Author's Note;

  Thank you for your support!

  Also... Last Mage in Minnesota Book 3 submitted to Amazon an hour ago. It will probably not show up till Sunday after noon or Monday (they can take up to 3 days putting it up). Excited to post this as news. Also I've worked hard on it and put every trick I could into making it amazing. It will have approximately 485 pages. (I like to give readers plenty so that when they finish the book they don't get this feeling like, damn I wish that were longer... too short.)

  I will keep up increased activity here and on KTAW for more chapter activity.

  Chapter 16

  The armed thugs are like ten feet from me with only the door in the way.

  Holy shit. Holy freaking shit. I can’t believe this! This is scary.

  In my mind I’m screaming at my legs to try to move but it doesn’t work that way. Its agonizingly slow and difficult to move. Good thing these don’t make noise. Unless I trip. I also have to be silent moving.

  I can hear them trying to break open the screen door as quietly as they can. They are coming in! And only a few feet away from me.

  Oh jeez… this is bad.

  But they didn’t know I had a private security arm that was hooked up to the front gate, not my door. And they’d tried to get past the gate about ten minutes ago. The property yard fence gate having an arm gives the arm company several minutes head start before they even get to my front door.

  As they approach the door the security arm company shows up, pulling up in front of the house.

  But it’s ughable because the mall security guys, err I mean the security company aren’t cops. They are like mall security guards only…less so. They even have ‘the panza’ look. It’s also obvious because they are sloppy and fat. Just like the whole concept of donut cop stereotypes; it’s even more amplified on them because they don’t have access to real danger and that makes there less urgency to act on training.

  The cops are stretching and compining about their lousy pay and hours before they even know what hit them. They’ve just exited a small budget mini truck. And they aren’t even paying attention. They look like they are acting like it was a pet or false arm trigger but show up so they can keep their job. This kind of model of mini-truck they are using was popur because it could do small cargo but it was designed to be able to maneuver into tight spaces and narrow pces that other cars couldn’t get into.

  The security guys were probably paid minimum wage and their uniforms looked like they’d been recycled a few times. Seriously? Look up guys. You are in deep shit. They are talking about the game on TV, oblivious to the fact that there’s like 4 guys with guns, hoodies, and masks looking right at them, and clearly amused at their level of ‘alertness’.

  “You know I think I have a fshlight in this tool box? Where is it?” the one guard said as his back is turned to my house and the thugs in front of it which have ducked behind one of the front bushes. There’s the sound of metal scraping as he’s banging around in the tool box.

  “Can you hurry up? It’s probably just some stray cats. That’s what usually happens. Or sometimes teenagers pying a prank,” the other guy said.

  “Oh here it is I found it,” the first one said.

  My g-d. Guys please look up. How stupid can you be.

  “I dropped my fsh light,” one of them said looking around in the grass.

  The other one sighed.

  While they are moving I’m already trying to move to the back of the house to sneak out the back.

  A few more seconds passed.

  ...

  That’s when I heard the gun shots. I didn’t have a chance to look it up. Nor do I want to go take a look. It’s ironic but the safest pce isn’t my house, but actually the backyard instead since these thugs seem to be killing stuff based on where loot is and how to acquire more stuff. There’s nothing valuable in my backyard as long as I stay behind the woodpile that’s at the back of the shop area and avoid the shop itself. I can hide back there and not be seen from the house or the side of the house even.

  Those guys won’t think of going to the back yard. And there’s nothing to steal there. So after I got there I just id down on the ground behind the wood pile. Its the only thing I can do. Thankfully I’ve got a light jacket on with a hood.

  I'd out smarted them! They wouldn't think to check a backyard junk pile!

  I hate this part too because there’s all kinds of bugs and spiders that infest the wood pile. That makes it hard to sleep because I’m obsessed with the feeling of bugs crawling all over me. Most of the time there isn’t.

  Still…no cops showed up. That’s weird again too.

