The Pole Shift

Clarky and the Peanut Butter Man

        Lett was breathing hard, they'd parked up at the base of the television masts, walked half way down the hill as if they were exercising, then ascended again.  Clarky trailed the three, to watch for intrusion. They got to the area where caches had been found before,  and all met up. They were sweating but their breathing had evened out,  their fitness telling. Clarky arrived moments later, "Clear" he said, and he had that stupid grin on his face. She was tempted to get closer to have a whiff, but telling him off here was not an option.

                "Get to work, you know the signs to look for. I don't want to spend more than an hour at this, Clarky, watch the trails, stay hidden, if anyone surprises you get into a loud confrontation!  Don't forget, what we are doing now is highly illegal. Don't think that execution is an airy threat, they'll do it."

                They parted and stomped through the steep part of the hill, it was covered in brush, and above leaned stringy bark gum trees, the tall mountain ash couldn't grow on the slope, nor could houses be constructed without expense. Here and there were the remains of previous caches. This area had been the first choice of the pre mad weekend survivalists, but once it got too popular, as in everyone was digging up each other's caches then reburying them sometimes not 50 yards away, the idiocy ashamed them.  There had been a jokey news article a year ago on the group, hidden cameras had been placed amongst the woods that had recorded some of the scenes. They had sped it up and put the Benny Hill tune to it, and aired it in prime time news. They were a joke. That was a year ago, and now she had a hunch that the double bluffers, the ones that hid in plain view, would have returned to bury, bury well, some caches in an area that most survivalists felt too embarrassed to return to.

                They had been looking for twenty minutes when her phone vibrated, that was the signal that one of them had found something. The phones weren't connected to a network, instead they had established a wireless network that covered a few acres. She knew algorithms would pick up their activity if they were using a commercial network, and she wouldn't be surprised if they could discern them anyway. Data got grabbed quickly, but one buzz for Mick and two for Dean was a hard code to break. She followed the route on her phone to the later goon, watching for flies, real or otherwise.

                He stood over a hole, his collapsible shovel on the freshly dug mountain dirt. She felt the age old excitement, what had they found? Heavy duty plastic tied up with cable ties held about fifty large tubs  of peanut butter, and a Glock. There was ammo too. This was a superb find, but the gun put her on edge, it was illegal to own guns in Australia, and in these days deadly as far as the authorities were concerned. Who ever owned  the cache wouldn't be pleased either.

                "Not been here long" said Dean, pleased with himself. "There's a note." He unfolded the paper. 'Mine!" it said in black marker, and he read it loud in a theatrical voice. He crunched it up and threw it over his shoulder. "Mine now!" he said and picked up the Glock, turning it in his hand.

                "Ours." Said Lett, dead pan but full of warning. She held out her hand for the gun.

                "Oh yeah, ours." He reluctantly handed over the weapon. Lett was losing them, she could feel it at every moment. They probably had discussed her, there was something awry. She presumed it was because things had suddenly got real. They had all lost their jobs, warehouse hands and Mick the Builder. No one wanted anything built, and no one wanted new furniture.

             "I'm going to bury this somewhere else." She took the bag, pretending to examine it carefully, but she was watching them, analysing their sideways glances, the tiny grin from Clarky, the dimpling cheek of Dean and perhaps most worrying, the rigid expression of Mick.

         Clarky lingered by the cache hole as the others left, flicking twigs into it. Dean had told him to fill it but he couldn't be bothered. He had his head down, listening to them go. When he couldn't hear them he stood and watched their passage across the rocky slope, then when they disappeared he tracked them, like Lett had taught him to. She was tough, and Clarky was attracted to that. She made him want to impress her, to make her laugh. He didn't mind her being angry at him, didn't mind the slaps. As long as he had her attention it seemed to make him happy, like a young dog. Lett told him that if she ever caught him tracking them she'd thrash him, and he tried so hard to be silent that over the two years that the group had formed he had become expert. He would sometimes go barefoot, he knew how to move when the wind blew, how to follow a line of rocks and how to stay very still. When he saw the man sitting on the rock watching Lett and the other two pass he was astounded. The guy was stock still and he blended perfectly with the surrounding rocks. Could he be the peanut butter man? There was every chance. When his crew had gone, the man stood and went the other way, Clarky decided to follow him instead of Lett just so he could tell her more than 'Someone was watching.' The observer paced back up to the walking track and past the television masts. He went through the Mountain Ash reserve then into a house. A resident, a survivalist one. He could be fair game, he could not wait to tell the others.

        Lett was sharp with him when he walked in. Annoyed that he was late.

      "What track did we take?" He tried to shoosh her up but she flashed red and inched towards him. "Don't you - !" She was getting ready to slap, but something about his earnest eyes stayed her hand.

                "I tracked the peanut butter man, he was watching us all the time, he knows your faces, but I know where he lives! I tracked him instead of you."  He watched his words sink in. Her eyes slipped down the side of his face before snapping back eye to eye. She suddenly smiled, her hand touching her stomach.

                "You did good boy."  She wanted to know every detail, the house, the neighbours.  Her eyes widened slightly when he told her the house backed onto tree reserve.

                "Anyone else?"

                "There were some kids, but they ran off when he got back. They threw some sort of green fruit at him I think,  he seemed irritated as fuck by them."

                "We've got work to do tomorrow boys. A survivalist in a house on a hill is almost too good to be true."

                 "Cool!" said Clarky, as if pizza had arrived, diminishing the menace of Lett's words.