Conflicted Home (The Survivalist Book 9) by A American (learn to read books TXT) 📕

pallet of fifty-pound flour sacks. “This is a good sign, that there’s this much coming in.”

I looked at the bags. On the side of one of them, it read, A Gift from America. That struck me. It was the sort of thing you’d see on TV in disaster regions around the world. Or where a population was starving. And yet, here it was.

“Looks like that was already here.”

Sarge nodded. “Maybe. It could also have been stored overseas someplace. But that rice,” he pointed to another pallet full of huge sacks of rice, “that came from Japan.”

“Kind of funny how things come full circle. After WW2, we helped feed them. Now they’re doing it for us.”

Sarge spat onto the ground and replied, “The world ain’t all bad, Morgan ole buddy.” I grunted in reply and walked over to see what all we’d been given.

The variety of items was impressive. I had asked for a lot of it, but some, I hadn’t. There was yeast and baking powder from England, as well as beans. There was sugar from India that I was sure found its way here through England as well. In addition, there were sacks and sacks of beans labeled with India as the country of origin. It was interesting to see.

There were also sacks of Costa Rican coffee and Mexican corn. That one kind of confused me as I was sure they weren’t in the mood to help us at all. But who knows how it found its way here. There were also stacks of boxes of diapers from Turkey. The boxes had a company label on them, Vora; but other than that, they were generic looking. The same label appeared on boxes of sanitary pads. And the amount was impressive. Obviously, they wouldn’t last forever, but in the near term, they would make the women’s lives in the area easier. Along the lines of diapers, there was also powdered baby formula. Something I’d thought of because of Fred.

Mike was cutting open a case and I walked over to see what was in it, as I couldn’t read the writing on the outside of the box. He removed a can and looked at it, asking, “What the hell is this?”

I looked at the can. It was a little bigger than a tuna can and had a picture of a horse on it. I took one from the case and examined it. It was from Romania. There was no pull top; it would require a can opener. But I had a pretty good idea what was in it. “I think it’s horse meat,” I said.

“No shit?” Mike mumbled while he examined the can. “I’ve never had horse meat before.”

“It’s good. I had horse steak once in Wyoming.”

He looked at me, “Really? What’d it taste like?”

I shrugged, “Kind of like beef. But it was way more tender. You could cut it with a fork.”

He grunted and dropped the can into his pocket. “I’m going to try this shit.”

And there was more. Doc and Jess were going through the medical supplies. Everything from bandages and bottles of alcohol to bags of IV fluids and infusion sets. Doc was busy sorting the items into different stacks. One for dry goods and one for wet.

“Hey, Ronnie, are these antibiotics?” Jess asked, holding a small box in her hand.

He took it and looked at it. “No. This is a steroid. Didn’t expect to see any of this.”

I reached into the open box and removed a package. It was made in Israel and was just the beginning of the drugs we found that had been made there. In the end, there were indeed antibiotics. As well as anti-inflammatory drugs, pain killers, muscle relaxers, anti-diarrheal medicines and one that surprised even Doc.

“Holy crap,” he exclaimed, inspecting a small box.

“What is it?” Jess asked.

“It’s chloroquine. A malaria drug.”

“I didn’t think we had malaria here in Florida,” I said.

“There were a couple of cases back in the 90s. But I thought they had it under control. Kind of weird they sent this.”

“Maybe they just had a lot of it. Sent it as a precaution,” Jess said.

“Maybe,” Doc replied as he tossed it into a box of medications.

“You know, with all this rain, in a week or so the mosquitoes are going to explode,” I said.

“Yeah. But that doesn’t mean there will be a malaria outbreak. It has to be here first, and I really don’t think it is.”

“Look at this!” Fred shouted as she looked down into a very large box. She reached in and picked up a pair of white sneakers. They were simple canvas shoes, much like the old school Converse All Stars. “Anyone need shoes?”

Sarge hopped off the Hummer and walked over to inspect them. “We need to look through there and get a pair for these youngins. A size or two up for growing years too.”

“Good idea,” I said and called Little Bit over. She still had good shoes and we had a couple sizes up for her as well. Hand-me-downs from her sisters. But they were valuable now.

I sat her down on a sack of rice and took her shoes off. Fred handed me what she thought was her size and I tried them on her. She jumped up and pranced around, happy in her new shoes. I wanted to box them back up, but she ran off.

“I guess she’s keeping them,” I said. “I wanted a couple sizes up, so she’d have some later.”

Fred dug back into the box and pulled out another pair. “Here. These will fit her later.”

I took the shoes and said, “I feel kind of bad taking two pair for her when so many others need them.”

“Morgan,” Fred replied, “If it weren’t for you, no one would have new shoes. Keep them.”

“She’s right, Morgan,” Sarge said. “You thought of way more than any of us would have.”

“I’m amazed they had all this stuff,” I replied.

“Fawcett said they’re starting to get a lot of aid in now that the military had