Conspiracy of Illusion

Paradise Lost - Pages 7 - 8

       As they break away to go their separate ways, Wilma flashes a smile in Sheila's direction. And for a split second, Sheila could swear there is the hint of a sparkle in Wilma's eyes. Sheila feels as if she could genuinely see signs of life stirring within the listless core of the recovering addict she has befriended. 

       It's been four months now since Sheila's internment at Fort Indiantown Gap with Wilma. And this is the first time she has seen any kind of warmhearted response from her friend.

       Sheila now walks alone in silence as she ponders over their breakfast conversation. She wonders if she may be offering Wilma the only real hope the woman has ever known in her entire adult life. Tears of joy begin to well in her eyes as Sheila picks up her pace a little. 

       Upon her approach to the heavy glass doors where she works, Sheila leans back as she grabs the handle of one of the thick glass doors to swing it open. After heaving it open, she enters a vestibule.

       Sheila enters a waiting area after passing through the vestibule and negotiating the second set of heavy glass doors. On her right, a waist-high counter with four evenly spaced workstations extends from the front doors to the back wall. A glass barrier runs the entire countertop length, with windows cut out at each workstation for communication between those on either side of the counter. 

       On Sheila's left is a wooden framed sofa with red cushions and four matching chairs, two on either side. A cheaply made coffee table sits in front of the couch with several State approved magazines strategically fanned out in the center for visitors to read until their call to a window. Dead ahead, solidly fixed in the back wall at the end of the counter, a door lies directly in front of her. A sign on the door says, "Workers Only." 

       The building is quiet and empty at this time of the morning. Workers who staff this office behind the counter will not start their day till nine o'clock. Sheila stabs through the Workers Only entrance without hesitation and immediately makes her way to a time clock on the right side of the hallway that leads directly to the loading dock. Even though she is ten minutes early, she punches in and heads to her station to begin her day's work.

       After spending the winter in the lap of luxury at Fort Tuscarora, Paul and Emily return to Two Rocks to check up on the fledgling clan. They have come to see if they can offer any assistance in helping to get the new confederation up and running. The distinctive honking of Canada geese can be heard in the distance as the couple climb the last few yards of the hill. The air, crisp and still, sharply carries their cry as the wedge of calling foul fly ever closer. Robins chirp as they fly through the freshly opened tree leaves on their way to feed in the fields and meadows hemmed in by the forests and woodlands of eastern Pennsylvania. 

       Squirrels and chipmunks seem to be everywhere as they scamper about the dew-filled forest floor. Shoving their noses under the leaf litter, they search out the buried treasures left behind before they huddled down into their nests and burrows for the long hard winter.

       Over the last few months, some changes happened in the Smith's lives during their hunker down in their subterranean accommodations in the Tuscarora woods. For one, Emily is about to enter the final trimester of her pregnancy. And Paul has become so much more attentive and responsive to her needs that he is almost unbearable.

       Both of them are so excited and looking forward to the birth of their first child. Emily is hoping for a baby girl while her husband, naturally, wants a strong young boy. Either way, they are happy to become parents finally after six years of marriage.

       The past winter was ferocious, with seven significant snowstorms in which one storm deposited almost three feet of snow. The bitter sub-freezing cold that gripped the Mid-Atlantic state during January and February was relentless, and the snow didn't have much time to melt between blizzards. As a result, the accumulation became more profound with each passing snowfall, with some drifts attaining over twelve feet in depth. It is now April, and Easter is just around the corner. There are still pockets of snow gripping the north-facing slopes where the "Two Rocks" clan calls home. And although the little band doesn't know it, there is snow in the forecast again.    

Paradise Lost - Pages 9 - 10

       Approaching camp from the opposite side of the monoliths that give the area its name, Paul and Emily hike in from the back way. 

       "Lass, if there's one thing I can tell yah for certain," Paul huffs as he and Emily crest the hill, "and that's the fact that I miss global warming." Paul playfully turns to catch his wife's reaction to his engaging narrative. But instead, the loyal husband is stunned as he watches her smile turn to absolute terror as she gazes past him and looks toward the camp.

       Paul turns to see the campsite in utter chaos. The outfitter's tent under the pines that once served as Obadiah's infirmary is tattered, laying in a heap on the ground, and spotted with what looks like blood. A section of the fence around the community fire lies destroyed, deliberately smashed by some powerful outside source. The two newcomers notice two bodies covered with blankets pulled up over their heads, laying on the ground only yards away from the crumpled tent. While within the circle sit several clan members nursing fresh wounds in various degrees of severity.

Immediately Emily rushes past her husband through the break in the wall to assist those in need of medical attention. Paul proceeds toward the two bodies to identify those who have given up the ghost.

       As Emily enters the community circle through the wreckage, she finds Dr. Leatherman tending to several deep gashes on, battered, Francesca Chen's left upper arm. Her daughter Sarah is sitting between her legs with her left thigh wrapped in a large gauze bandage. Her jeans are torn and wet with blood, and she has various cuts and bruises on her head and face. 

Joon Chen is standing on the left side of Dr. Leatherman, applying an antiseptic cream to a cut on the physician's forehead as the doctor works on Mrs. Chen.

       Emily mutely surveys the carnage for what seems like hours, but it is only a few minutes in actuality. Eventually, she breaks the silence. "What happened?" she inquires. 

