HARD ROAD

By Terry McDonald

Copyright 2012 Terry McDonald

All rights reserved

CHAPTER ONE

NOWHERE TO HIDE

Honolulu Hawaii, November 12, 2017

The dying started today. Susan keys the remote to catch the news while we prepare breakfast. The first words we hear are from CNN’s Sharren Bahshria reporting from the street in Sydney.

“…has estimated over a half million are dead, and thousands more infected. The dead and dying surround me. The main highways are blocked with stalls and wrecks and alternate routes out of the city are all but impassable.”

With the rest of the world, Susan and I witness the death of a continent. This is Sunday, and neither of us has to work. I doubt many people in Honolulu left their homes today. The news, and Miss Bahshria’s narration of what we see through her cameraman’s lens, is surrealistically hypnotic. The live feed is so intense, we watch the disaster unfold in our bedroom while our children, Gail and Sammy, play together in the game room. Only nine and ten, they are too young to see such frightful images.

Six hours pass. Sharren Bahshria dies a victim of the plague. Her cameraman’s effort to keep her on her feet, begging her to keep her eyes open, has us crying. He carries on in her stead, documenting with his camera the unrelenting horror. The death toll, from what the network has named ‘The Sleeping Disease’, is over a million and a half. The services humans have come to depend on are non-existent. The ranks of the police and other emergency responders are faring no better than the populace. Sydney is in flames, the streets filled with terrified people milling about in panic, stepping over the dead littering the sidewalks and roadways. Many of them are afflicted, staggering, trying to stay on their feet, begging others to help them stay awake. Some fall to the pavement as we watch. A few cars are still attempting to navigate their way out of the city. The drivers are running over the bodies and bashing through anyone desperate enough to try to block them. Leaving the city to escape the death is an exercise in futility. Every corner of Australia is affected, even the remote outback.

We leave our bedroom only to feed the kids and check on them intermittently. At five this afternoon, the broadcast from Sydney ends. The cameraman is dead, shot by an elderly man who took affront to him recording the tragedy. The view switches to the CNN Broadcast desk in Atlanta, then to Melbourne, but we have seen enough. The shock of that first day remained imprinted in our minds.

*

In less than two weeks, Australia was no longer a viable nation. The World Health Organization said it was a plague like nothing encountered before. They could find no pathogen or toxin to account for the symptoms, nor any logical vector for the spread, but the short of it was the afflicted were dead within six hours, and there was not a single recovery. It was not an ugly death, but it was death for sure. First, the victim would get tired, and then beyond tired to listless, and after about six hours simply fall asleep and never wake. No pain or suffering, if you exclude the terror of getting tired and knowing you were going to die.

The world rushed to Australia’s aid. America sent its emergency relief ships. They, along with other top tier nations, moved medical teams and researchers into the major cities, but to no avail. The dying continued unabated. It took a month for the UN to vote an embargo. By then the dying had stopped. Of the twenty five million inhabitants, only fifty thousand survived.

Fearing the spread of the plague, Australia was isolated from the rest of the world. A vast armada of war ships from a coalition of countries encircled the continent. They stood back a hundred miles off the coast, prepared to destroy any plane or boat attempting to leave. Flyovers were prohibited and the only observations were from satellite images.

Unlike Sydney and Perth, Melbourne was spared the burning by the panicked populace. Even so, with no one staffing the generating plants, the cities were without electrical power and water. After the dying stopped, a news station in Melbourne cobbled together a crew and managed to resume broadcasting, using a generator. The satellite link from there became the most watched station in the world. For three days, their sole reporter wandered the streets with his camera, documenting the death. Some of the most horrific images came from homes he entered. The bodies, entire families, sometimes grouped together in one area, sometimes dying randomly in separate rooms. The worst broadcast was from Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. Over two thousand dead lay in the pews and aisles.

A group of six armed survivors invaded the station and rousted the News Host from her seat in front of the camera. A woman with garish makeup and spiked hair spent the next two hours describing the nasty ways they were going to harm the news crew unless a plane was sent to take them to England.

Something happened to the feed, perhaps the camera operator cut it or the generator failed, and the broadcast stopped. No one knows the fate of the news crew.

There were isolated contacts received by ham radio, many of them detailing the anarchy resulting from the lack of a governing body, and the complete failure of the national infrastructure. Mostly they pleaded for rescue.

The world was on edge, praying the plague had been contained. The US declared martial law, as did other nations. People were discouraged from gathering in large crowds, and laws were passed against the hoarding of food, medicines and fuel.

Fear ran rampant. Someone simply stating they were sleepy, or nodding off in public, was often enough to create a panicked reaction. After two months, and a few scares of possible outbreaks, the world began to breathe again.

Of course, the psychological and social impact, along with the economic and political upheaval of losing an entire continent, caused turmoil throughout the world, but the feeling life would continue seemed to unite most of the globe to work together.

In the aftermath, the US and Russia sent a volunteer group of medical researchers, along with a small contingent of soldiers into Melbourne. This brave group knew they would not be allowed to leave. None of them became ill, but their research only deepened the mystery surrounding the plague.

By the time they arrived, there were no bodies to examine. They found skeletons with no flesh remaining, the clothing intact with no staining from rot or putrification. Even the bone marrow was gone. In the homes and buildings with no wind to disturb the scene, they found flesh turned to dust. The dust itself was a mystery. If it was indeed what was left of the body, it was rendered to its base elements, leaving no organic components and was useless as a material for study.

They examined hundreds of survivors, but could find no traces of a contaminating agent, nor did their blood show abnormalities in their antibody mechanisms.

*

For Susan and me, life returns to normal and actually improves. We run our insurance business from home. Sales spike to such a volume we bring in extra personnel to handle the load. Three months after the Australian event, I am at the gym and my phone sounds off. It is Susan telling me the plague is in the UK, and that she wants me to come home to her. The gym I use is near the Honolulu International Airport. I guess everyone is getting the news. The H1 is bumper to bumper and it takes over an hour to get home.

We watch the Sleeping Disease of Australia repeat itself in the English Isles. Millions die and London burns. Thousands are attempting to use the Chunnel under the channel to escape. Hundreds make it through before the French block their end of the passage. Thousands more make it across the Channel in boats, most of which are met with a hail of gunfire from the French military, and from terrified citizens near the shore.

*

The scientific community was bewildered by the fact the plague was entirely confined to the UK. Despite all the people who managed to escape to the mainland, not even one case was reported across the Channel. Bewilderingly, the plague knew the boundaries of the area of infection and did not cross an invisible line.

Another blockade was established. International tensions ran high. Accusations of terrorism flew. Elements in the democracies were blaming the Islamic nations and China for spreading the plague. The US and Russia, while deploying their strategic forces, worked together, along with the UN, to calm things. They managed to get the world to stand down while an even stronger investigation of the disaster was developed.

The investigation was still ongoing. A breakthrough by a French research team concerning abnormalities found in the MRI’s done on UK survivors indicated the cause might not be from a pathogen or toxin. Their report that the causative agent for the plague was tiny machines called nanobots met with skepticism, but confirmations of their finding removed that skepticism. This discovery initiated another barrage of countries blaming their foes.

*

This morning, six months after the initial Australian event, the plague starts in China. The Emergency Alert Warning System interrupts the program we are watching, and after hearing the report, we turn the television off.

Now we are at the dining room table with Gail and Sammy, playing their favorite board game. Susan and I have our laptops in our laps, surreptitiously sending emails to our loved ones and dearest friends, but the major portion of our attention is for our children.

Susan buys Boardwalk for two thousand, and sells it immediately to Gail for a hundred dollars, giving her a set with Park Place. I one-up her by selling prime real estate to Sammy at rock bottom prices. Our children are smiling. We are smiling with them, even though we are rapidly losing our play money.

We express our love.

We block our tears, our fears.

China has not wasted time with words or diplomacy. Knowing the plague will decimate their nation, they launch their missiles while they still have the infrastructure to accomplish it. They give no reason or warning.

The islands are within range and multiple missiles are coming. We can hear the muted wailing of the warning sirens. The nukes will arrive in a few minutes.

Ending my email, ‘With Love from Bobby’, I click send for my final communication to my brother, Jake, and lower the cover on the laptop. I hope the web isn’t so clogged it will not make it out. I ask him to remember my family in his prayers.

I have closed the past and am living in these final moments. We have no place to hide and we will die. I hope it is quick and the children feel no pain.

CHAPTER 2

Georgia, USA

March 2026

The ugly day had begun beautiful with bright sunshine to mute the crisp morning chill. His break from walking over, Jake Markett stood from his seat on the trunk of a dead pine which had fallen across the roadway. He refolded the worn sheet of printer paper and put it in a metal box that contained other items he valued and placed it in his pack. He shrugged into the straps of the backpack and resumed his journey, thinking about his brother as he moved. Bobby’s death, along with Susan and their two children, represented a loss that hurt even after nine years. Something about this morning made him feel the need to connect with the past. As always, after reading the printed copy of his brother’s last email, he said the requested prayer for them.

He walked with a smooth mile-eating stride, keeping to the center of the deteriorating roadway to avoid the worst of the weeds that took advantage of every crack in the pavement. The tall pines, and underbrush crowding the road, were living walls of green and brown. In the past, this would be a whistling day. He remained silent. Since the plague, and the downfall of America into anarchy, his ingrained caution prevented actions that could bring unwanted attention.

A couple hours later, he began looking for a suitable place to break for lunch. He preferred his meals warm. Yesterday, while searching through an abandoned grocery store he had found two undamaged cans of irradiated beef stew. The thought of eating one, set his stomach to growling. He saw an overgrown graveled drive ahead on the right and was going to use it to go a distance from the road before setting a fire in his camp-stove.

Before he reached the drive, the sound of a distant gunshot froze him in place.

A girl screamed. Mingled with her piercing shrieks were the sounds of men shouting and the terrified voices of young children too far away for him to distinguish their words.

His familiarity with weapons told him the shot came from a small-caliber pistol.

“Damn,” he said aloud to a decision already made. Ignoring the graveled drive, he leapt the ditch at the shoulder of the road and raced through the vine-tangled forest, using the girl’s incessant screams to guide him.

Torn by the thorny underbrush, he knelt in concealment and again cursed his inability to ignore people, especially children in danger. He was too late to prevent the rape of the two young blacks in the overgrown pasture behind a small farmhouse.

A young man, tall and lanky with straggly blond hair was standing, pinning a boy to the ground with his foot. His deed done, he buckled his belt as he watched another man humping a girl, ignoring the boy squirming under his boot. The boy’s pants were bunched around his ankles. His bare buttocks rose and fell in his attempt to escape.

The head in his sights would be an easy shot. Jake vengefully lowered his aim and shot the man in the lower back, severing his spine.

The man on the girl was fat with gray hair. His bulk trapped her arms. Her legs flailed and kicked as she struggled against him. Reacting to the sound of the rifle and his partner's cry of agony, he pushed up with his arms, lifting his body from the girl. Jake put a bullet through the back of his head. His victim screamed even louder, wiggling from under his body.

The wounded man, his legs dead, used his arms in an effort to move, clutching clumps of weeds to drag him forward, a bizarre, slow motion attempt to escape.

The body of a black man was lying close to the house. The handle of a knife protruded from his chest. A small, terrified girl was on her knees beside him.

The victims got to their feet amidst the bodies. The girl was silent now. As they struggled with their clothing, they looked wildly in every direction for the source of the shots.

Jake watched the wounded man drag himself a few more feet. “You kids. MOVE!” he shouted through cupped hands.

The taller of the two rape victims, the girl, gazed searchingly towards where he hid and shouted back. “Are you going to kill us too?”

“No. Just move from that man.”

The kids scurried as he aimed. Jake noticed the girl kept her eyes glued to where she thought he was hidden. The wounded man clawed desperately at the ground, grunting with the effort to move faster. Jake felt no pity, only anger at himself for wanting the man to suffer, knowing he should have taken a killing shot to begin with. His M-16 spoke and the man’s head jerked. Blood splattered the weeds in front of him.

“You got any guns or knives?” Jake shouted again.

“No sir,” the girl answered.

“Finish dressing. I’ll come over.”

Jake continued to kneel. The pulling of the trigger had woken memories of another time when he dealt a hand of death. He fought against a vision of frog legs, joined at the hips, twitching in a hot frying pan. His body jerked fitfully as he battled to slip the claws of the past. The immediacy of the young ones strengthened his resolve to say “No!” The power of the word prodded his clenched muscles to release, allowed him to stand, to move.

His deep blue eyes flitted and jumped from place to place. Mostly, he watched the weed-covered drive the rapists probably used coming there. He took in the condition of the victims as he approached. The boy whimpered as he cinched a length of rope used as a belt. Tears ran down his cheeks.

The tall girl stared at Jake with silent apprehension, the streaks of her tears almost dry. One hand clutched her ripped blouse closed over her small breasts, the other held up her loose fitting trousers.