  I did hear the gangsters car out front and it’s burned rubber peeling out too shortly after they shot that guy. They were worried about being caught so I don’t think they went in my house but I would wait till morning to find out. That would also mitigate the chance of being caught by one of them in ambush mode, if one of them had decided to stake out my house from the inside.

  For now I’ll just sleep out here. The backyard isn’t viewable by other yards also, due to opaque fencing. I don’t dare go back inside while those guys are driving around.

  It took a lot of time to go to sleep since I was so stressed out. All night I kept thinking, what if those guys come back? What if they start snooping around that street or doing surveilnce? It makes sense that they’d want to make sure they weren’t seen. They would do follow up bckmail or another shooting spree. That’s how those things were managed, since it’s easier to control through fear than use wyers.

  They really could get paranoid and be watching for other changes in the neighborhood. It makes me uneasy. I also get even more uneasy thinking about what if Barbara shows up right when they are scouting the pce out.

  …

  Still no cops to check on things when morning came. Its right around sun up now.

  I got up like usual because of my habits. It wasn’t easy. And when I do get up I’ve got a massive headache because I’ve gotten less sleep than I usually need while my body is trying to heal itself up. I managed to get to the bathroom and clean up. Sometime about forty five minutes ter I’m semi-awake and combed up.

  I checked my house carefully after waking up outside in the back. There wasn’t any sign of forced entry and the windows aren’t broken. I still didn’t want to go inside. I’m worried something might be hiding in a closet or worse, but I have to check things out.

  Do I go in there… or not?

  The gangster’s truck is gone…

  After my hands were shaking so badly I spilled my morning juice I managed to check everything out. No prowlers and they didn’t get inside the house. Its even a miracle that it didn’t turn out worse than it did.

  Whew…that was so freaking close.

  I can’t believe I was saved by some sacrificial mall cops…I mean private security guards. Weird though that their bodies are all gone but their security truck is still there in front of my house.

  Why did they leave their company truck here but take the bodies only? And they also left rust brown stains on the side of the road where they were gunned down.

  That’s strange…

  Normally a tow truck would take that to the police impound yard. Probably milk their company for fees also.

  Some might think it’s a plus to have a symbol of security and awareness of security in front of your house. But if things are really bad it could be a symbol that will be one of the first things to be challenged in this area when the anarchy erupts.

  I’ll figure that out after lunch. I have probably until dark to figure it out.

  I have some fresh toast on bakers bread smothered in melted butter between some mayo, mustard, sliced tomatoes, lettuce, and a small amount of bacon before calling Barbara. I almost decided the breakfast sandwich was my true love before remembering how wonderful Barbara is.

  I’m leaving the lights off still.

  There’s a video feed from Barbara on my machine. She wants to talk, but she had sent it directly to my messaging and not having it dial the house directly. That’s interesting. I’m curious what she’s going to talk about. She sounds pretty sweet and caring. How do androids do that? Or do they just know we’re a sucker for caring love? I’m still struggling with responding too quickly to it.

  As usual there’s about five other potential customer calls too that want their cars fixed when I’m checking my messages. Two of them sounded kind of rattled and scared. I’d have to give them the bad news. I hated letting my bread and butter go. It was fairly typical to get up to five calls in a normal day for my auto repair business, of which three of them would be trying to yank my chain or screw around with price checking or trying to get free stuff. Four of the five would typically request actual bids, and two or three of those I might close into a solid deal. It’s stressful to not make ends meet and I want to tear my hair out. I do have a sizable savings because I’ve never believed in working paycheck to paycheck. But it doesn’t eliminate the stress.

  I kept the drapes and windows shut. It would be hard but I was going to board them up too, and keep them so tightly covered that not even a bit of light could get through, I think as I sweep over looking up and down the street through my peep hole in the drapes.

  It’s inconclusive. I don’t see anyone on the street. Also when I look at what cars are there. Most of them I recognize except for a van down the street. It’s a white utility mag van with no markings or writing of any kind.

