

  “And drinking,” Angel said.

  Matt laughed. “So sue me.”

  “No, really, there’s something going on down there,” Trevor said. “Unusual people are showing up. Crossing the border on its entire length, from Yuma to San Diego.”

  “Yuma is in Arizona,” Seth said.

  “It’s right on the border,” Trevor said.

  “So what’s unusual about them?” Angel asked, “and no comments about wetbacks, you assholes.”

  “They look unusual, and some people have overheard them speaking Arabic,” Trevor said.

  “Bullshit,” Matt said. “That’s conspiracy theory garbage. You need to stay off of those tin-foil hat message boards. Next you’re gonna tell me that we didn’t really land on the moon.”

  “That’s a whole other subject,” Trevor said. Seth turned towards him and snickered, rolling his eyes.

  “My granddad worked on the moon launch,” he said. “He knew some of the guys in Houston. It wasn’t fake. That’s just garbage.”

  Angel got a goofy smile on his face. “So Trevor, how do you feel about Nessie? Bigfoot? Spontaneous combustion? Area 51?”

  “Ha ha ha,” Trevor said. “There’s more to things than meets the eye sometimes.”

  “I’m surprised you didn’t mention Chupacabra,” Matt said.

  Angel laughed and punched him in the upper arm. “That’s racist, man.”

  Seth laughed, looking over at Trevor, who couldn’t resist laughing himself.

  “All right, you’ve had your fun,” Trevor said, “but I’ll tell you something. Combat shooting isn’t such a bad thing to know. What if we have an invasion coming?”

  “The army will take care of it,” Seth said.

  “After all the cutbacks, the Army isn’t what it once was,” Trevor said. “You know this Administration.”

  Matt rolled his eyes. “Here we go again.”

  “No, really, man,” Trevor said. “We might have to rely on ourselves.”

  “Then we’re in deep yogurt,” Seth said.

  They continued the banter for the next hour, finally making it to the huge outdoor range, nestled against the hills in Grande Terrace.

  “C’mon, guys, let’s go,” Seth said. “Our reservation was for five minutes ago.”

  “Coming,” Trevor said. The others stepped it up, and they hurried to the office, lining up at the front desk.

  “Reservations for the Combat Range,” Seth said.

  “Name?” asked the gruff old man behind the counter. He looked like an ex-cop.

  “It’s under Trevor Hall,” Seth said.

  “That’s you?”

  “No, sir, it’s me,” Trevor said, stepping up. He pulled out his driver’s license.

  “Weapons?” the old man asked.

  “Three .44 mag Winchesters and a .357 Marlin.”

  The old man snickered. “Going in there with lever guns? Lot of that going around these days.”

  “Assault weapons ban,” Trevor said.

  The old man got a disgusted look on his face. “Yeah, it does narrow your choices a little, I guess. None of these are modified, right?”

  “Modified how?”

  “To fire by just cocking the lever,” he said.

  Trevor and Seth looked at the man like he was nuts, but Angel cracked up.

  “Mucus McCain.”

  “I do believe that was Lucas McCain,” the old man said with a smirk.

  Angel laughed. His friends weren’t getting it. “ The Rifleman, you idiots. Chuck Connors. My dad loved that show. My brother and I came up with Mucus to mess with him.”

  “All right,” the old man said. “So none are modified, then?”

  “Nope, but it sounds like a good idea,” Matt said. The old man rolled his eyes and shook his head, a slight grin showing.

  “Hey, Gus, want to take these kids to the combat range?” the old man asked.

  A man got up out of a chair behind the front desk and looked them over. He was about ten years older than them, wearing camo and sporting a crew cut. “Why do I always get the inbreeds?”

  Angel laughed. Gus looked at him. “What’s so funny, smiley?”

  “Nothing,” Angel said. He and the others followed Gus out the door and to the right, watching as he unlocked a gate about forty yards down. They took a path another hundred yards to a street with building facades.

  “Okay, knuckle heads, whoever isn’t shooting stands behind here,” he said, pointing to a wall with a thick plate glass window. “That’s the observation wall. And when you’re shooting, don’t shoot this direction. You do that, even by accident, and you’ll be banned from the range. Got it?”