The boy went to the body of the dead black man and knelt by the little girl. He put his arm protectively around her. They watched his approach with wide-eyed fear.

Jake stopped close to the tall girl, seeing, but trying not to see, the blood and small pieces of flesh on her face and clothing. She was older than he had assumed from a distance. Her eyes looked huge on her thin brown face. She was a little shorter than his six-feet.

“I’m not going to ask if you’re okay,” he said gently. “I know you’re not.” He nodded in the direction of the dead black man where the other two huddled. “Is that your father?”

“No. That’s our uncle,” she answered sharply.

“Where are your mom and dad?”

“You go to hell, mister,” she spat at him, “that’s none of your business.”

Jake thought before responding. He could not fault her for being leery.

“I know you’re angry and hurt. I probably scare you, but I don’t mean any harm, young woman. It was only a question.”

“You don’t scare me. They’re out getting food, and you’d best not be here when they get back.”

Jake studied her for a moment. He could tell by the change in her voice she was lying about her parents returning. He admired her attempt to be strong, but knew her bravado was born of fear and distrust.

“No… they won’t be coming back. You’re here by yourselves now your uncle’s dead.” He paused, looking at her face, giving her time to respond. She glared at him for a long moment before letting her eyes fall.

“Leave us alone mister. Just go. We been hurt enough.”

Jake considered his answer before he spoke. “I’ll stay until your parents return. I’ll leave once I know you three are safe.”

She raised her eyes to glare at him again. “They’re not coming. They’re dead, all right. White men came through and killed’em four years back.”

From the corner of his eye, Jake saw the boy dig a large stone from the ground beside him and conceal it under his leg.

“They didn’t bother the rest of you?” He asked, shifting his position so he could keep the boy in view.

“Willie made us hide till it was over. They raped Mamma to death, then they beat our daddy dead.” She paused, fighting back new tears, then asked even more angrily, “You happy now you been told?”

“I’m sorry,” Jake replied gently. “How old are you?”

“I’m eighteen,” she replied, her voice registering her annoyance. “You finished asking questions yet?”

Jake ignored her question and glanced at the bodies of the white men.

“Those guys are dead. We can’t erase what’s happened, but we can get on with living.

“Boy,” he said, turning to speak to the two beside Uncle Willie, “how about helping the little girl and let’s go to the house.

“You got a douche kit in there?” he asked, turning back to address the young woman.

“I got a what?” she replied with a puzzled expression.

“Water and a plastic bottle?”

“Yes.”

“As soon as we get to the house fill it and squirt it inside to wash out that man’s poison. You keep doing it until you’re clean. You understand what I mean?”

“Yes sir, I know what you mean,” she replied in a mild sweet tone that caught him by surprise.

“Girl, you’re something else,” he said, smiling. “One minute you act like I’m your worst enemy, and the next you don’t.”

“Excuse me for being out of sorts,” she retorted, speaking in clipped angry sentences. “I been raped. That man’s face and blood is all over me. One of my ribs feels broke where he kneed me, and you smilin’ and askin’ questions like it ain’t nothin’.” She turned to speak to the other two. “Allen, grab Janie and let’s get to the house like the man says. Are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” the boy replied as he stood, using his sleeve to wipe his tears. He kept the other hand concealed from view.

She turned back to glare at Jake again. “That’s the question you should have asked us to begin with instead of skipping it,” she stated venomously. “We’re just fine thank you.”

“Good,” Jake said, feeling kicked out of sorts himself. “We can come back later to bury your uncle, and see if those two have anything worth taking. Keep your eyes open, they may have friends in the area... Boy, if you're going to keep that rock, you'll have to walk in front of me. You may as well drop it. You don't need it.”

The boy let the stone slip from his hand.

Time and the elements had taken its toll on the small house, and on the barn set off to the left. The barn doors stood wide open, one sagged listlessly from a single hinge. Both buildings had large areas of missing roofing. The roof of the house was roughly patched with odd bits of plastic sheeting and plywood to keep out the rain. The door allowed entry into the kitchen. The girl took a bucket of water from a counter and hurried to the bathroom, taking the little girl with her. Jake followed Allen into the living room.

He studied the boy while they waited. His clothes, while not threadbare, were well worn and too big. Skinny, but not to the point of emaciation, he stood without slouching. The delicate features of his face showed the promise of being handsome. His hair, like the girls, was a matted, mess of dreds.

“Do you have food here?” he asked. “Have you three eaten?”

“We got some fish from last night, and some honey,” he answered.

“Your name’s Allen?”

“Yes sir.”

“Are those your sisters?”

“Yes sir.”

“How old are you, Allen?”

“I’m fourteen, sir.”

“I’m going to call you Al, if it’s all right with you. Allen sounds too formal. What are your sisters’ names?”

“Beth and Janie.”

“Beth’s the oldest one?”

“Yes sir.”

“How old is Janie?”

“She’s nine.”

“Damn,” Jake exclaimed, “I figured her for six or seven and you for twelve. Beth barely looks eighteen. You kids haven’t been eating very well. The three of you are nothing but skin stretched over bones.”

“We been afraid to go far for canned food. We done took the food from the houses around here,” he answered defensively. “We eat mostly fish and wild greens and such. Sometimes animals from the traps we got set.”

Jake saw he was trembling. “Are you afraid now?”

“Yes sir.”

“You don’t have to be afraid of me. I’d rather hurt myself than any of you. How about you call me Jake, no more yes sir, okay?”

“Yes sir—,” he caught himself. “Yes.”

“I have to ask. Are you bleeding down there? Are you hurt anywhere else?”

“No sir, I mean no,” he answered, staring at the floor, embarrassed. “It hurts though.”

“That’s to be expected. Let me know if you start bleeding. Mostly get what happened out of your mind, it won’t do any good to dwell on it.”

Jake paused in thought. “I could use your help. Do you have a BB gun or pellet rifle?”

“I got a Whammo and some marbles for shot.”

“That’s even better. I want you to go out front and find a place to hide where you can see anybody coming. If you do see someone, do not move or shout, just use your sling to whack the front door with a marble. Think you can hit it?”

“Easy, I can hit a running rabbit, but I ain’t leavin’ my sisters in here with you.”

“Al, I’ve already told you I mean no harm here. If I wanted to do anything with your sisters you’d be dead out there with the others. Maybe those men were part of a bigger group, maybe not. We can’t take the chance there were only the two of them. I need you to grab your slingshot and get out there.”

“I’ll go, but if you hurt my sisters I’ll kill you. I mean it!” Al turned and went down the hall to a bedroom door, returning with his slingshot and a handful of glass marbles.

“I’ll be by the big stump you can see out the front window. I can see everywhere from there.”

“Watch the driveway most,” Jake advised.

Al went out the front door. Jake watched through the window as he ran to the stump with no attempt at stealth, disappearing from view in the tall grass and brush surrounding it. “Damn,” he thought, “the boy needs some survival training.” He noticed his own reflection in the glass, his long brown hair displaced and tangled from his dash through the forest. His hand went to his cheek to scratch an itch. The itch came from a thin line of blood from a shallow gash on his face. He scrubbed the dried blood away with a licked finger, and wiped it with the bottom of his sweatshirt. He walked around the living area, picking out twigs and finger combing his hair, occasionally blotting the cut with his sleeve.

The interior of the home was clean and neat. Several more water buckets were on the kitchen counter. A cast-iron wood-burning cook stove sat near a wall in the living room with the stack going through the wall to connect to the chimney of a blocked-off fireplace. Crude plank shelving near it held a collection of cooking utensils. A low fence made with chicken wire stapled to a wood frame separated the stove from the living area. A wire-covered gate allowed access.

One end of the living room was fitted with custom shelving filled with books. A useless flat-screen TV hung in an open area in the center. He gave a mental nod to the number of classics and college textbooks. At least one of their parents was well educated, which explained the mixed syntax the young ones used.

There was a small framed picture on one shelf. Though they were much younger, he recognized Beth and Al, seated in chairs in front of a handsome couple, he assumed their mom and dad. The woman was holding a baby in her arms.

He took a seat on a worn leather couch and waited until the girls returned from the bathroom.

Beth had washed the gore from her face. Still holding her bloody blouse closed, she told him she needed to change out of her nasty clothes and went down the hall with the little girl in tow. When she returned she sat in a worn out recliner across from him with Janie on her lap. She seemed composed and calm. Like their brother, the two girls had delicate features. All three had skin the color of light chocolate. The feminine lines of Beth’s face lent an element of grace that diminished the visible signs of malnutrition. Her, thinness, and the sunlight filtering through the windows, made her brown eyes appear even larger than before. Janie lay against her, twisting to hide her face, her small body trembling.

“Is the little one hurt?” he asked.

“She’s all right, just scared. She’s never seen a white man that she can remember, but she knows white men killed our folks. According to Willie, you’re the boogeyman.”

“I guess those two outside sort of reinforced that image.”

“I did what you said, mister. What you want next?”

Jake hesitated, watching her pat Janie's back as he framed his reply. Her tone was still hostile, almost challenging. She was self-possessed, considering what she had endured only a short time ago. There was an aspect of strength about her that belied her young age.

“I don’t like being inside this house. I feel trapped. You can’t stay here, you know. I’m amazed you’ve stayed alive as long as you have.”

“What else were we to do? Where were we to go?” she responded, snarling her reply. “'Sides, if you feeling trapped, you can walk out the door. Ain’t nobody holding you here.”

“Take it easy, I’m not trying to offend you, I’m only stating a fact. You’re right. One place is as bad as another. The world is dangerous since the plague and the war. The only way to stay out of trouble is to be out of sight. Good thing about your place here, it’s safer because it’s not near any major roads or towns.”

“What you know about anything doing ‘round here?” she replied sarcastically, fighting back tears. “We ain’t been safe, mister. This ain’t the first time I been raped. A white man came through not long after Mamma and Daddy were killed. He drug me out to the barn to rape me and left ‘cause I told him Mamma and Daddy were out getting food. Allen had Janie with him in a closet.”

“What about your uncle? Where was he?”

“Willie? He did what he did best. Got out the back door and hid ‘till it was over. Last summer me and Janie were here by ourselves when a gang of black men came. I guess they saw smoke coming out the chimney when I was cooking.” Her voice broke and he could see she was struggling to continue. Her bravado weakened and tears broke loose.

“There were five of them. They did bad things to me.” Her voice choked with emotion and shook her head violently from side to side. She bowed her head and breathed in deeply.

“I don’t know why I’m even talking to you, but I’m going to finish this, mister, ‘cause I need to. They was laughing while I was screaming. When they finished, they tied me up and took me with them. They left Janie by herself. One of them, the one hurt me most, wanted to kill her. Otis, the man in charge, wouldn’t let him.

“They had a truck and a lot of gas in cans. That night they hurt me some more. The truck broke down the next day and I got away while they was fussing with each other. Took me seven days walkin’ ‘cause I was hurting up inside from the things they did. I didn’t trust the kids being with Willie without me.”

Jake did not say anything for a while. Beth sat with her head bowed, tears dripping from her face as she rocked her sister back and forth. Janie had cried herself to sleep.

Jake broke the silence. “I know it’s been hard for you, but now you have to think ahead. What do you believe we should do?”

“I don’t know, mister. You’re the grownup. You tell me.”

“You’re eighteen and old enough to think. Be the tough person you’ve been acting like.”

“Eighteen ain’t nothin’ but a number. I don’t hardly know a mile past this house.”

“That was thoughtless of me,” Jake said… “I don’t have a right to make assumptions about you. You were only nine when the collapse happened. Beth, I'm not doing myself a favor, but I say we gather your things and get out of here as fast as we can.”

“And go where? Do what? You gonna take care of us, mister? You gonna keep us safe?”

“I can’t promise that. We’ll have to take care of each other.”

She regarded him with a twisted grin, misconstruing his words. “I guess you'll be wanting some of me too? You can have what you want, long’s you’re good to us and don’t hurt us none.” With those words, her voice broke again and tears flowed even stronger. “We ain’t got nothin’ here.

The despair and surrender inherent in her statements ripped Jake’s heart.

“When you cry it makes me want to reach out and comfort you, but you don’t know me. There is something you can do. Like I told your brother, call me Jake, not mister or sir.

“Another thing, I don’t want anything from you. If I hadn’t heard you screaming and seen what was going down, I wouldn’t be here. As it stands, I can’t walk away.”

Beth gave a short sarcastic laugh. “So the big white hero’s gonna save him some picaninnys?”

“Jeez,” Jake said, exasperated. “Can you cut me some slack? I’m a grown man willing to help you stay alive.” He continued in a softer voice. “I can’t leave you here by yourselves. If someone comes looking for those men and finds you here, they will kill you. If you stay, I’ll have to stay and maybe die with you.”