  I can’t tell if that’s unusual or not.

  The local news feeds don’t show anything about an android shooting or a senior citizen being killed. In fact all the news is purposefully happy, in both the local paper and the local crime section. That’s really weird. I had already doubted someone shooting a senior citizen gardening in her yard would make the front page what with so many other things going on but I had expected it to at least be in the local crime section. And if anything would make the news, you’d think that it would be cops or security guards getting shot; that’s not a lot of people but it gets noticed. But that’s not there either.

  But nothing? It’s as if none of them even exist!

  What does it mean? And no police follow up or attention?

  And what was the status of what was going on with the android that was lost to me? Would she still have a future? Would she even know she was stolen from me?

  That was the worst part…if she didn’t even know.

  If she knew there was the hope it could be rectified somehow. It could even be like some kind of Hansel and Gretel story as it were.

  Carefully I send Barbara a message to meet up as per her request. But I warn her there was an android shooting st night and this area could be watched and to be careful. And that its probably not safe. She still wants to meet ter around 6 PM.

  That’ll work. That’s plenty of time to get this worked out. She would have some kind of news I think. She wouldn’t want me to just meet up with her for nothing.

  I better pn this out. I need to be ahead of the game and not just reactive. I needed to think about creating control switches of my own; ways where I could be the one that calls the shots. The idea of getting seeds was one of those, but it wasn’t enough. And supplies. I had gotten some of those supplies be dry goods also, and grain. Stuff that keeps for awhile.

  I don’t have a gun. I didn’t believe in guns as a way of solving problems, but instead that they created them. But what do you do when society as a whole embraces guns and using them for chaos and anarchy?

  But now I wish I had a gun.

  And what if someone found out I had seeds and ability to produce my own food and they didn’t while they had those same guns I needed?

  I’ve always thought I would be standing up for what’s right. But does that including having to defend things with weapons? I haven’t ever wanted to actually shoot someone in real life.

  But you can’t get a gun now anyway without a three month background check minimum. The w was changed thirty years ago to…still not inhibit gun rights but make the background check more extensive and have time involved to weed out people that were using guns for a quick shooting spree the next day. What a joke. People can’t wait 3 months when they have a self defense event.

  It also included a medical check that barred guns from being acquired by people with certain conditions such as domestic abuse, schizophrenia, violent crime history, homicidal tendencies or history, extreme biporism, history of suicide, and a few other conditions which I couldn’t expin since I wasn’t a medical professional.

  So bottom line my chances of acquiring a gun legally before all hell broke loose was really slim to none. Unless somehow the rest of society were to somehow keep itself together for three months…

  But people would notice whole states dropping off the map…like what half the dairy and grain stuff I knew of was somehow connected to the mid-west where this was already happening.

  And trying to get something illegal would probably just me shot or picked up by the cops since I didn’t even know the science of how someone does that without getting into trouble.

  I could still work out other things to acquire. I’m sure there were things I’d missed.

  Like a water tower. I needed like several water towers. You could never have enough water. And you needed to know how to purify and clean the water up too.

  I needed a lot of bricks without breaking my android budget. And hopefully there wasn’t some kind of restocking fee bullshit for them having to get me a new android for them not having tight enough security but stuff like that happened in real life.

  I should beef up my wall, I thought as my paranoia was running full throttle. Paranoia was also a defense mechanism right? It was built into our genes for a reason.

  My wall, it needs to be like…taller. Like a lot taller, and look un-climbable with nothing that could be grapped onto for a foothold. Or I could hook it up to electricity since there were metal bars going through the front that were interlinked.

  Years ago when dad had installed it, these types of metal rod fences were popur. Because they were really tough. That would require some voltage calcutions however. I had to also make sure it really was a life or death situation before shooting electricity through the fence in a residential area, or I could just go for non-lethal voltage right?

  And maybe I had to also think about if the wall was thick enough that it could withstand a pretty good sized mag car impact hitting it. Though cars were much lighter now days than they used to be they had a lot more efficient power designs.

