That was awesome, Guys! 
Gunner's a neat character, Oreo.
Here's my next long-winded chapter. 
Chapter Five
James held his clenched fist in the air and pumped it up and down, "We licked 'em, boys! We got 'em on the run!" He climbed on top of his Volks and did the v-for-victory sign like a celebrating Nascar driver, "Woo! We have victory!"
The other family members cheered and hurrayed over the dead bodies of the Randalls. They had taken out a huge number of the Randall family with relatively few loses themselves. Now, the Randalls would almost certainly have to bring up the Shenandoah Randalls. That would take quite a few days. In the meantime, the Robertsons could try to divide and conquer, destroying the Randalls one day at a time before their reinforcements could arrive. That was exactly what Granpa Rick, family leader, wished.
The next day...
Everyone was camped out at James' house that morning. In what looked like a campground from the Civil War, they were huddled around the campfires, singing songs, playing cards, and making plans. Some buried the bodies from last night's battles. Uncle Hank, the family's minister, delivered a sermon and a group of men shoveled dirt back into the holes. A few stick crosses marked the graves. Nobody but nobody actually had tombstones in Pennsylvania these days, except perhaps pro-Nazi "cooperatives" in the government. James held his cap over his chest while they sang some old funeral hymn. He slapped his cap back on and went to the living room in his house. Granpa Rick, Pop, and Cousin Harry were sitting at a table discussing plans.
"I say we try an immediate attack on the old gas station. We've been bickering over that place forever. It was one of the main sources of the feud's start. If we capture that, mebbe we could get some of the old cars in our junkyard runnin'. If we had even a couple more cars, we can chase them through the gates of Hell. Imagine getting great granpa's old T-Bird running! And, it'll help Cousin James, too. Now, he always has to buy ridiculously priced Kraut oil in NY to get his car running. Plus, even if he had the money to buy gas for multiple cars, most of ours are junk. We
need more parts. The Randall gas station has a
garage. Then, we need to attack their still to further demoralize them. After that it will be Whiskey for My Men and Beer for my Horses," he finished, referencing a popular underground song by some country artist. The Germans, even in areas they barely kept control over, tried to eliminate American music. If you were one of the fortunate few who owned a radio, the only FM channels you could get played music by Wagner, Bach, and other great Prussian musicians. If the occupation forces felt like "rocking out," which was rare and depending on the DJ, they
might play
Iron Fuhrer or some other German rock group. Hitler and Himmler would have turned over in their graves, but the Germans had allowed more freedom in
their own music and entertainment ever since they had both died in the 60's.
Granpa Rick scratched his bushy white beard, "Ah kin see the logic in that, I kin. Awlright, I think it sounds good. James? Son? Anything?"
Pop, 'Son' to Granpa Rick, nodded, "We definitely need to seize the old gas station. Overrun that, and we can fuel up our cars, and use them to raid the Randall still. We basically know where the booze-maker is, even though they tried to keep it hidden. I heard it's in a basement on Lincoln Street."
Harry nodded, "I heard that, too."
James raised his hand, "Harry told me the Randalls from Shenandoah have a tank. That true?"
Granpa leaned back in his rocking chair and twiddled his thumbs. "Yeah, it's true. They killed my sister's boys with that thing." The Robertson-Randall Feud was not limited to Spruce County, but went on even in distant Shenandoah. "We
do need a plan on how to deawl with that. I know it's an old gas-guzzling Stuart, so it's far passed its prime. If we could hit it with all we got, we might take it down. But...
I have a better idea." He almost whispered it. It sounded to James like a line from an old Hitchcock film he had watched in a theater in New York.
Harry raised one of his red eyebrows, "Better idea? What is it?"
Granpa Rick leaned forward onto his knees, with a very attentive face, "My dad used to tell me he had fowned some dead marines near 'r house during a drop by the Fallschirmjäger, durin' the War. Seein' an opportunity, he took the poor souls' gear an' hid the stuff somewhere. He done told me there were some assawlt rifles, a lotta ammo, some grenades, an'... an ol' bazooka. We could blast that Stuart into next week with that stuff."
James, Pop, and Cousin Harry looked shocked. Pop snapped back to normal first and asked, "Why didn't you tell us about that before?!"
Granpa grinned, " 'Cause he told me abowt it decades 'go an' he never revealed the location of his stash, at least I don't think so. Lucky I remembered it at awl."
Harry threw his Afriker Corps cap on the floor in frustration, "Man! If we could get our hands on that stuff, we could eradicate the Shenandoah Randalls! Did yer Dad give any hints on where the stuff might be hidden?"
"Lemme think." Granpa reclined back in his rocker again. He shut his eyes and did not say a word for the next five minutes. Harry wondered if he was dead. Finally, he opened his eyes and smiled. "The oak. He mentioned an oak. 'I found the dead soldiers under an oak an' hid the stuff on the spot.' There's only one oak tree in the Village. It's next to the Randall gas station. We
must capture that place."
Harry snapped his fingers, "Yes! We're seizing that gas station immediately! James, get the men together. I hope your Volks is fueled up, 'cause we're gonna need it to crash the Randalls' party. We seize that place, and you'll have fuel for a
very long time. There's all kinda gas under that place. It's not stored in the pump's, ya know."
James put his cap on and grabbed his Garand, "Aye, Cousin Harry! ASAP!" He dashed out the front door, ran down the dilapidated steps to the yard, and fired off two rounds. "We strike the Randall gas station! NOW!"
