Walking in the Rain (Book 4): Dark Sky Thunder by William Allen Page A

see. He made up some, sealed them in a box, and buried them. Just in case.”
    “Sorry, guys, I don’t get it,” Amy said. From the little smile, I was guessing she was thinking something about boys and their toys.
    I pointed at my father’s rifle, a standard AR pattern setup with rails, tac light, and scope. “Dad’s buddy Mike, the one you met here, is a machinist, and he whipped up some suppressors for us in case we ever needed such things.”
    She still didn’t get it. I could tell.
    “Without a tax stamp, they are illegal. Like, violates Federal law, ‘go away for twenty years’ illegal,” I explained briefly, and Amy nodded.
    “Are they useful?” she asked.
    “Yes, ma’am,” Dad said. “In the right circumstances. Besides reducing the noise, they also make it harder for the enemy to find you. Pain in the butt on the 5.56 ARs because the subsonic rounds are either hard to get or they don’t cycle properly. Fortunately, I reload and I’ve got a good recipe for them.”
    “And Mike made enough to go around?” I asked dubiously.
    “Affirmative. Tomorrow is range day for all you new folks. We’ll see then. But right now, we have another errand,” my father said, and his voice turned somber at the end of his sentence.
    We loaded up in Dad’s pickup and headed out for the gate, where Scott and Mike were manning the defenses. I thought that was a good match. Scott was still hurting from the death of his parents, and Mike was a wise choice for a partner for him now.
    Mike Elkins was a big guy, a bear of a man with a bit of a beer belly that didn’t detract from his solid strength. He was also a genuinely nice guy, jovial and friendly to just about everybody. Dad had confided once that Mike had been the class clown, but nobody ever minded since he was often the butt of his own jokes. Scott was funny too, but there was just so much darkness in his humor these days.
    “Ya’ll going over?” Mike asked, his voice solemn for once. He was leaning on the window, giving each of us a nod as he looked around the cab of the truck.
    “Yeah. Lucas wants to visit. Might be good for all of us to go. Claire’s got the kids working in the garden still. I think they’re canning tomatoes today. Seems like we just did that last week.”
    Mike nodded. “We did. Those women kept adding to the garden, so the thing’s more’n five acres if you count the sweet corn and the potatoes. And then there’s all those field crops, too.”
    “I guess they are serious about keeping us fed. You still think we need to put up the greenhouse?” Dad asked.
    “Structural stuff, sure. We can skin it when it gets closer to winter. Do it after the harvest, anyway.”
    Dad nodded. This wasn’t out of character. Food was a constant concern and I heard folks here talking about this crop or that, because if we don’t grow it, we most likely won’t be eating. What we didn’t eat would be preserved to help get us through the winter.
    The drive was short and uneventful. Dad parked under an old oak that might have been around since Texas belonged to the Spanish, and we all dutifully filed out of the truck. I spotted Grandpa’s grave easily enough, since it was the only recent addition, and I removed my ball cap and we approached to pay our respects.
    The grave marker was a simple wooden cross with Grandpa’s name, Augustus Messner, and his date of birth and date of death. I did the math and realized Grandpa was almost seventy-five when he died, which seemed really old. Of course, I was still wishing we had another seventy-five years together, so maybe it wasn’t so old after all. And now, he was resting next to his beloved wife, the grandmother I barely remembered.
    Amy was wiping back tears as we walked up, and I could see Dad try to wipe his eyes without being too obvious. I looked down at the tops of my boots and composed my final farewell for this crusty, ornery old man who taught me so much. I loved him unreservedly, and as I stood