“Who we to you that you’d fight for us?” she asked, anger changing to bewilderment.

“It’s my nature to protect people, and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Beth looked him full in the face, a glimmer of hope showing through her tears. “If we go with you, you swear you won’t hurt us none?”

“I won’t hurt you, and I swear I’ll do my best to keep you safe. How about you lay your sister down and let’s pack what you need and get out of here?”

“That won’t take long.” Beth stood and laid Janie gently on the seat before wiping her tears with her sleeve. “Where’s Allen? He can help.”

“He’s outside keeping watch.”

Making a decision seemed to change Beth’s attitude. She worked efficiently alongside Jake to gather their needs. The pickings were slim, and a short time later, they were ready to leave. They had Al’s meager bit of fishing gear, the fried fish in a plastic container and two plastic water bottles filled with honey. They collected the few wearable clothes they owned, aluminum pans used for plates, empty food cans used for drinking, a large aluminum stock pot along with a big frying pan and some eating utensils. These they packed in two nylon bags Beth provided.

He asked why they did not have regular plates and glasses.

“'Cause Janie cut herself on a broken glass and bled so much it scared me half to death. I threw away the plates and stuff made with glass.”

“I guess she’s why you have the fence around the stove,” Jake said. “That was good thinking.”

She smiled, pleased at the compliment. “I had to do something to keep her from gettin’ burnt when she was littler. It ain’t like we could call an ambulance.”

“It’s time to get out of here,” Jake said, shrugging into his backpack and slinging his rifle. “When you wake Janie, tell her to keep quiet… You might want to get the picture of your family from the bookshelf to bring with you. You may never see this place again.”

She looked towards the bookshelf and ran to get the picture.

“Thank you,” she said, her face showing appreciation deeper than words. She wrapped it with a hand towel before placing it in a bag.

Jake opened the front door enough to speak. “Al, we’re going out the back door,” he called in a low voice. “Stay where you are and keep watching.”

Jake, carrying the two bags went out the door, followed by Beth with Janie riding her hip. When they passed Uncle Willie, Janie began to whimper again.

It was much warmer, and flies were buzzing around the bloody wounds of the dead men.

“Beth, turn Janie where she can’t see while I search them.” Beth turned, but kept her eyes on what he was doing.

He searched the older of the two first, grunting as he rolled the heavy man onto his back. Ignoring the messy exit wound the bullet had made of his face, he went through the jacket pockets. He found nothing of value. The jacket of the second man delivered the pistol he was looking for. He slid the pistol and spare clip into his pants pocket as he stood.

“We’re finished here. Will it bother you if we don’t bury your uncle?”

“Ta hell with Willie,” Beth replied bitterly. “He didn’t help us bury Mamma and Daddy, and he ain’t done nothing since for me to give a damn. I want the knife though, and he has Mamma and Daddy’s wedding rings on a string ‘round his neck. I want those too.”

She followed him to the body. As he knelt, Jake saw a bullet hole in Willie’s jacket close to the knife.

“How did your uncle manage to get shot and stabbed?”

“He always had the knife with him. They came so sudden he didn’t have time to run off. The one with the gun shot him when he pulled it out his belt. Willie was still alive when he fell. The fat man picked up the knife and stabbed him. Says, ‘You dropped this,’ when he did it. Son of a bitch thought it was funny.”

The wide eight-inch long blade made a soft sucking sound as Jake pulled it out. He wiped it on Willie's pants leg and used it to cut the cord holding the rings.

He stood, handed the knife and necklace to Beth, and led them back to the stump where Al was hiding.

“You can come out,” Jake told him.

Al emerged from concealment, dusting his pants. “I’m glad I’m not squatting in them weeds anymore. I feel like I got bugs crawling inside my clothes.”

Jake chuckled. “Are they chiggers, ants or centipedes?”

“That’s not funny,” Al responded, half smiling back.

“Are you still hurting?”

“Some, but not as bad.”

“I’ve got a pistol for you. The safety’s set. You ever use a pistol before?”

“We used to have one.”

“Can I trust you not to shoot me with it?” Jake asked, before passing it to him.

“I’m not going to shoot you.”

“I’ll hold you to that. Remember, do not use it if you can run away, but if you have to use it, aim for the chest. You got it?”

“Got it,” Al replied, checking the safety himself before slipping it into the pocket of his trousers.

“We’re going to walk straight to the woods behind the house,” Jake said. “Try to walk so we don’t leave a trail.”

Beth let Janie slide from her hip to stand, and took one of the bags from Jake.

“She’s awake enough to walk. Allen, grab the other bag. If anything happens, Mister Jake might need both his hands.”

They reached the woods, and he led them a few hundred feet deeper.

“You girls keep quiet. Al and I are going back to the field to make sure no one is following us. If you hear any shooting, you two head straight away from here. Go a couple of miles and find a place to hide and wait. We’ll find you.”

Jake slid his pack from his shoulders and led Al back to the edge of the woods. He picked a spot with good cover and a wide field of view and began observing, his eyes moving from one area to another.

“Why do we have to watch more?” Al whispered. “If we’re leaving we ought to keep going.”

“I killed two men over there. When you do something that serious, it doesn’t hurt to err on the side of caution. Let me ask you, why didn’t you have any weapons at your place? Here in the country almost every house is sure to have rifles and pistols. ”

“There was a man, one of our neighbors, a man named Jackson that didn’t die from the sickness. Willie told us he went to the houses for miles around us and collected all the guns. He came by our house one night and kicked in the back door while we was eating supper. It was before Mamma and Daddy got killed. He had a pistol and made Daddy give him his shotgun and hunting rifle. Willie said Mister Jackson was crazy in the head and we was lucky he didn’t kill us all. He went away to somewheres and never came back. Every time me and Willie went in a house looking for food we looked for guns too, but we never found none. We did have a pistol for a while that the man didn’t know Daddy had. The men who raped Beth took it.

Time passed. Jake began to itch in many different places. Funny how that happens, he thought, “chiggers, ants or centipedes,” laughing at himself. It really wasn’t funny. After fifteen minutes, they rejoined the girls. Janie jumped to her feet and ran to hug her brother.

“We kept waiting to hear guns,” she said. “We were scared.”

This was the first time Jake heard her speak. Her voice and vocabulary said nine but she still seemed too small.

“What you worried about? We got Captain Whitey leading us,” Al replied jokingly.

“Whoa there, Al. Call me Captain Avoidance,” Jake said, shaking his head. “I don’t like situations like this. After we put some miles between us and your farm, we’ll find a place to hide for a few hours to eat and rest.”

As they walked, Jake took time to show them how to move through the underbrush without leaving a trail. Janie, with the resiliency of youth, turned it into a game, trying to walk without stepping on any plants or scuffing the ground debris, and chiding any of them when they did. They had traveled about a mile when Al called for Jake's attention.

“I just remembered. If we keep going this way, there’s a cave beside a skinny little creek. You can’t see it because of the bushes. The only reason I found it is ‘cause a baby pig I hit with a marble ran inside.”

“How far do you think?”

“Pretty far still, but it’s a big cave.”

“I guess you’re the Captain now?” Jake said, smiling, waving his hand with a flourish for him to take the lead.

The cave opening was at a sharp curve in the stream, and was barely big enough for Jake to enter on his hands and knees. A fortunate arrangement of several large boulders had allowed water at flood stage to wash out the soil behind them. Less than three feet inside the opening the cave panned out to a space, although little more than five feet high, had a level dry floor. It could have held ten or more in comfort. Beth let the other two enter, and pushed Jake’s pack and the bags in before joining them. The opening allowed barely enough light to see.

“This is perfect,” Jake said. He sat for a moment in thought. “If anyone does come, I doubt they’ll search very long. They for sure won’t figure on us hiding so close.”

“We gonna get hungry if we stay here too long,” Al said.

“We would if we had to depend on what we took from your place, but you have no idea what I have in my pack. I’m going out and erase any signs we may have made coming in and then I’ll make a false trail for a few miles. While I’m gone, how would you like some biscuits and strawberry jam with your leftover fish?”

“Mister Jake, if you got strawberry jam and biscuits you’re willing to let us have, I reckon I won’t bury this butcher knife in your heart while you’re sleeping tonight,” Beth said with a straight face.

“You’re kidding right?”

“Just thought I’d say something so’s you know we ain’t friends yet. Mamma used to say, ‘sometimes wolves act like sheep till they’re hungry’.”

“Your mamma’s right Beth,” he replied while digging around in his backpack. “Keep your knife handy, but I guarantee it won’t be me you need it for.” He removed the jar of jam and a plastic container full of biscuits he had baked the day before and turned to face the kids.

“Al, hang onto the pistol. I’ll be back in about three hours. I wouldn’t advise it, but we’re not so far from your place you three can’t return if you want to. While I’m gone, you think about traveling with me. If you do, I want your word I can sleep peaceful at night.” He reached for his rifle, and crawled from the cave.

The kids stared at the tin of biscuits and the jar of jam sitting beside his backpack. Beth stood, bending low not to scrape her head on the roots dangling from the ceiling, pulling Janie to her feet along with her. “Al, dig a spoon out of our bag for the jam, Janie’s ready for a surprise.”

“What’s jam?” Janie asked.

“I’m sure Jake’s got a spoon in his pack,” Al said.

“An’ I’m sure he does too, but he didn’t say we could look in there. Maybe it’s a test or something. One of our spoons will do good enough.”

“What’s jam?” Janie asked again.

“You’ll see in a minute, sweetie,” Beth said, squatting beside the can of biscuits. “What you think about him, Allen?”

“He seems okay, but we got a gun an’ knife now. We could run away with these biscuits and jam. Willie says there’s still plenty of food in the houses further away. ”

“Silly, we could take his whole backpack, but we ain’t that kind. He seems okay to me too. Besides, you see the way his eyes keep jerking around looking for stuff. We ain’t trained up like he is. It’s for sure we ain’t going back to the house. I say we go with him."

She felt something tapping her thigh, and took the spoon Janie was using to get her attention.

“Do you want the pistol?” Al asked.

"No, he gave it to you. Anyways you’re too little to be fighting with a knife. If he tries to do anything to us, go ahead and shoot him. Aim for the chest like he said, and I’ll stab him with my knife. He can have two holes in him like Willie.”

“What’s Jam?” Janie repeated impatiently, “I’m ready for my surprise.”

CHAPTER 3

Jake back-trailed the last few hundred feet of the path they had taken to the cave. He found some signs of their passage, a few trampled plants, which he straightened, and a scattering of scuffed footprints he smoothed by hand and re-covered with ground debris. He came to a spot that was soft with ground water and overgrown with moss. It was disturbed so badly there was not much he could do to erase their passage.

He left it as he found it and moved off at a tangent to lead away any search. He left occasional signs of his route as he went, crossed their creek two hundred yards upstream from the cave and continued about three miles further, remaining vigilant for anyone following him.

At one point, he had to take the long way around a herd of cattle gone wild. There were at least a hundred head, with some dangerous looking bulls among them.

As he walked, it struck him that compared to the northern half of the nation, the southern states had rebounded quickly in the four years since the end of the nuclear winter. There were a great many dead hardwoods visible in the woods surrounding him, but just as many were putting out spring buds. The evergreens ... pines, cedars, magnolias were still populous enough to color the forest green. The underbrush was thick and vibrant.

He topped a small rise and spotted a treeless patch of land. It had been farmland in the past. Not much remained of the farm. A chimney and some burned timbers where the house and barn once stood. Scenes like that were common during his travels, not as often in rural areas, as closer to major highways.

Since the Die-Off, and the end of the long winter, the gangs and thugs who normally clung close to the vestiges of civilization were ranging further afield, searching for more people to kill rape or recruit. Something in the psychopath mentality enjoyed burning things.

He did not bother investigating closer. Too many times, he had found the bones of people killed in unspeakable ways.

He skirted the open area and continued a bit farther before making his way back to the cave, taking care not to leave a trail.

Jake thought about the kids. He had shouldered responsibility for them willingly, even though he knew they would delay his arrival at his destination. It was a good thing he still had plenty of time to get there.

He had not lied to Beth when he told her he would have normally bypassed their place. His rule was to avoid people as much as possible. These days, people most likely meant trouble. He would have shot those men anyway, but if the victims had been adults, they would have never seen their benefactor.

The young ones were a different story. It never entered his mind to leave them to fend for themselves, but it was hard enough traveling alone in these dangerous times. Now he would have to ride herd on a trio of youngsters untrained in the skills needed to stay alive. He hoped they were quick learners, for his sake, and theirs.

Jake recalled the hysteria that ran rampant in the states following the nuclear exchange in Europe, the Mideast and Asia. Prices on all necessities skyrocketed in the US as severe shortages began to arise. Gasoline sixty dollars a gallon, bread twenty a loaf, forget meat unless you were a millionaire. It was not just the poor, even the upper middle-class were unable to absorb the cost.