       "It was a bear," the doctor says dryly, moving only his eyes as not to disturb Mr. Chen’s progress. 

       Francesca Chen watches Dr. Leatherman nurse her wound while Sarah manages a blank stare. She is emotionally spent and undeniably exhausted. She doesn't even lift her head as Emily is inquiring. Instead, she vacantly stares at the fire in front of her.

       At this time, Paul steps into the community fire with his brief report to Emily. "James and David,"  Paul informs her, profoundly disappointed.  They never even had a chance. They're tore up somethin' awful."

       "The bear was already there when the two of them entered the tent," Mr. Chen explains remorsefully. "They must have surprised it when they went in to get breakfast supplies."

       "I was tending the fire when I heard them shout," Sarah fills in her part, still staring at the fire. 

       Then looking up with tear-filled eyes, "I ran to the tent to see what was the matter when I saw the bear. As soon as I realized what it was, I ran back to the fire, hoping the bear would be afraid of the flames and leave me alone. I dove over the wall, but the bear broke through and grabbed my leg, then started to pull me back away from the fire." Sarah begins uncontrollably sobbing as she sinks back into her mother's embrace. 

       "I picked up a tent pole and began beating it to make it let go of my daughter when it turned on me and swatted me like a common fly. It knocked me down and then bit Sarah again. Again I got up to beat it when it started for me."

       "That's when Obadiah and I got here, "Joon continues, "and he speared it in the mouth with a "glass point," and the bear bit down and broke Obadiah’s spear. After that, I managed to put a couple of Fletchers in it myself with my bow. 

       “Then the bear broke through that section of wall over there," Joon points to the second section of demolished fence to his right, "and took off between the rocks. I managed to get one more arrow into him before he escaped. We think he's heading toward Paradise Farm. Obadiah and two hands armed themselves and are tracking it now."  

Paradise Lost - Pages 11 - 12

       "I think it was the same bear that attacked us last fall," Dr. Leatherman says after a short break in the conversation. "We were carrying Obadiah up here to the temporary infirmary when it charged me and knocked me down. I'll never forget that smell. If it weren't for David's courageous act, I wouldn't be here now."

       "How did you get that nasty cut on yer head Doc?" Paul inquires.

       "Oh, that." The physician pauses almost with embarrassment as he reaches to feel the bandage that now adorns his wound. "Mrs. Chen accidentally hit me with a pole when she took a swing at the bear."

       "The good doctor was down on the ground and barely conscious when I got here," Joon reflects. 

       "That bear has caused me more grief than anything else I can think of," Dr. Leatherman grumbles in his soft Israeli accent. He lifts and turns his head as he shows off the scar left on his jaw from his first encounter last fall.

       "All the wounds I've received from the bear attacks are from those who were attacking the bear."

       Then after a short pause, Dr. Leatherman runs the palm of his hand over his thinning hair and asks, "What should we do with the two boys, David and James, over there?"

       "I guess we should start digging a couple of graves and make two markers," Paul reasons. "We can't report them to the System. That would undoubtedly be detrimental to our cause now. The State would surely want to conduct an investigation, and that could lead to who knows what kind of legal ramifications. And who knows, they may come and get all of us for murder if nothing else.”

       "Why don't we spread the word that we'll have a meeting around the fire this morning," Paul suggests to the doctor out loud and to all who are within earshot.

       Sheila takes up the position at her workstation and mentally prepares to get her day underway. Her job title is Checker, and it's her responsibility to separate stacks of pallets unloaded from incoming semi-trucks. 

       There are three categories in which the skids must be divided, usable, repairable, and recycle. Then Sheila must inventory what she has separated, marking down her tallies on a form on her workstation desk. Once she is ready,               Sheila flips a switch on a column next to her station. The toggle controls a flashing yellow light above the bay door and lets Wilma know she is all set to separate another stack of pallets.

       Wilma removes a stack of skids with her forklift from a trailer dropped at one of the bay doors and then gingerly places the pile near Sheila's workstation. Then, because the stack is about eight feet high, Wilma will slip her forks about halfway up the load and separate it into two more manageable piles.

       Sheila flips the switch near her desk to turn off the flashing yellow light. And Wilma disappears to some other section of the loading dock to do the same thing for someone else. 

       Wilma's function as a driver keeps her constantly busy. Her tow motor is heard all over the loading dock as she continually darts back and forth performing her duties. Other than unloading trailers, her other functions may include taking stacks of good pallets to the other side of the building to load onto waiting trucks. Then again, Wilma may move a stack of repairable pallets to the shop, located in the warehouse center, for repair. Or take a pile of junk skids to a sector at the end of the warehouse called “Recycling” for dismantling, where they throw unusable material into one of several dumpsters located at the last dock door. The reclaimed material is then recycled into the repairable pallets at the shop and loaded onto waiting trucks, a task also performed by Wilma.

       Even though the bay doors are open and the cold April air blows throughout the docks, Sheila is sweating from the heavy labor she has tasked upon herself. She wipes the sweat from her brow using the back of her forearm. As she works to separate her pallets, she thinks to herself. "I'm a school teacher, for gosh sakes. I should be teaching children, not killing myself with manual labor." 

       She understands that this is the punishment the System has determined she deserves just because her religious beliefs aren't State approved. Her vitriolic hatred fuels her deep-seated animosity toward the new State and the One World Order, intensifying her resolve to make it to the end of her sentence. Sheila thinks about her eventual release and how