  That wouldn’t be fun to figure out.

  I also had to consider what if the wall might fail? Or if someone got past it?

  That was also a possibility no matter how well I built it.

  But I had to invest in survival. Things like seeds, food storage, and food production. I’d have to convert as much space to productive space as I could, but also having it be protect-able space. So I couldn’t just go out to some field that didn’t have any barriers.

  This was difficult…

  So the wall calcution... my lot size was about 6900 square feet. That meant the perimeter was … wait a minute. I’d have to look up how to work this out. Perimeter can’t actually be obtained perfectly from a non-square area and I didn’t any reasonable ability to emute geologic surveys or nd surveying. It’s imperfect. It can be obtained from a square but most yards are rectangles not squares.

  But I wasn’t a calculus master either, though I’m pretty sure you could figure out a way to calcute this with integral calculus or other advanced math taught in colleges. I remember a problems simir to this in one of my calculus csses but it’d been so long since I’d looked at a math book that I wouldn’t even be able to remember setting this up.

  I didn’t have time to go figure out how that would work. I had to estimate.

  It’s reasonable that anything extra from concrete or brickwork would be valuable to use for inside the house too in shoring up a good defense. If I use the square perimeter from area conversion it would have an error percentage but would give me a quick calcution I needed while time was running out.

  Punching in my 6900 square feet in my datapad I found it would convert to around 332 ft of perimeter. If I divided that by four it would give me the front wall calcution. Of…wow, eighty feet and some change?

  The pricing of both brick and concrete surprised me. Anyone on even a small paycheck can build something. The building prices are a lot less infted than people think! At least now. That’s probably because they are fighting for business though.

  Quick pricing showed cinder blocks to be 17.50 a brick. Damn you inftion! That brought on a shit storm of swearing until I’d collected myself again.

  OK, trying again…

  A 16 by 8 by 6 inch brick is not quite a square foot. It’s actually off. Plus I have a huge extensive amount of brick wall in the front yard that is already in pce but just not high enough. I needed less than half the front wall calcution to add another four feet or so and fill in some gaps, and some other things.

  Doing the calcution for straight bags of cement is going to be too much work and too messy. I don’t know how I would even contain the concrete without some forms and rebar. The brick idea is better in many ways. When I do a concrete calcutor it’s estimating like so many bags of cement that I’d be completely lost and it would be unmanageable. Plus I have little experience with concrete. But I do have some experience fixing stuff around the house and it’s not that different than fixing cars.

  The idea of using the cement as a mortar is workable. It’s final. I’ll need like less than eighty bricks and about eight or so bags of cement for mortar. That would build up the front wall, but not every wall of course. That would buy plenty of time.

  I could put in an order and maybe hope it goes through. But there’s a chance none of this will work out before all the trouble hits.

  I worked on mag cars at home jor a job, but it didn’t mean I had a good shop with a lot of yard space. It was mostly a tin shed garage which was separated from the house with part of the main floor of the house used as a converted garage. I always had to be careful about space here. It was lockable but not as sturdy as the house itself. That was a problem. It wouldn’t be as helpful in this kind of situation since I couldn’t exactly convert it to a greenhouse…or could I?

  If I was going to have to survive and be in a survival situation of societal colpse it wouldn’t be needed as a mag car shop. I could fix a car on the front wn or the driveway in front of it if I really wanted to.

  I would also need to figure out a way to setup sor panels, and order the parts from a hobby store of some kind. Naturally delivery on this and the other items will be a must.

  I wonder if this was even going to work.

  The delivery was expected to be the next day.

  I feel depressed.

  ...

  I saw those gangsters driving around in their truck again. They did drive in front of my pce. But I’d not had any changes or lights on that suggested someone was here. And they thought other targets were better.

  Shit… is that them? I think they are patrolling again.

  I hurriedly turned everything back off and got ready to hide again.

  Are they coming here specifically or looking for any ‘fish’?