The price gouging did not last long term. The desperate were going to eat and feed their children. The looting and rioting, along with the burning, went beyond anything the authorities could handle. Of necessity, the police and other essential service personnel were with the looters in the stores, grabbing what they needed.

The Federal Government had prepared for this contingency. The Federal Emergency Management Agency was mobilized, backed with deployments of the National Guard and from other branches of the military. Essential industries, industrial and farming, were nationalized. These measures, along with strictly enforced martial laws, restored a semblance of order. The stores and gasoline stations were restocked and ration coupons issued. This did not completely prevent hoarding, and ‘Prepping’ became the driving force for most people. Survival bunkers, community, and individual, were created and stocked.

The plague, coming so soon after the breakdown of services, was a horrific blessing. In its aftermath, the survivors were few and widely scattered. There weren’t enough people left for looting to make a dent in the supplies available. They had access to more food than they could consume in a hundred years, much of it preserved in such ways it would be edible for decades.

Even more died in the short-term nuclear winter that followed on the heels of the plague. The atmospheric debris, thrown up by the nuclear weapons used in the Eastern hemisphere eventually spread around the globe, masking the sun and lowering the temperature. The weather turned erratic. For the first two years, it snowed a lot of gray snow. Places as far south as Jacksonville, Florida saw snow cover for months at a time. The third year, and in some ways the worst, a warming spell set in, and instead of gray snow, the world was deluged with downpours of ashy mud.

The erratic weather pattern gradually diminished, and for the last four years, nature had been in recovery mode. The normal rains washed the mud away. Dormant seeds sprouted and grew. Most wildlife species survived with enough numbers to mate and repopulate.

Beth’s statement that eighteen was just a number, and her not knowing about the world beyond the farm, had registered. She was nine when the plague first appeared and fourteen at the end of the long winter. That meant Janie was only five and Al was ten when she had assumed responsibility for them after the murder of their parents. Nothing had equipped her for the rigors of this new hard world. The collapse of civilization had left her family isolated, uninformed and unprotected.

There seemed to be guilelessness to them, perhaps resulting from not being exposed to the previous pressures of social mores that dictated a dog-eat-dog interplay in almost all interactions. Not attending school, subjected to the peer pressure of other children where the art of deception and manipulation is learned, seemingly left them open and genuine.

He realized he was making assumptions, and that he did not really know them. He was taking a chance allowing them to be armed, but given the dangers of moving about, especially traveling the roads, as they would be soon, he would be remiss in not allowing them some means of personal protection. Still, Beth’s glib statement about burying the butcher knife in his heart while he was sleeping did worry him some.

*

At the cave, he called softly to alert them he was back. He found them huddled against the far wall, sound asleep. As he put away the biscuit container and jam, he noted the three biscuits they spared for him. As sweet starved as they probably were, it must have been a hard choice for them to make. Watching them sleep for a minute, he felt his own fatigue, decided what the hell, and lay down beside his pack.

The sound of them whispering woke him. They sat close together, as far from him as the cave allowed. Judging by the amount of light filtering through the opening, it was getting to be late afternoon. He roused himself to drink water from his military flask. The whispering ceased and he could feel their attention. He ignored them for the moment and snaked out the entrance to assure himself no one was in the area. He returned and sat on the dirt a few feet from them.

“We’re hungry and thirsty,” Beth said.

Jake tossed her his flask. “Pass it around,” he instructed. “Are you hungry, Janie?”

“I like jam.”

“I bet you do, but how would you like pancakes with honey, some beef jerky and some dried apple slices for dessert?”

“You got that in your pack?” Beth asked.

“And more,” Jake replied, “but, we’re going to need to gather additional supplies before we can travel. Now, if Al wouldn’t mind sneaking outside and getting some dead hardwood sticks about as big around as my thumb, we can make a meal fit for royalty.”

“How much we need?” Al asked, moving towards the cave mouth.

“Whoa, slow down, Champ. Slow and careful going out. Get as much as you can wrap both hands around. They don’t have to be very long. Stay on this side of the creek and keep low and quiet while you do it.”

“What about pissing and such?” Al asked. “We did it in here, but it stinks.”

“We’ll do it in here until we leave. We can cover our messes with dirt to keep down the smell.” Jake tossed Al the nearly empty flask Beth had returned to him. “Refill this in the creek while you’re out,” he continued. “Judging by the slope outside, the dirt overhead isn't very thick. I’m going to jab a hole through the roof and the girls are going to make pancake mix.”

Using a garden trowel from his backpack, he attacked the roof of the cave. The tight packed dirt was less than three feet thick. When Al returned, Jake was pleasantly surprised the sticks he gathered were neatly bundled with a thin vine securing them.

“Good job Al, pull up a seat and watch,” he said, patting the ground beside him. “Anything you learn will come in handy. Cooking can be a sloppy, haphazard chore, or it can be fun. Personally, I prefer it to be fun, considering the time spent finding food, cooking food, and the cleaning after.”

“I want to learn what you know,” Beth said. “You pay attention too, Janie. Mister Jake ain’t skinny.”

“Smart attitude, Beth,” Jake replied, ignoring the Mister. “I do know a lot about staying alive and healthy. By the way, don’t say ain’t. Say is not or isn’t.”

“You a teacher or something?”

“Or something,” he replied, smiling. “We may be reduced to living like primitives, but it won’t hurt to preserve our language. It’ll help us stay above most of the trash calling themselves human these days.”

“You’re strange, Mister Jake. I know enough to say isn’t, but we got into the habit of saying ain’t. Long’s you don’t act like we’re stupid you can remind us if we say it.”

“I know what you mean, Beth. My mom used to say bad habits are easy to make, hard to break. Let’s get back to the pancakes. Once you add the salt and baking soda to the flour, stir the mix with some water until you have a thick, runny paste... Beth, you add the water and show Janie how to stir it. Just add a little at a time. Al, open the top flap of my pack and get the stove, it’s a shiny metal thing.”

Thirty minutes later, they were sitting in a four-cornered circle eating pancakes covered with honey and nibbling thin strips of seasoned dried beef. Beth was close to the almost smokeless stove, tending a pancake on the flat cooking surface while she ate.

“What’s the stuff in the plastic jars in your pack?” She asked.

“It’s mostly dehydrated veggies and meats, a few spices. There’s enough food to last one person a month. It will last the four of us a week, maybe a little longer if we’re careful. That’s how long we can travel before we have to find a place to hold and resupply.”

“Where we going to, Jake?” Al asked.

“We’re going to a place called Haven.”

“What’s there?”

“It’s a sanctuary about a hundred fifty miles from here. I had a friend, a very rich friend, who got involved with the prepper movement. This was before I met him, and before the die-off, back around 07 or 8. He was worried about the failure of the financial system and was sure the world was going to fall into anarchy.”

“I understand most of what you said, but what is anarchy and sanctuary?” Beth asked.

“Anarchy is when authority fails, and there’s no group or no one in charge. People being how they are, fall into a condition of lawlessness and disorder.”

“Sort of like it is now.”

“Exactly how it is now. So you can see why a person, thinking anarchy was just around the corner, might get a little worried. My friend, his name was Avis, bought five thousand acres of land in South Georgia. He spent a fortune building and stocking a huge survival bunker. That is the sanctuary, a place of safety.

“The financial system was shaky, but it never completely collapsed, so he mothballed the facility... Er...  sealed it tight. After the first wave of the plague depopulated Australia, he became paranoid again ... No, that’s too strong a word, I should say, worried,” Jake said, correcting himself. “Avis came back to Georgia and spent more than a year and over two hundred million to expand the original facility.

“There’s enough food, medicine and such to last a thousand people for five years. A lot of other stuff stored there too. Seeds, farming equipment, weapons and tools, everything needed to start over from scratch.”

“You think it’s all still there?” Beth asked.

“He brought a lot of the workers from out of state to do the construction and most of them are dead by now. He took other precautions too. As I said, he was very well off. The sad thing is, he came to Wisconsin to get his family, and they didn’t make it back to Haven. He was only in Wisconsin for three days when the plague came to the states. He and his family were among the first to die.” Jake paused for a moment before continuing. “Still, you never know, we may get there and find it ransacked or even occupied.”

“If it is still there, it sounds like we’ll be in heaven,” Beth said. “When do we leave?”

“Tomorrow evening. As soon as it’s dark, I’m going to do some scouting. Something has been bugging me since this morning, and it’s why I wanted to get away from your farm so fast. Those men weren’t packing much protection, and they didn’t have backpacks or any other supplies, not even water. It’s almost as if they were out for a stroll. I figure they came from the main road to the right of the narrow lane your driveway connects to. I’m going to check a couple miles each direction on the main road. If they were with a larger group, I doubt they wandered far from them.”

“Why do you want to go back there?” Beth asked. “Seems to me we should just head to the safe place you told us about.”

“That’s the way I am. I don’t like leaving something unknown behind me. We’d hate for something we could have avoided to jump out and bite us later.”

Al asked, “You want me with you? I know the roads and houses around here better’n you.”

“I think that would be a good idea,” Jake replied.

Beth stood, pulling Janie to her feet with her. “I don’t like it, but I don’t know enough about things to argue with you. You make sure you keep my brother safe. While you’re gone, I’m going to do some cleaning. Can I use your little shovel thing to dig with, Mister Jake? I want to bury the poops we made and dig some holes for fresh ones. We had to go in your pack for wiping paper, but we put it back.”

Jake turned to rummage in his backpack and removed the garden trowel along with a roll of toilet tissue.

“Beth, we’re traveling together now. Anything you need, you’re welcome to check my pack. There’s more water in there too.”

“I’ll wait till you’re gone. Ain’t no use stirring that mess around this soon after eating. Will it be all right to wash these dishes in the creek?”

“Al and I will take care of them when we leave. By the way,” he added with a smile, “you said ain’t again.”

When it was almost dark, Jake handed Beth a small bottle, which, with the cap removed, revealed it was an oil lamp.

“After we pass the dishes back, stack the bags and my pack to block the opening before you light this. There’s a disposable lighter in a side pouch of my pack. Keep the flame small and it’ll burn for hours.”

Jake and Al worked their way carefully back to the farm. Jake had Al wait in the shadows by the house, and went to where the bodies were. They were gone, even Willie. He could tell from the crushed ground cover that several more people had been at the site since they had left. Flattened weeds showed tire tracks leading to there and back to the driveway. He returned to where Al was waiting, and let him know what he had discovered, warning him they had to be extremely cautious. They walked slowly down the long graveled drive that led from the farm to the secondary road. The lightly clouded sky and the crescent moon provided, in Jake’s opinion, too much light. He used this time to whisper some basic survival techniques to a very attentive boy.

“Anyway,” Jake said, “always keep to the side of the road with the most cover in case you have to get out of sight fast.”

“Got it,” Al acknowledged.

They continued in silence, watching ahead, but also constantly glancing back to make sure no one was following them. The freshly crushed vegetation growing on the pavement clearly revealed the tracks the vehicle had made coming to and leaving the farm. At the paved secondary road, they turned right in the direction of the main road. They walked a little less than a mile farther before Al touched Jake's back and broke the silence.

“I saw light through the trees,” he whispered.

Jake stopped and peered for a long moment in the direction Al indicated.

“I don’t see anything.”

“I’m sure I did. It was too bright to be the moon bouncing off something…. There, did you see it?”

Jake caught a dim flash of light as the slight breeze moved the tree limbs. “Yeah, I did. Let’s get off the road.”

Among the trees, Jake sat, motioning Al to join him.

“What’s there?” he whispered.

“It’s the end of this road where it joins Johnson road. Old man Loggins used to live at the corner. Somebody’s in there, and it’s not old man Loggins ‘cause he's nothin' but bones in his front yard.”

“Damn, I’d hoped those guys I killed were loners. The missing bodies told me they weren’t, but I’m amazed no one came to the farm sooner. They’re so close they had to hear my shots. We’re lucky they didn’t catch us at the house. Al, you wait here while I check this out. You have the pistol I gave you?”

“In my pocket,” he said, touching his hip.

Jake retrieved the extra clip he had pocketed earlier and passed it to him.

“You said you’ve used a pistol?”

“We used to have one. It belonged to Beth. It got took by those men that raped her. She taught me to shoot.”

“Okay. This is going to take a while. If you hear shots or if I’m gone longer than thirty minutes, I want you to run to the cave and get the girls as far from here as you can.

“You don’t want me with you?”

“No, you have to think of your sisters. If anything happens to me, you three are welcome to my stuff.”

“Don’t let nothing happen to you, and hurry back, I’m so scared I’m shaking.”

Jake stayed off the road as he made his way to the home. The place was small, more like a large cabin than a house. Three battered US Army trucks with canvas-covered cargo beds were on the road near the short driveway. Smoke was coming from a chimney and now he was close, he could smell it.