The 'soldiers' immediately decamped and were standing in a neat line in 15 minutes. Granpa, Pop, and Harry paced in front of them, issuing orders like 1800's marshals. Harry was to take twenty men and form the main "line of battle," as he put it. Clearly, he had spent many hours of his "military homeschooling" reading dusty Civil War history books. He liked to think that made him a tactical expert, but it could not hide the fact that he was a post-Apocalyptic hilljack. Pop and eight "skirmishers" were to circle around and attack the Randalls from behind. Overwhelmed, James, Will, who had decided to continue helping, and Billy-Joe were to ride in in the "armored mobile rallying point;" the armored Volkswagen. They would drive in and crush the Randalls utterly. The M1919 would wipe out any remainders. With that done, the Volkswagen would be taken to the Robertson junkyard, where they would tow several cars to the gas station to refit them into "machines of war."
One hour later...
Harry looked at the Randall gas station through his old binoculars. The Randalls had fortified the building and the area around the pump long ago, soon after "county wars" broke out as the survivors of the war rioted for necessities like food and gasoline. Once they got it, they didn't let go. The Randalls' only car in the Village was an old pick-up truck. It had taken quite a few hits in the past, and, at the moment, it had a bad engine and would not even start. Still, they knew better than to let the Robertsons have fuel to use in their cars. "I love the smell of dead Randalls in the morning... It smells like... victory," said Harry to himself. Up to that point, they had been hidden and a long ways a way from the station. Now, he waved his "marshal's baton," his cane he always carried like a sword, in the air. "Men, fall in!" The Robertson extended family formed a squad in the center of the old, pre-War, paved road.
"Oh, I don't know what I've been told!"
"But at the end of the day they'll be some dead Randalls on this road!"
"A Ooh-rah!"
I saw an old lady walkin' down the street.
She had a chute on her back, and jump boots on her feet.
I said, "Hey, Old Lady, where you goin' to?"
She said, "I'm goin' to the Army Airborne School."
I said, "Hey, Old Lady, I think you're too old;
You'd better leave that stuff to the brave and the bold."
She said, "Listen, Sonny, I'm talking to you;
I'm an instructor at the Airborne School."
I saw the same old lady walkin' down the street.
She had a pack on her back, jungle boots on her feet.
I said, "Hey, Old Lady, where you goin' to?"
She said, "I'm goin' to Marine Corps Recon School."
I said, "Hey, Old Lady, I think you're too old;
You'd better leave that stuff to the brave and the bold."
She said, "Listen, Sonny, I'm talking to you;
I'm an instructor at the Recon School."
I saw the old lady walkin' down the street.
She had a tank on her back, and fins on her feet.
I said, "Hey, Old Lady, where you goin' to?"
She said, "I'm goin to the Navy Diving School."
I said, "Hey, Old Lady, I think you're too old;
You'd better leave that stuff to the brave and the bold."
She said, "Listen, Sonny, I'm talking to you;
I'm an instructor at the Diving School."
I turned to leave, and she spun me around;
She kicked me in the head, and threw me to the ground.
I looked up through my tears, and with a voice full of fear,
I begged, "Please, Old Lady, don't kill me right here."
She said, "Listen, Sonny, don't you mess with me;
I'm Airborne, Recon, and UDT!"
"Ooh-rah!"
So sang the marching Robertsons. Harry had always tried to turn the family militia into a fighting force similar to the old US Marine Corps. He loved training them to use running cadences. According to him, it also "scares the hades outa the Randalls and lifts our morale."
Seconds later, they dispersed and took cover. The fight had begun.
Harry crouched behind a dilapidated brick fence, raising every few seconds to squeeze off a few rounds. Several Randalls had already been killed. About 22 Randalls were inside the gas station building itself, while about 10 were stationed outside behind a makeshift barricade of junk and sandbags. Harry fired eight shots with his Thompson into the building. Most went off-target, one wounded a Randall in the arm, and another lodged itself in the head of a middle-aged Randall and knocked part of the man's brains onto the floor.
It was Billy Randal, the one Pop had told James had gotten wounded days before in a shoot-out with Harry.
"The job is finished, Billy. Hasta la vista, chump." He crouched back behind the fence and reloaded his weapon.
The Robertson's had lost three men, but they kept shooting. The exchange of fire seemed to go on forever. Two Randalls threw a Molotov cocktail into an abandoned house several Robertsons had occupied. The building burst into flames and screams of horror from the burning men terrified everyone. Furious, Harry raised up and bagged another Randall, this one a careless one who had stood up for a few seconds reloading.
Then, more shots came from behind the filling station. Pop and his eight skirmishers had arrived.
Harry waved his cane, "Onward! Onward, House of Robertson! Charge!"
The Robertsons stood up, and with only ancient army helmets, kneepads, and the occasional vest made from scrap metal or hockey armor as protection, charged the gas station Gettysburg style, rifles and machine guns pointed forward, blasting away. Six never made it to the barricade.
Harry climbed over the barricade and whacked an enemy in the jaw with his cane, cracking his skull. Kneeing an oncoming attacker, Harry then fired several shots into him. As the other Robertsons clambered over the fortifications, another noise was heard from the direction of down the road.
The Volkswagen.Seconds later, the Randalls were being mowed down by the M1919 mounted in James' car. Harry and the others pressed on, hitting the Randalls with their gun butts and their fists. The Volkswagen delivered the final crushing blow as it sprayed a mean wall of fire into the station windows. Shouting and screaming, the Randalls started pouring out of the building through a back door. Pop and his men had a field day. Crammed together and exiting from a single door, the retreaters were like fish in a barrel. One after another, they went down. Two minutes later, only seven got away successfully.
Harry pulled a small can of paint out of his pack and painted, in large letters, "ROBERTSON" on the front of the building, and below it: "KEEP OUT!"
James clapped his hands together.
If you're serious, you... are... in! (if K97 agrees, and he likes us, so I'm sure he will) You're like the god of story writing around here.
What are you two planning for in the story with your characters?