the Dirty Dozen - Chapter 46

   Panic awoke a while later, and saw it was almost dark. He wondered what had awoken him. Warm, slow bellows of hot moist air blew into his neck rhythmically. The now long familiar arm snaked under and up around his neck, the leg slung over his thigh, the knee inside it, the warm foot resting low on his shin. The cat was curled up practically in the same spot it had fallen asleep in. Then it came, the slow long series of raps at the door. He was pretty sure it wasn't locked.

   He knew that voice. He made a fairly quiet "come in" because Merry had to have obviously stirred and pulled the sleeping bag up and over them to the level of their shoulders. Rob tried the door and pushed it gently in. Peeked in at them. The cat swiveled a furry head around, pinched eyes peering and dismissing anything threatening.

   When Rob walked quietly in a few steps, the cat got up, stretched and shook slightly, then stalked off to the far edge of the mattress and sat down. Panic slowly peeled the sleeping bag back, and let Rob see the two of them. Merry was in nothing except the white stockings, her tan body all but painted over him still asleep. He put his fingers to his lips to keep Rob quiet, and Rob gave him a double thumbs up, while Panic gently relaid the bag over them as it had been before giving Rob a peep show. You really couldn't see anything, but, it had been a tantalizing show, he figured.

   "What's up?"

   "They sent me down to see if you guys wanted to eat with us. I can see you're busy…"

   "We're done…"

   Panic gently roused Merry, and told her they had company. She yawned and stretched while he kept the covers over her breasts and anything further down for her, until she focused on six and a half feet of German farm boy just inside the doorway, framed by the failing light.

   "Thanks for keeping the covers on me, hun."

   "No problem."

   "They sent Rob down to see if we want to go up for dinner."

   Merry shrugged. Rubbing her face with her loose fists.

   "Okay."

   After a few seconds, Merry addressed little Robbie…

   "Rob?"

   "Miss Merry…"

   "Are… you going to help us dress, or…"

   "No thanks, ma'am. See, I ain't allowed to make whoopee with my best friend's girl, and Panic? He just lays there, so… no thanks. But, I appreciate the offer and all.."

   "Robbie?"

   "Yes?"

   "Shoo!"

   Rob giggled and went back outside, closing the door behind him. A few minutes later they joined him, now dressed but still quiet. The tiniest chill was in the coming night air, nothing major, summer was still there changing slowly into fall.

   As they walked down the spur trail to hit the main trail to walk up to the main camp, they talked idly of things. Rob asked Panic what was wrong, so Panic brushed it off for sleepiness and afterglow. Rob told him he was forgetting he knew him a long time and knew much better than to fall for that. He knew something was gnawing at him gently.

   "Rob? You know what happened down in DC. Why we're up here."

   "Ayuh. Still under my hat."

   "Eventually, it'll happen again. I can't be ready forever. I'm only human."

   "Well… when one on one fails, you know what comes next. What would we do in that situation? It's obvious, ain't it…"

   "I know."

   "Let's see how sharp you still are. What are your options. List them."

   "One. Wait forever. Hope for the best when it eventually comes. I don't like that option."

   "I don't either. That'll be the last resort. Go on…"

   "Two. Turn the tables. Go back down to DC, and start hunting city cops."

   "Do you have a list of friends you need to visit one at a time? Not to mention, it won't take long for the rest to get wise when their friends quit showing up for beer and poker night… they'll either huddle up and hunker down, or, scatter like mice… and I honestly figure you'd have a split into two groups picking either option…"

   "Plus? I have no list of friends to go visit. That ain't no good, either…"

   "Only one option left. What is it?"

   "Tip their hand. Bring them up."

   "Why is this the best option of all these?"

   "Because. I'm picking the time, I'm picking the ground, and I'm forcing the play on my terms."

   "Bingo. You haven't lost a step. Question?"

   "Sure."

   "If… you don't have a list of friends to visit, how do you know who to invite up for a play date?"

   "That's my central issue."

   "You know how this works. You can't take out a billboard advertisement. Too obvious. You can't leave a trail of tiny breadcrumbs, dip-shits might not notice it at all. You'd be back to waiting forever, basically."

   "I was hoping you'd have some new ideas."

   "Sorry. You need more intelligence…"

   "The intelligence well? Dry as a bone. Merry? We're back to square one."

   Merry admitted…

   "Was worth a try."

   They came into view around the last bend. Panic and Merry were still shooting each other wry grins from back when they had passed the trail they had forged to 'rape tree', where Merry had left her heels when they went out off the trail and into the woods.

   Rob started announcing…

   "Hey! Look who all I found! Sleeping!"