Several minutes of observation convinced him there were no guards posted outside. The windows were crudely boarded over. The little light visible seemed to be coming from candles. He made a careful circuit of the house, and still seeing no guards, crept to a side window to peek through a crack between the boards.

There were many people inside the room, and judging by their scruffy appearance and lack of uniforms, they were not army personnel. Four men were standing by the front door, and as he watched, one of them opened the door and they went out. Jake ducked down and pulled his pistol, thumbing the safety off. Moments later he heard a vehicle crank and drive away. The aroma of cooking oil, wafting around the corner of the house, informed him the trucks were burning bio-diesel.

He stayed down a few seconds longer before rising to peer back into the room. There were at least ten men and maybe half as many women still in there. The women were near the wood burning stove, and the men were scattered around the room in small groups drinking from bottles of vodka. Judging from the movements of the men who were standing, they were on their way to being drunk. One woman was carving a big hunk of meat. Slices of it were sizzling in a large frying pan.

Jake finished getting a count of the group when a feeling made his eyes jerk back to the meat the woman was carving. His mind had rejected what he first saw in the dim candlelight light. She was slicing the flesh from a human thigh! The dark skin told him it had to come from Uncle Willie. Jake ducked down again and fought an overwhelming urge to vomit.

Again, the vision of frog legs, twitching and kicking in hot grease, strove to overwhelm him. Hotly aware of the pistol still held in his hand he went to the front door, raising his leg to kick it open, already envisioning himself in the room pulling the trigger, making them pay for a crime far from them in time and distance.

Suddenly his mouth filled with the flavor of chocolate. Beth's disembodied face replaced the door. The face uttered one word, "No!", and disappeared. Jake's leg dropped and he moved from the door, shocked by the experience.

He returned to the shelter of the trees near the house, shaken and shaking, recovering from the aftereffects of a killing rage unfulfilled. His irrational loss of control hit him hard. What was he thinking? He had almost rushed in like an avenger with no forethought. Those people were going to die, but not like that.

He remained where he was, pushing at the emotions that had prompted his actions. He forcefully tried to replace the images of his dead wife and sons with visuals of them all together, alive and whole, but they were slow in coming. After several minutes, he was able to stand and go to where Al nervously waited. Jake related only what he had observed. As he was describing the cutting of the meat, he did lose it. Al watched in silence as he threw up.

Jake finished and wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his jacket.

“Sorry, it finally got me. I almost puked by the window.”

“I would have,” Al said. “How many are there?”

“Fourteen. Five women and nine men. Four others left in a truck. Probably to take the bodies of the men I shot to some other place.”

“Yeah, I heard the truck.”

Jake rubbed his hands across his face, collecting his thoughts. “Al, I’m going to share something with you. Traveling the roads for almost three years now, I have come across bad people more times than I like to think about. I have one rule I try not to break. I kill them.”

Al replied, alarmed. “How you thinking of killing so many people?”

“I have a plan, but it’s going to take both of us to pull it off.”

“Jake, I never killed nobody before.”

“Al. Back during the long winter, when things were bad, and the animal population dropped, some people resorted to eating human flesh. There was no reason for it. There was plenty of food still in the stores and houses, and there still is. There’s damn sure no reason for it now. Game is plentiful and things are growing. These are evil people and if we let them live they will continue doing evil things. What if that was Janie or Beth being sliced for supper.”

Al was silent for a bit before speaking again. “You say you got a plan?”

“I do.”

“They’re eating my uncle and some of them hurt me and Beth. I’m scared, but you tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”

“I like to keep things simple. The windows are boarded-over, screwed in place. The only easy ways out is the front and back doors. Before I came to your place this morning, I spent the night at another farmhouse not far from here. Blue with black shutters, and two outbuildings, one concrete block and the other wood.”

“I know the place,” Al said.

“Good. I found two containers full of gasoline and hid them in case I ever came back this way and had a need for them. I say we set fire to the place and shoot them as they come out.”

“That’s a lot of people to be shooting,” Al said.

“It should be me doing all the shooting. The back door opens outward. I’m sure I can block it. They’ll panic and run for the doors in a stampede, but the only way out will be my door.”

“By the time we get the gas maybe they’ll be asleep,” Al said.

“And don’t forget drunk,” Jake said.

When they returned, the moon had set, leaving the night appreciably darker. They found a clear spot close to the house. Jake set the gas cans down and flexed his shoulders. The five-gallon metal container was too much of a load for Al’s slight frame and Jake had carried both cans most of the way.

He checked the house again before finalizing their plans. There was no light from inside the house, and inexplicably, he found no guards posted. Everyone was asleep. After estimating the length needed, a rickety lean-to shed behind the house yielded a plank to wedge under the doorknob of the back door to the base of a post supporting the roof over the small landing.

He returned to where Al waited. As he passed by the trucks, he looked to see if there was anything worth taking. All he managed was to feel stupid. Each truck had a five-gallon fuel container in the cargo bed.

“Once we get started, we have to move fast and quiet,” Jake began. “You begin at the front door pouring gas around the right side to the back door. I’ll start at the back door and pour around the other side to the front. I figure most of them are going to try the front first. Once we start pouring, it shouldn’t take us more than thirty seconds to get it done. Pour a solid stream with no breaks and do not slosh any on you. Can you hoot like an owl?”

“Yep,” he answered, “just like a real owl.”

“Okay, that will be the signal you’re ready for me to light the gas. I have the back door wedged so they will have to come out my door. Just in case they break through yours, stay back from the house about fifteen feet, and lined straight in front of the door. If they do break through, start shooting, use a two-hand grip to fire. The chest is best, but aim for where the rib cage and stomach meet. That’s biggest target.”

“Beth taught me to shoot with two hands. Let’s do it. I don’t want to think long about it.”

“Quick is best,” Jake, agreed. “Remember, if you have to shoot, keep firing until whoever you’re shooting at hits the ground. Don’t let them get to you.”

They each hefted a can. “When I get to the back door I’ll hoot to let you know to start pouring,” he continued. “As soon as you’re at the back and in position, you hoot, and that will be the signal for me to light it. The house is sided with cedar shakes. Once the flames hit them, they’re going to burn almost as fast as the gas.”

Jake hurried to his position at the back door. Taking a deep breath, he removed the cap from his can and did his best imitation of an owl hoot. Taking another deep breath, he tilted the can and began pouring. The fuel had a strong, disagreeable odor, like gasoline does when it sits too long. From experience, Jake knew it would still burn. He thoroughly soaked the area in front and beside the door before continuing around the side towards the front of the house, pouring a heavy unbroken stream as he went. He felt it took forever to reach the front. Al had done a good job pouring around the front door.

Seconds later he heard the hoot from Al. Jake lit one of the few wooden matches he had left and tossed it. It sputtered and went out before reaching the gas. He quickly struck another. This time the old gas lit with a muted whoosh, spreading across the front porch and around both sides of the house faster than he thought it would. He positioned himself with his pistol in a two-handed grasp pointed at the door and waited.

He was right the siding would burn fast. Within minutes, the house was flaming so hot he had to back further away. He waited for what seemed an eternity before hearing a blood-curdling scream. A woman burst through the front door followed by an outpouring of smoke. Jake fired instantly and she dropped, still screaming. Almost immediately, another person came out. Jake fired twice and the body fell.

Jake's heart was racing, and the adrenaline rush seemed to make time stand still. He heard more screaming from inside, and readied himself for another rush at the door. It did not happen. The woman he had gut shot was down but still squalling. He shot her twice more and swung back to cover the door.

Even though he heard terrified screams and shouts from inside, no one was coming out his door. The fire broke through the roof and the house erupted in flames, brightly lighting the front yard. Smoke was pouring out the front door.

Finally, shrieking like an enraged animal, a man burst through the door opening, his clothes flaming, blindly charging directly at him. It took four shots to drop him. The man managed to get close enough for Jake to see his hairless head and blackened, blistered face, before he fell, inches from his feet.

He heard four shots in quick succession from Al’s position at the rear.

The screaming from inside intensified. Long before the roof fell in, the screaming stopped.

When he was sure no one could be alive, he went to Al. He found him frozen in position, his arms outstretched, holding the pistol pointed towards the house. Two bodies lay smoldering in the ashes just outside where the door had been. The smell of burning flesh filled the air. It took an effort to push Al’s arms down and pull his attention from the still flaming ruins of the building.

“It’s done, boy, they’re dead. We need to get away from here.”

Jake led him back to the road, setting a fast pace. They were quickly at the drive to the farm. He pulled Al to a stop.

“Take a minute to breathe.”

Al stood, taking in several deep breaths. Abruptly he bent and vomited. He remained bent, breathing ragged breaths and vomited again.

“I could hear them screaming and crying,” he sobbed as he stood. “They burned to death. Why didn’t they run out your door? They burned and screamed.”

Jake faced him and placed his hands on Al’s shoulders.

“You did a man’s job back there. They were too drunk and dazed to find a door.”

“They fell through when the door came off. I had to shoot them ‘cause they was still moving, but they was burned up,” Al said, tears streaming from his eyes.

“Don’t shed any more tears than they would for you, boy. They don’t deserve pity.”

Al shrugged Jake’s hands from his shoulders.

“I don’t pity them,” he replied, tears still rolling from his eyes. “I wanted them dead so’s they’d leave us alone, but they kept screaming. They kept screaming and burned to death. ”

“Al, I kill vermin any way I can. I shoot’em, blow’em up, burn’em up, it’s all the same to me. Dead is dead.”

“I ain’t never killed nobody. I don’t even like killin’ animals. I just want to go home. I want to go home, Mister Jake, and I know there ain’t no such place anymore, and I’m scared, and I don’t want to kill no more people. I’m afraid of you and so is Beth and Janie, but we got to be with you 'cause you’re a grownup. I need my sisters. Maybe they heard the gunshots and scared to death we’re dead.”

Al turned and walked away. Jake followed at a respectful distance, thinking his own thoughts, mentally kicking himself for letting his lust for vengeance put a child at risk.

*

After Jake moved the backpack and bags into place, there was a flash as Beth lit the lamp. Al went to his sisters and began conversing with them in whispers. A few minutes later Beth came to sit beside him. She gave him a shove to get his attention.

“I ought to stick you with my knife right now. Al told me what happened. You could have got you and my brother killed, and me and Janie would be sitting in here wondering why ya’ll weren’t back. Are we safe now?”

“Beth, I don’t know. I was worried those men from this morning might be part of a larger gang, and they were. Four of them left in a truck, most likely going to where other people are. We found the most trash I’ve seen in one place since I left Wisconsin and there are more of them in the area. If I were by myself, I’d grab my stuff and light out of here like a rabbit running from a fox.”

“You ain’t… aren’t by yourself, but that don’t mean you got to be any different. You’re alive and healthy. By ourselves, we’re as good as dead. If you think it’s bad to stay, you do what you think is best. If you don’t mind us going with you to the Promised Land you talked about, we’re ready.”

“If you've decided not to bury your butcher knife in my chest while I’m sleeping, I won’t mind if you three tag along. I say we get away from this area tonight. According to my map, there is a small river about fifteen miles from here. That’s where I planned to be this evening. If we leave now we should be there by midday tomorrow.”

“Jake, I’m sorry about the way I was. I was mad and hurt. You killed the ones I was mad at, but I still had the mad inside me, so I gave it to you. You don’t hurt us and I promise I won’t hurt you.”

“Fair enough, and believe me, I understand mad. You said he kneed you in the ribs. Are you able to walk...?” Jake caught himself short. “What I want to ask is, are you okay?”

“Thank you for asking. It stiffened up some since this morning, but nothing’s broke. Why did you shoot him while he was still on me? His face came off while I was looking at him. Some of him went in my mouth.”

“Beth, I’m older than you, and because I am, I know more about people. How could I be sure he didn’t have a knife on him? What if he decided to cut your throat when he finished? I know now he didn’t have a knife, but I wasn’t taking any chances.”

Beth thought about his answer before speaking. “I’m glad you didn’t take a chance. If you was right, and waited, I would have been dead.”

“I’m sorry it went down the way it did,” Jake responded with sympathy.

“It’s not your fault. I’d rather have a nightmare than be dead.”

“Friends?” Jake asked.

“No. You seem different, but not yet. I guess we need to get our stuff and get going.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “One other thing, next time there’s killing needs to be done, you take me. Allen is a sweet, good boy, and I want him to stay that way. There ain’t nothing sweet about me, I mean aren’t, isn’t…anyway, I’ll be better for you than him.”

“I made a mistake tonight. I have my own reasons for killing those people and I would have done it no matter what, but I should have sent him back.”

“At least you admit it. He’ll do what he has to do. I just don’t want him to do it now. Things sit in your mind better when you’re older.”

“Oh, and you’re so much older than him?”