  “Yeah, we got it,” Trevor said, an excited look on his face. “This is gonna be a blast.”

  “No pun intended,” Angel quipped.

  Gus shook his head. “Who’s first?” Gus asked.

  “Let Trevor go first,” Seth said. “He’s the one who’s nutso about this idea.”

  “I’m fine with that,” Trevor said.

  “Okay, normally we go thirteen rounds,” Gus said. “For now, all you guys got to do is walk down the street and react. You’ll see a target pop out. If it’s a bad guy, shoot it. One shot only and move on.”

  “So I need to top up my magazine?” Trevor said. “Since I only hold ten?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “That’s what puts the lever guns at a disadvantage during a tournament. But for you guys, don’t worry about it. You don’t have to worry about cover and tactics now either. If you do well, I’ll give you some pointers on that, and talk to you about our classes.”

  Trevor took his rifle out of its case and set it on the table behind the observation wall. He loaded it, then stuck three loose rounds in his shirt pocket and walked out onto the street between the building facades.

  “Ready?” Gus asked.

  “Yeah.” Trevor walked forward, rifle at the ready. There was a click. He turned and fired, hitting the target in a window dead center.

  “Nice,” Seth said.

  Trevor continued walking until another target popped up. He whirled around, leveling the gun. It was a woman carrying a grocery bag. He lowered his weapon and kept walking. There was another click, and he fired, dead center again. He continued on through the course, topping off his magazine in the middle, only missing one target. He left the bolt open and walked back.

  “That was great!” he said, setting his gun down.

  “Damn, you’re a natural,” Gus said. “I guess I shouldn’t have called you a knucklehead. Where are you from?”

  “Torrance,” he said.

  Gus got a grim look on his face. “You know what happened there last night, right?”

  “No,” Trevor said. “We left pretty early this morning. Didn’t bother with the news.”

  “Gang members went into North Torrance. Burned down several buildings, raped some girls, killed several people who resisted, and torched a bunch of cars.”

  “North Torrance?” Seth asked. “I can’t believe we didn’t hear about that.”

  “You live in North Torrance?” Gus asked.

  “Nah,” Ang
el said, “We’re in the south-east part of town.”

  “I’m almost in Lomita,” Matt said. “The line is just across the street from me. That’s quite a ways from North Torrance.”

  “Well, you guys better watch yourselves around there,” Gus said. “I know that area. My sister lives down by the Torrance Airport. It’s not that far from where the trouble was. Only four or five miles.”

  “Maybe it’s a good thing we’re learning to shoot combat, then,” Matt said. “Who’s next?”

  “You,” Seth said. “Go for it.”

  Matt nodded and took his gun out of his case. The boys took turns cycling through the course. Gus gave them all pointers, although he was most interested in Trevor’s ability. They exchanged phone numbers with Gus at the end.

  ***

  John woke up sweaty, intense morning light shining through the bedroom window of his rig. He felt for Sarah, but she wasn’t there. “Sarah?”

  “I’m out here,” she said. “Want coffee?”

  “Yeah,” he said, climbing out of bed. “What time is it?”

  “Little after eight,” she called back.

  “Why’d you let me sleep so late?”

  “Eight isn’t late,” she said. “You’re retired. Try to enjoy it a little bit.”

  He walked out, pulling on a sweatshirt. “Little chilly.”

  “It’s not so bad,” Sarah said, putting her newspaper down on the dinette table.

  “You already been to the clubhouse?” he asked, sitting across the table from her.

  “Yeah, I was there early,” she said. “Woke up at five thirty and couldn’t go back to sleep. I hate that.” She got up and went to the coffee pot, taking a cup out of the cupboard and filling it. She brought it to the dinette and slid it to John.

  “I could’ve done that, you know,” he said, taking a sip. “But thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it,” she said. “What’s on the agenda for today?”

  “I have no particular plans,” he said. “I’m retired, remember?”

  There was some commotion outside. Loud talking, and then the alarm bell sounded.

  “Crap, there must be a fire in one of the rigs,” John said, standing up. He carried his coffee to the door and opened it, stepping out. Other people were coming out, looking around to see what the noise was about.

  “Hey, John,” Clem said, going down the steps of his rig. “Know what’s happening? I don’t smell any smoke.”