   Everyone greeted them warmly. Merry drifted to Skykid and his cooking that was nearly done. Everyone wanted to know how the uncle meeting had gone, then teased Panic any way they could gently and friendly about it.

   After dinner, Panic and Merry took turns relating the tales of the trip to the nail salon, and had everyone in stitches. True to Panic's earlier assumptions, Rob chimed in with a string of hilarious stories about him dealing with his brother the "turd burglar" and his "close friend".

   The laughter and camaraderie helped them mask their growing apprehension about the upcoming issue. Panic got Rob, at Merry's remembering and insistence, to take them into town the next day to get the used electric range and oven they had talked about. Plus a stop to the grocery store, Merry relating Panic was bugging her about his "damned tater tots" and if he didn't get them, he claimed he was going to be pouty and bitchy and withhold sex until she got them and cooked for him.

   This predictably drew a round the campfire series of jokes and innuendo that everyone enjoyed. There was one new face, and one regular face had disappeared. The boys were slowly coming in and out, getting the place ready. Rob related that they were thinking of nicknaming the bunkhouse "Auschwitz" because of the densely arranged bunk beds to accommodate as many shooters staying over as possible at one time. Apparently, someone had commented how the place resembled pictures of the camps from world war two.

   As the camp slowly forgot them, Merry and Panic drew their chairs next to each other, and Merry got a large Styrofoam cup filled to the brim with Skykid's gourmet homemade Merlot. She slowly alternated sips for herself, and kissed alternating sips to Panic until it was slowly gone. Someone noticed when they were almost done, and they came up from the last wine kiss to find everyone quiet and staring. A group "woo" and applause made them smile.

   Merry took out the little baggie of white chocolate disks Panic favored, and they shared them slowly the same way. After a couple hours, they made their goodbyes, and ambled off hand in hand back up the now dark trail to their little cabin. They undressed each other, and got into their double sleeping bag on their gigantic mattress. Merry kept her stockings on at Panic's behest, even without any action. He claimed he liked the feeling of them rubbing his skin as they laid on each other.

   They spent an hour or two plotting ideas before finally falling asleep in the usual fashion.

   The next day, Rob picked them up in his work truck and they went and loaded a used electric oven Panic picked out at the secondhand store. He got a large roll of thick gauge copper wire with silicone insulation instead of the garden variety PVC; he explained it was more expensive but the top of the line high temperature solution for rewiring the whole thing.

   Merry took him into the grocery store, and bought him a gigantic bag of his "damned tater tots" with a smile on her face, along with a large container of oil for cooking them. The secondhand store also had yielded a wire mesh strainer they stopped back to pick up as well.

   Panic spent the better part of the rest of the day rewiring the stove, and seeing that it worked; he claimed he could scrape and paint it anytime for looks. While it was still afternoon, They went by themselves to Merry's biker bar. They wanted to go when the place wasn't "hopping". They spent a while talking to the guy who had always claimed to "be in charge here" when Merry had asked.

   After quite a while of talking with him, he sat back and stroked his chin, thinking. Then he nodded, seemed to agree with them. The little bar skank dutifully brought all of them soft drinks and generally made herself scarce otherwise. This early, no one else was in and few outsiders or locals would stop in as a general rule that weren't on friendly terms with the gang.

   The three of them left the bar skank to hold the fort down, and they walked around back and surveyed the area. The rear of the bar had a flat area around the bar itself in the back, then sloped up at a fair angle, spreading out in a somewhat auditorium shape up and out. Dense woods surrounded the up-sloping and widening field, and they hiked up to the top. Two thirds the way up was an old storage building, that Panic and Merry inspected at great length.

   They shook hands with the biker in charge, then parted ways. The biker went back into his empty bar, and Merry and Panic drove back to their cabin. Merry heated up oil on the range top, and dropped a large quantity of tater tots into it, then filled up a medium sized saucepan with the tots she retrieved and salted with the wire strainer.

   She pranced and preened around, and brought them over to their mattress, and they both laid down to lounge on their rock star sized bed, careful not to touch skin to the hot saucepan they were cooling the tots off in. When they were able to be picked up with fingers, Merry plopped them in his mouth for him one at a time, and he did the same back to her. They giggled like little kids at this game for a while, slowly eating and talking and planning.

   Panic asked Merry if she had any idea how some magic tricks and illusions were perpetrated, and she admitted she didn't. Panic explained a couple to her. She found it fascinating. Bitty Kitty demanded a tater tot, but ended up not eating it and more or less batted it around the mattress.

   Panic started ordering things off of the internet, and paying the extra for next day delivery or two day delivery on every item, whatever was fastest.