“I’m older than I am. Deep inside I’m not young. My mother had a saying. The eyes are the windows of the soul. Look at my eyes and tell me if you see a child.”

Jake stared into her eyes. As he did, he felt a sensation, as though his mind separated from his body. The longer he stared, the deeper her eyes drew him past the golden brown of her iris, and further into her. There came a nauseous, disorienting moment of blankness, darkness, a searching, and then he was again seeing her face. It wasn’t the face of a skinny young girl. He saw the filled out features of the woman she would become, and she was beautiful. His mind touched hers, and he had a sensation of information exchanged on a level beyond his grasp.

The lamplight flickered and he felt a queasy feeling as something slid from his mind, leaving behind a taste of sweet chocolate in his mouth. Once again, he was seeing a young woman. Al was squatting beside him. As Jake felt control of his body return, Al gave his shoulder a rough shove, nearly toppling him.

“Leave my sister alone!”

Janie was shaking Beth who stared at Jake with a dazed expression.

She spoke to Al. “It’s okay. You and Janie go over by the cave hole.”

Janie began crying. “You and Jake was froze for a long time. We was trying to make you move.”

Beth gave her a hug. “I know, honey. Go with Al. I need to talk to Jake.

Jake watched the two move the short distance to the cave mouth and then turned to Beth.

“Where were we? What just happened?” Beth whispered.

“I don’t know,” Jake replied. “I was having trouble with the lighting and got caught in some other thoughts.”

“I don’t think so,” she disagreed. “I tried to move my eyes, but they was stuck like something had hold of me, like something crawled from your head to mine. You were looking at stuff inside my mind. What did you see, Jake?”

“Not me. Whatever it was had control of me too.”

“I don’t care about that, I felt you looking and I want you to tell me what you saw... and don’t lie.”

“It was weird. I saw you as a grown woman.”

Beth waited for him to continue. When he didn’t, she filled the gap.

“Tell me what else you saw. I saw stuff about you too. Lots of stuff.”

Jake decided to be forthcoming. “I’m going to tell you. Your face changed to an older face, not much older and you were healthy, your face was fuller and you were beautiful. Then I felt like something out of my control was digging through your mind, but it wasn’t communicating with me. Then the kids shook us out of it. Nothing like that has ever happened to me before. What did you see?”

“I ain’t talking about it right now. We need to get out of here like you said. I need to think and I can think just as well walking.”

“That’s fair enough,” Jake agreed, glad to quit speaking about the incident. He had some thinking to do also. “We’ll do as you asked and shield Al whenever I can. Let’s get out of here. I’ll carry my gear and one of the bags. You three eat the rest of the biscuits and jam before we set out.”

*

Jake thought about the moment with Beth as they walked. He had never experienced anything like that before, and was at a loss. The vision had been vividly real, and like her, he had felt that something had taken hold of him. He had an idea about the source of the strange incident but not the why. He decided there was no explaining the inexplicable and diverted his attention to the chore at hand, safely putting distance from the murderous group they had encountered.

They journeyed through the remainder of the night. He ended carrying Janie a good portion of the time. Except for one long stretch along a road, they traveled cross-country, and it was well past midday before they arrived at their destination. It was more a wide creek than a river. They went downstream and came to a place where it widened at a curve and formed a deep pond.

The day was still warm and they had encountered no signs of human activity as they traveled. Jake was bone tired, but the two older ones seemed rejuvenated as soon as they set the bags down. Beth made a pad of clothing for Janie to lie on and she was promptly asleep.

“Al, I’ve got to get some sleep too. I’m worn out,” Jake said. “Would you mind trying to catch some fish for supper?”

“Can we set a fire to cook?”

“No, use my stove, it smokes less than an open fire, and only use dead hardwood. You all may want to wash while it’s still warm.”

“I’m going swimming,” Al, declared, “and then I’m going fishing.”

“Cool,” Jake said. “You two keep alert.” He bent to remove a pistol from his ankle holster and called for Beth. “Take this,” he said, handing the pistol to her. “Keep it with you from now on. You’ll find two more clips in my pack.” He scuffed some debris away with his feet, laid down where he was, shut his eyes and went to sleep.

CHAPTER 4

Jake awoke to the sound of his own scream. His eyes opened and he saw his three companions leap from beside the little stove and rush off in the direction of the creek. Lingering fragments of his dream still clouded his mind, but not so much that he could not register the frightened faces they presented. They stood tight together over thirty feet from him. He sat up, still slightly dazed from waking so suddenly.

“Nightmare,” he called out. “I was having a bad dream. I’m sorry.”

“You sure you’re okay?” Beth called back.

“Yeah, I’m awake now.”

Beth led them back to the stove, watching him with a wary expression. They stopped ten feet from him, still grouped close, with Janie hiding behind Beth, peeking at him from around her hip. “You sure you’re okay?”

“I’m sure. Listen… I had a bad… something bad….”

“Something bad happened that gives you bad dreams.” Beth supplied. “I think you’re still half asleep.”

“Thank you. Yes, something bad happened, but I don’t want to talk about it right now. I’m sorry I startled you.”

“Scared the shit out of us is what you mean.”

“How long was I asleep?”

“Maybe an hour, you started making noises and talking before you screamed.”

“I need more sleep. Beth, can you wake me if I start making noises again?”

“I’ll poke you with a long stick ‘cause ain’t none of us getting close to you.”

When he next awoke, it was to the sounds of them bustling about, talking in low voices around the cook stove. The aroma of fish cooking in the frying pan was nothing like what he had smelled in his dream. Beth was teaching Janie how to feed sticks of wood into the small hole at the stove base. Jake, sat and stretched his arms over his head with a big yawn.

“Man, did I need sleep,” he said, stretching again after standing. “I feel ten years younger.”

“You don’t look ten years younger,” Beth said, glancing at him with a guarded smile to soften her statement. The smile changed to bewilderment. “What happened to the cut on your face?”

His hand instinctively went to his cheek.

“Yeah, that one, the one that’s not there.”

“That wasn’t a cut. It was just a streak of blood from where a thorn punctured my cheek.”

“Looked like a cut yesterday,” she replied skeptically. “You might want to wash before it gets dark. Supper’s almost ready. I made flat bread with some of your flour.”

“You’re speaking to my heart young lady,” he said, returning her smile. “I’m definitely ready for some fish and flat bread.”

Out of sight, Jake stripped and waded into the chill shallow water of the river. He scrubbed fast and toweled off with his dirty shirt. He felt the spot where the thorn had sliced his cheek and found no indication it ever existed. Healing fast was one thing, but overnight was another thing to add to a list of strange things. Back at the campsite, Beth was picking bones from a piece of fish for Janie.

“Your food’s over there,” she said, pointing towards his pack. “We already ate.”

Jake found his plate crowded with two fish and three tortilla-like pieces of bread. The bread was unleavened and Beth had used no spices, but it smelled delicious. He did not speak until every morsel was gone.

“I thank the fisherman and the chef. That was truly a meal worth remembering.” He removed his toothbrush and paste from his pack, and turned to speak to them.

“I’m embarrassed about what happened earlier. I haven’t had a nightmare like that in over two years. I thought I was done with them. I lost some people close to me. The things that happened yesterday, and having young people around, triggered some painful memories. I’ll try not to let that happen again.”

“How you going to do that?” Beth asked. “Dreams is dreams and they just happen. We can put up with noises and screaming, if that’s all that’s coming.”

Jake carried the dirty utensils with him to the creek and scrubbed them with wet sand before returning to the camp. He noticed the fire in his compact stove was almost burned out which was good since it was very close to nightfall.

“We’ll have to rough it tonight,” he announced. “It’s too late to build any kind of shelter, and to tell the truth, I’m too tired to fool with it. My sleeping bag will unzip to make a blanket, I figure we can scoop pine needles for padding and snuggle under it. We need to move away from this site. It’s too exposed and I think I saw bear tracks by the water. This pond is probably a watering hole.”

“Before we move, I need to do something,” Beth said. “I saw some scissors in you pack. I’m going to cut our hair off. We’re a mess, and our heads itch.”

“Tell you what, while you do that, I’ll find a spot to sleep and move our stuff. Stay alert and keep your pistols handy.”

“You got any more jam?” Janie asked, “I’m still hungry.

“No little lady, I’m afraid it’s gone. There’s a piece of your sister’s flatbread left. I bet if you asked Al, he’d put some honey on it for you. He may even get you some jerky from my pack, if you ask him nice. Be sure to say please.”

“Al, can I have some honey bread please?” She asked in her sweetest possible voice.

*

As she dug through Jake’s pack searching for the scissors, Beth spoke to Al and Janie about something on her mind.

“You remember how Willie made fun of us when we were studying the books. He said, “There ain’t nothing the world hates worse than a smart sounding nigger.” I think he was stupid. We’re traveling with Jake, and he cares about how people talk, so let’s try to sound less ignorant.

“I’ve been trying,” Al said defensively, “but it’s hard to remember what we learned from Mamma and the books.”

“I been telling ya’ll you don’t talk like the books say,’ Janie said smugly.

“You don’t talk any better than us,” Al retorted.

Beth spoke to stop the bickering. “We’ll work on it. Like I said, being around Willie didn’t help us any. Just pay attention to how Jake talks and we’ll get better at it.”

“What’s wrong with him?” Al asked.

“What he said, bad dreams. Anybody can have bad dreams. You sure had your share of’em when you was littler. Now, who wants to be the first to get snipped?” She stood, holding the scissors high, opening and closing them while making an insane face. Janie hid behind her brother.

“Al wants to be first, ‘cause you’re scary. ‘Sides, I still got to eat my flatbread,” she said holding out the bread folded over a strip of jerky with honey dripping from both ends.

*

Jake found a spot to overnight about two hundred yards away, a cozy nest among the branches of a recently fallen oak tree. The trunk and leafy branches would not only act as a windbreak, but also serve to conceal them. He returned to retrieve a load of their gear. Beth and her siblings were at the river.

The sun was set, but he could see the moonlight reflecting off the scissors busily cutting at what remained of Janie’s hair. Al was kneeling by the water scrubbing his scalp.

Jake gathered the remainder of their gear. When he returned they had about a quarter inch of hair and the effect was to make them seem even skinnier.

“We’re not pretty, but we sure feel better,” Beth said.

He took a moment to appraise them. “You know, I’ve been so busy thinking about what to do next, I never took time to look at you. Aside from being a bit too thin, you are a handsome bunch of kids.”

“Yeah right,” Beth replied, but she sounded pleased. “Did you find a good place?”

“I tried booking rooms at a hotel, but they were full, I did find a place at the Oak Motel, though.”

They followed him to the fallen tree, and worked quickly to gather a mound of pine straw to spread in the bare area among the branches. They fell asleep within minutes of pulling the opened sleeping bag over themselves. Jake slept on the edge next to Al. Beth took the other edge.

It turned cold, and even huddled together, the spread out sleeping bag was too small. A tug of war took place as they slept. Jake and Beth had a miserable night.

*

The sun was up and Jake was sweating under the cover. He worked his stiff muscles to stand and climbed over the tree trunk. The kids were in a nearby flat area, seated around a small circle cleared of brush and leaves for the stove. The large pot, precariously balanced on the surface of his small stove, was steaming.

“What’s cooking?” He asked, joining them.

“Turtle stew,” Al said, moving closer to Janie to make room.

“Smells good,” he said, sitting in the vacated space.

“It was a big mud turtle he caught with a trot line he set before we left the river last night.” Beth said. “I used some of the dried greens and stuff from your pack, but I think I used too much. They really swelled.”

Jake said, “Dehydrated food does that. Did you use any spices?”

“Just some pepper, I wasn’t sure about the other ones.”

Jake went to his pack and removed two plastic containers.

“Dried onion and garlic,” he said, passing them to her. “Add a half spoonful of each.”

They sat in silence, watching the pot steam. Beth would stir it occasionally. Al fed thin sticks into the bottom of the stove as they burned. Janie was not much of a talker. She simply observed those around her. Jake could tell she didn’t miss a thing. He realized he was comfortable with them. They certainly weren’t complainers and even little Janie was a tough one. His shoulders ached from carrying her, but she had walked as many of those miles as she could.

Beth broke the silence.

“Stews as ready as it needs to get. Dig out some plates and let’s eat.”

This was Jake’s first experience with eating turtle. He was surprised at the tenderness and the delicate flavor of the meat. For some reason he expected it to be tough and chewy.

He thanked Al and Beth for introducing him to a new taste. After the meal, while the others tidied up, Jake reorganized the gear in his pack. He saw how meager his supplies seemed now that four were eating from them. He knew it would slow progress constantly foraging for food.

“Beth, Al, Janie,” he called, motioning for them to rejoin him in the area they had cleared.

“The place we’re headed to is beside the Alapaha River just south of Lakeland Georgia, about a hundred thirty miles from here. I figure at the rate we can travel, considering the need to be careful about walking in the open on the road, and the fact Janie will set her own pace, we’ll be about a month getting there.”

“I did at least a hundred in seven days,” Beth said.

“You were by yourself and desperate to get back to Al and Janie.”

“Just seems like a month is a long time to go that far.”

“Wouldn’t it be safer in the woods?” Al asked.

“Yes, but it would take too long. We’ll use the road for the most part, but what will slow us down is moving in stages as we scout ahead. Another thing is that we won’t be leaving this area right away. We need to stock a few supplies before we head out, food mostly.”

"Aren't you afraid about those men leaving that house in the truck?" Beth asked.

"I am, but they seem to have a penchant... er... fondness for riding. Their engines will give us plenty of warning to get out of sight."

“Can we get more jam?” Janie asked.

“We’ll certainly try,” Jake replied with a chuckle. “I’ve been curious about something,” he continued, turning to address Beth. “The majority of homes still have plenty of food and clothing. I’m wondering why you three are so run down and skinny.”

“During the long winter Mamma and Daddy took all the food from the houses for miles around. After they were killed, Willie got us spooked about going far from the farm. He kept telling how the white folks would do us if they caught us. I was afraid to go by myself, and I damn sure wasn’t going to take Allen and leave Janie with Willie. I didn’t trust the way looked at her.”

“Willie was probably right about it not being safe, but we need more weapons and you need backpacks and better clothing, toothbrushes and paste. It wouldn’t hurt to have some two-way radios.”

“The batteries you find nowadays are dead,” Beth said.

“We’ll need to find rechargeable ones and a solar panel. What’s the nearest town with Walmart’s and such?” Jake asked.

“When I was little, Daddy took us to Colquitt to buy food and feed for the animals,” Beth said, “but there wasn’t much in the way of a town there, and since everybody died, there’s not much of anything left of it. Somebody started burning the buildings.”

“I saw that. I passed through Colquitt the day before I came to your place. Fires happened a lot back then, sometimes accidentally, but mostly from people expressing their desperation by doing stupid things.”

Al asked in a low voice, “What happened to the world, Jake? Beth said it used to be a lot different and safer, but I’m too young to remember.”

“That’s a big question and I’ve got some ideas of my own, but the short answer is, in a little less than three years over ninety nine percent of the world’s population died from the plague. There was a nuclear exchange, mostly confined to the eastern hemisphere, which just about depopulated some countries. What the plague didn’t get the nukes did. A lot more died during the three-year winter caused by the debris thrown into the air. Six years of hell happened to the world. We here in the US fared a little better because the plague took a long time to reach us and because no nukes hit the western hemisphere, but I doubt there are more than three hundred thousand survivors in the United States. With the killing that’s still going on, and no births, I figure in a few more years, half of those will be dead.”

“We know almost everybody’s dead, but what caused it?” Beth asked. “It’s strange more people didn’t live. Our neighbors got sick and were gone in a few days, but none of us got sick.”

“A whole bunch of weird happened and is still happening.” Jake answered. “Like I said, I have my own ideas about what caused it. Maybe this evening I can tell you more, but right now, we need to get moving. According to my map, the nearest town of any size is Bainbridge, a good twenty miles from here. I say we pack and head out.”

“I know the way,” Al said. We just need to go back a little ways to the big road we crossed coming here. That’s Johnny Freeman Road and it goes straight to Bainbridge. I was there before.”

“How long ago?” Jake asked.

“Two summers ago. Me and Uncle Willie went down there to see what we could find.”

“How was the place?”

“It was okay except there were a few people left alive, don’t know how many and we didn’t stay to count them. They started yelling and shooting as soon as they saw us. Called us niggers and coons and said they’d kill us if we came back. I never seen Willie run so fast. That’s why we was afraid to leave home.”

“I’ll bet,” Jake said. “No wonder Willie got spooked. We’ll have to be careful to avoid that bunch. Let’s get everything packed. We can eat jerky on the way and save the left over stew for supper tonight.”

They did not make many miles that day. Jake’s ultra-caution, while keeping them safe, seriously impeded any rapid progress. They moved in a progression of short sorties. Jake, Beth and Al, took turns scouting every bend in the road while the others waited in concealment until signaled to come ahead. They were in a rural farming area and homes were rare. Occasionally, they passed vehicles abandoned on the roadway. Some had the skeletons of the plague victims still inside them. Most of the afflicted had left their vehicles in an attempt to walk off the sleepiness that was the main symptom of the plague. Their bones were usually found a short distance away, scattered among the plants and small trees growing through the cracked asphalt.

Another thing that slowed them down was Jake’s insistence they search any home that had a boat or ATV parked on the property. His reasoning was that those homes would be the most likely to have camping gear.

He warned them there was a good chance they would find the remains of the owners in or around them. In this, he proved correct. The bones were in every home they entered. In three of them, the bones were in the dining room with an open bible on the table. The first time Janie saw them she was almost too afraid to stay inside. In the subsequent houses, she had them check each room before she would enter.

After they searched several such homes, even Janie had a backpack. The kids gained warm jackets, rugged clothing and boots that fit. They also claimed an assortment of compact cooking and eating utensils, toiletries and lightweight sleeping bags. With each find, they discarded the ragged possessions they replaced. By the time the sun was lowering, the four of them were well-equipped hikers.

They also found weapons. Jake was able to reclaim his ankle pistol from Beth. She gained a pistol and holster of her own, and an AK 47. Al claimed an AR 15. They found more ammo than they could carry.

They found other weapons. These they covered with a coating of cooking oil and hid in places within the homes so no one doing a casual search would find them. Jake told them you never knew when you might be in the same area and need them.

Beth wondered why the homes were not looted, prompting Jake to explain.

“Here in the US we had a lot of time to prepare. Many people thought they could build shelters to hide from the plague, most simply stockpiled food and other supplies. The President took proactive steps to maintain order. After the Nuclear exchange overseas, the Federal Government declared martial law. To help forestall panic, FEMA began distributing food products, including survival rations. There were a lot of people who were preppers well before the plague existed. As a consequence, many homes had food in bulk, and most had firearms.

“Do you remember when the plague started here in the US? How fast people began dying. Even though it took nearly two months for the plague to run its course, the majority of the deaths happened in the first week. America was and is a land of plenty. Our country was depopulated so fast there wasn’t time to consume or use a small fraction to the bounty available.”

Beth wanted to gather canned foods, but Jake warned her not to. He detailed in vivid terms the two times he’d suffered food poisoning during the past year eating from old cans, even though they seemed okay and didn’t smell bad.

The discovery of a large stash of irradiated dehydrated survival rations resolved Jake’s food supply concerns. This was in the basement of the last home they searched. The owner had obviously been one of the preppers Jake spoke of. The food was packaged in boxes from one of the many companies that had catered to the growing number of people stocking for catastrophe. The family members had retreated to the basement in hopes of avoiding the plague. They weren’t a neat bunch. Empty food pouches and water bottles littered the floor of the area. The prepping had not spared them from the plague. Their bones lay among the litter on the floor.

Jake let them know that any irradiated foods would be good as long as the seal was intact. There were several large unopened boxes containing assorted food pouches. It was more than they could carry, so they took time to sort through, and divide the lightweight portions among their packs.

He determined they had traveled enough for the day. There was a windowless outbuilding at this home. It was set back from the road, and a windbreak of pines and scrub concealed it from view. He decided a night inside the former woodworking shop would be good for them.

Janie found candles in a drawer. Jake lit several, and began arranging workbenches and mismatched chairs into an eating and cooking area. The kids went to gather firewood. Jake was glad they had refilled their flasks and water containers at the last creek they crossed. Reconstituting dehydrated meals for four people would use a lot of water.

Outside, they had finished collecting firewood and Beth was speaking earnestly.

“Like I said, pay attention to everything he does and says. So far he’s saved our lives at least twice.”

“I had a hand in the second one,” Al said.

“I know you did, but whose idea was it to check out the road?” she replied sternly. “Those people would have killed us, or worse, if he hadn’t come along. The point is, he knew to get us away from there, he knows how to stay alive, he knows how to stay healthy and he knows how to kill. We have to be as tough and mean as he is.”

“He’s not mean,” Janie said. “He’s scary sometimes, but he’s nice and he feeds us and now we got good stuff.”

“You’re right,” Beth said. “I don’t mean ‘mean’ like a bad person, but he don’t think twice about killing bad people when he needs to. We need to be like him.”

“I don’t want to kill people,” Janie said.

“I know you don’t, honey. I’m mostly saying it for me and Al, but I still want you to pay attention and learn from him.”

“I’m going to watch everything he does,” Al said. “An’ I agree with Janie, he’s not a bad man. I agree with you too, but killing ain’t easy. Let’s get this wood in. I’m starving.”

“I didn’t say he was a bad—.”

*

Jake took the wood the kids brought and stacked it neatly near his small cook stove. “Left over turtle stew, tonight. There’s not much. We can have some beef stew or spaghetti after.”

“Don’t let it get too hot, I’m hungry right now,” Al said.

“Me too,” Janie echoed. “What’s spaghetti?”

“That would be hard to describe,” Jake answered. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”

Janie dragged a chair close to the table and took over the job of feeding the thin sticks into the stove as they burned. Beth and Al pulled another table close by and began familiarizing themselves with their new rifles, asking Jake questions about them. After a few minutes Janie spoke.

“I don’t think you’re a mean man. I think you’re nice.”

Jake saw Beth cringe at Janie’s statement.

“Thank you Janie… Since the die-off, I’ve done things I would’ve never considered doing before, but I’ve never harmed anyone who didn’t deserve it.”

“Jake,” Beth said, “I wasn’t telling them you were a bad man. I said mean, like tough. I was telling them we needed to learn from you.”

“That’s a very complimentary thing for you to say.” Jake turned to stir the stew. “We learn every day of our lives. I’m sure I’m going to learn a lot from the three of you. Now get your plates, this stew’s warm enough.”

“Jake,” Al asked, “after we eat will you tell us more about what happened to the world like you said you would?”

“I’ll tell you what I know, but it will take a while. I know more than most about what happened.”

The turtle stew did not fill them, and by unanimous consent, Jake warmed two packets of spaghetti. Janie decided she liked spaghetti almost as much as jam.

Jake had them make use of their new toothbrushes and paste while he cleaned the dishes. Janie had a hard time with her coordination and had them cracking up watching her efforts to get it right. She managed to look like a rabid dog frothing at the mouth. She laughed along with them, which only made her appear funnier.

Jake went outside to check the area. He returned and had the kids pull seats close to where he sat.

“Beth, you’re the oldest,” Jake began, “How about you tell us what you know about the death?”

“I don’t know much. I remember Daddy saying there was an illness and we were at war with the rest of the world. Not too long after that, the sky started turning dark and funny looking. What I remember most, all the people living near us began dying and dying from the plague. None of us even got sick. Mamma said we must be immune or something.

“We had bad weather for a long time. Snow and rain came one year, and stayed almost three, except for a little while in the summers. It was so cold most the time and we had to eat out of cans ‘cause nothing would grow.”

“What did your parents do for a living?”

“Besides raising cows to sell, Daddy worked at a wood place making doors and windows. Mamma was a school teacher,” she said proudly.

“That explains why I saw so many books in your home.”

“Yeah,” Al said. “She made us read and taught us at home because there weren’t no…, wasn’t no….”

“Weren’t any,” Jake supplied.

“There weren’t any schools. Beth reads to us now almost every night. We been teaching Janie to read and do math. She’s quick at learning.”

“I know she is, you all are,” Jake said. “I’ll give you a quick version of what happened. Nine years ago, in 2017, the dying started. It began in Australia. The onset was sudden and the spread was rapid. Over twenty two million people were dead within a month. It was estimated less than forty thousand people survived.

The doctors were baffled. They found no pathogenic cause, nor any toxic agent. The only symptom reported was people got tired, and more tired, until they fell asleep and died. They didn’t suffer, it was painless, but once you got sick there was no recovery, you were dead within six hours.”

“That’s the way people around here died,” Beth said. “Mamma said it seemed they just got tuckered out.”

“As good a description as any.” Jake replied. “When the doctors and researchers who went there to help began getting sick, they tried to leave Australia, but no country would accept them. The United Nations imposed a quarantine of the continent, and allowed no one in or out. With no further outbreaks reported anywhere else in the world, the UN declared the plague contained.

“They were wrong. About three months after the die-off in Australia, the same pattern began in the UK. The videos posted on the internet were horrifying. The people panicked and seemed to go insane with fear. In the end, the entire city of London was burning. The different governments of the world accused other countries of spreading the plague. Since both countries afflicted were democracies, the Muslim extremists, China and North Korea, reaped most of the accusations. The United States and Russia used every diplomatic means to calm things down, while at the same time, moving their militaries to full alert.

“China got hit by the plague next. They knew their country was doomed. They launched every nuclear missile they had. Luckily, they didn’t have as many as everyone thought, but they had enough to destroy most of Japan, several of the Hawaiian Islands, and South Korea.

“They made the mistake of targeting Russia. They managed to hit Moscow, Saint Petersburg and several other cities. The Russian and American responses took out the major cities and industrial areas in China. For some reason the Russians hit North Korea and several former satellite states too.

“The launch by China triggered other countries to use their nuclear weapons. Pakistan and India went at it, and they had a lot of missiles. Of course, Iran and Israel couldn’t resist the urge to commit mutual suicide. Israel also hit many other neighboring states. I read one report that they nuked over forty targets, even so, the Iranians managed to launch at least ten nukes, effectively eliminating their historical enemy.”

Beth interrupted. “Most of what you just said don’t mean much to us. Sometimes you get to talkin' and soundin' like a teacher. We don’t even know where most of those places are.”

“That’s okay,” Jake responded. “I guess the main thing is, the west, that’s us and Canada and South America, weren’t hit with any nukes… big bombs. Even so, the ones used over there threw enough debris… junk, into the air to cause a three year nuclear winter, not to mention a large jump in radiation levels worldwide.”

Jake paused and rubbed his hands across his face.

“I’m having a rough time with this. Since the fall of civilization, I’ve mostly been in guarded enclaves…places, colleges and universities where the people were highly educated. I’ve been on the road for three years locating these places and helping them organize. While actually traveling, I avoided people. Since I met the three of you it is really beginning to hit home how much we’ve lost.”

Beth’s face flushed with anger. “I know what you’re saying. You saying we’re stupid. If we’re so dumb why don’t you—”

“Nothing of the sort,” Jake denied, cutting her off. “The three of you are very smart. What I am saying, and I am sure you will agree with me Beth, is that with no schools and the lack of electronic information, the young are not getting the education we once took for granted... Beth, you have to admit you know things your brother and sister do not. Have either of them ever seen a movie?”

“No, but…, no.... I was going to say I told them about them, but that’s not the—.” She paused in mid-sentence. “Maybe you’re right … hell, if an airplane flew over right now it would probably send them running.”

“Especially if it was a propeller job, and buzzed low,” Jake agreed, chuckling, “but seriously, one of the main reasons I want to get to Haven is to set up a central place where at least some of our cultural and educational heritage can be reintroduced to as many as possible.

“I promised I’d teach you as much as I can, and that will probably bleed over into areas other than simple survival. Knowledge and the ability to coherently…er…properly process information and express thoughts and ideas are also powerful survival tools.”

“We’re willing to learn anything, but don’t get to talking at us like we’re stupid ‘cause we ain’t… aren’t…damn it.”

“I won’t, but if you ever feel I do, call me out on it... Beth, let me tell you. If your mother was here, she could spend the greater portion of her time correcting my grammar.”

Jake stood and stretched. “I’m going to take a break and check outside again.”

Beth stood as he did. “I’ll go with you if it’s all right?”

They left together. The evening chill was setting in and they went back to don jackets. Jake led the way to the screening stand of trees close to the road.

“What we do is hide, watch and listen,” he whispered. “In a few minutes our eyes will adjust to the light, and we’ll be able to see better. Always stay out of sight.”

“What are we listening for?”

“Anything out of the ordinary, any noise a human would make, the sound of birds being disturbed, anything that doesn’t seem natural or right.”

They stood in silence. The only sound they could hear was the movement of the trees in the light evening breeze. Beth took the opportunity to study him.

“He’s not bad looking,” she thought, “and he seems kind enough. Mamma told me there are good men and nasty men. He seems like the good kind.” Images of the men who had touched her flowed through her mind, she shuddered, turning away so he could not see her tears. Jake noticed her shake from the corner of his eye.

“Are you cold?”

“I’m okay,” she replied without turning towards him. “I like being out here... Jake, are you sure it’s okay for us to be with you? I mean, if we’re too much for you to worry about, we’re a lot better off now. I think if we’re careful, we’ll be all right.”

Jake did not answer for a moment. He saw her shoulders were moving and knew she was crying. Beth took the pause negatively.

“Tomorrow you can just go to the place you told us about and we can stay here. We’ll find a place of our own.”

Jake realized she was looking for validation.

“Will you turn around? I know you’re crying and you don’t need to be.”

She turned to face him. “I wasn’t crying about you. I was remembering the men who did things to me, like animals with no feelings, and they stank so bad.

“A while ago, while you were talking, I got to thinking how you told me back at the farm you would die for us. Why couldn’t it have been you, or somebody like you, came along before I got hurt so much. Before Mamma and Daddy got killed?”

Jake’s’ heart wrenched with sympathy. He reached out to comfort her but caught himself.

“I told you once before, when you cry like this I have a natural tendency to want to hold and comfort you. Let me tell you how it is. When I leave tomorrow, I want you traveling with me. That’s what I want because I like the three of you. I won’t stop you if you decide to stay, but I don’t want you to.”

“Are you sure?” She asked through the veil of tears streaming down her face.

“I’m sure.”

“Will you hold me like you said?”

Jake opened his arms, and she stepped between them and buried her face in his chest, her head tucked under his chin. He held her close and let her cry, patting her back gently. He could feel the wetness of her tears soaking through the fabric of his thin jacket and shirt. Her body shook as she cried. Finally, her tears slowed. She clung to him for a while longer before stepping back and wiping her face with the sleeves of her jacket, regaining her composure.

“Thank you for being like a daddy for a minute. I needed to cry. Those men hurt me. I’m strong inside, but I ain’t used to kindness.”

“Everyone needs comforting sometimes.” Jake said. “It's part of being human, getting past the hard parts. After what you’ve been through, I’m amazed you haven’t cried more.”

“I cried plenty by myself, but I couldn’t let Allen and Janie see how afraid I was. I need to get stronger and smarter. Dangerous like you. I don’t have to be weak.”

Jake smiled. “Does that mean you’ll be traveling with me tomorrow?”

“You’re silly sometimes,” she replied, punching him sharply on his upper arm. “Of course we’re going with you.”

Jake rubbed his arm where she hit him, and noticed she was sniffing the air near him.

“What is it, do you smell something?”

“I smell my daddy’s cologne. I smelled it in the cave too, that night we was…were talking.”

“All I’ve got on me is today’s sweat. It’s probably something blooming. We’ll give it a while longer out here. I‘m pretty sure it’s clear, but it won’t hurt to be double sure. All we have done is talk since we came out. We need to be more careful.” He did not bother to mention, that for the third time, if he counted the one when her face appeared at the Loggins house, he could taste chocolate from close association with her. After a few minutes he was satisfied no one but themselves were out there and they returned to the workshop.

“Are you all tired or do you want to hear a bit more before we turn in?” Jake asked.

“I’d like to hear more,” Beth said. “Give me a minute to fix Janie a place to sleep.”

“You might want to lay out some clothing to pad the concrete,” Jake suggested.”

Beth prepared an area next to a wall. She unrolled Janie’s new sleeping bag and helped her wiggle into it.

“Sleep tight, honey. You can listen if you want.” She rejoined the others.

“Where were you when the death started?” She asked.

“In Madison, Wisconsin. I was the instructor in charge of the ROTC program for the university there.”

“What’s that?” Al asked.

“The letters stand for Reserve Officers Training Corps. I was a Major in the Army Reserves.”

“You are a teacher. You were teaching Army stuff. How old were you when everything went bad?” Beth asked.

“I was thirty seven when it started in Australia, almost forty by the time the dying started here. By the time it did arrive, the global network was already history. With the junk from the war floating in the air, and the rioting and destruction that went on during the food and fuel shortages, the local and national communication systems weren’t much better.”

“You’re forty six. You don’t look or act that old. Were you married?” Beth asked.

He stiffened and grimaced, letting the question hang unanswered. After a moment, he rubbed his face with both hands and stood.

“It’s getting late and I’m tired. Why don’t we continue another time?”

“I’m sorry Jake,” Beth said softly. “I shouldn’t have asked you.”

“Nothing to be sorry about,” he said. “The question caught me by surprise. I was married. I’ll leave it there for now.

“Do you think we’ll make it to Bainbridge tomorrow?” Al asked.

“I doubt it,” Jake replied.

CHAPTER 5

Still moving forward in short scouted sorties, they continued searching likely houses as they traveled towards Bainbridge. Thanks to the dehydrated meals, they had adequate provisions for their trip to Lakeland, but Jake was determined to procure two-way radios, saying that being able to communicate at a distance would speed their travel, and make them safer.

They claimed more items from the homes. Jake had to caution against overloading, since any added weight would reduce the rations they could carry, but windup watches, and good hunting knives were welcome additions.

Al fell in love with a large four passenger ATV in the garage of one of the homes. It took Jake a while to convince him that, ‘Yes, it could be made to run if they had gas, but to ride in something so noisy, would be an invitation to be ambushed’.

A couple of hours before sunset, Janie began to lag behind. He could tell she was worn out, though she gamely trudged, leaning forward to shift the weight of her pack from her shoulders.

When they caught up with Beth, who was waiting for them after scouting ahead, he asked everyone to watch for a place to bed down for the night. No sooner had he spoken, Janie asked. “What about that place?” pointing toward a low tree-covered hill on the west side of the road. They stared hard in the direction she was pointing, but could not see anything, even though she insisted she could see a house.

As Jake was leaving to take his turn as scout, Al called to him.

“Wait, I see it.”

He had to sight along Al’s pointing finger to see what Janie had seen.

“Wow, Honey, you have great eyesight. If you take your eyes off the bit of roof, it’s hard to see it again. Let’s cut cross country and check it out.”

The bit of roof belonged to a small, sturdy building, with fake log siding, most likely a hunting cabin. To the left of the house was a large open-topped wooden tank on a tower. The interior was one large room incorporating, bedroom, living room and kitchen, with a bathroom and closets at the far end. Jake promptly declared Janie the hero of the day, stating it to be “the most perfect of places.” Janie beamed in the praise her siblings added to his declaration.

“Does that mean we can have spaghetti again?”

“Absolutely, honey,” Jake said. “We’ll make a whole ration just for you. The rest of us can have chili.”

“What’s chili? I want chili too, and spaghetti.”

“It’s not like you’re too fat. What do you think Beth? Can she have both?”

Beth smiled at Jake. “Like you said, she ain … isn’t too fat.”

Jake went to the small gas range and turned a knob. To his surprise, gas hissed out.

“Hey Al, There’s a water tank on a tower out back. Check the toilet and see if it flushes.”

Al went to the bathroom. They heard the gush of water when he tried the lever. He popped his head out the door.

“It was bone dry in the bottom part ‘till I flushed it. I can hear it squirting into the top part. There’s toilet paper in here too. I’ll be out in a minute.”

“You better hurry,” Beth, shouted, “the water sounds made me have to go too.”

“Me too,” Janie added.

Jake removed a roll of paper from his pack and headed for the door. “You two can wait if you can, but I’m going out back.”

When he returned he was carrying a rusted gallon can and a roll of roofing felt. Al was by the stove setting out rations and cooking utensils.

“The water in the tank is stagnant rainwater and not fit for drinking,” Jake announced.

“I washed my hand in the sink,” Al said.

“Rinse your hands with clean water from a bottle and wipe them well. There’s not telling what’s mixed in with the sludge at the bottom,” Jake responded to his concern. “Take a minute and see if there are any kerosene lamps in the closet.”

Jake went to the nearest window to set his burden down and unrolled a length of the roofing felt. Al called out that he had found three lamps, and came out carrying two of them. “They’re empty though.”

“Kerosene in the can here,” Jake said, pointing to the rusted container. “I found supplies in a shed out back. As soon as I cover these windows, we can have light.” He went outside to retrieve the hammer and plastic container of roofing nails he’d set down when he opened the door.

There were three small windows at the front of the cabin. When the girls returned from the bathroom, Beth, seeing the guys were busy, went to the kitchen area to start preparations for the meal.

Al filled the lanterns and went to help Jake. While finishing the last window, Jake lit one of the lanterns in order to see where he was nailing.

“Janie, I’ve got an important job for you,” Jake said. “I want you to go outside with your brother to see if you can see any light through the windows or around the doors. It’s very important to look hard.”

“I will, Jake. I got good eyes.”

Al took Janie’s hand and they went outside. Jake lit the remaining lamps and placed them where the light would do the most good.

“I like the way you are with Janie,” Beth said, turning to him as he placed a lamp near her. “She’s happy with you.”

“How about you. Are you happy?”

“I’m not sure. Sometimes I think I’m getting there, and then I get to feeling like something bad is fixing to happen any minute.”

“Not a good feeling to have,” Jake replied with sympathy. It had to be a tough job taking on the responsibility of your brother and sister. From what I gather, your uncle was pretty much useless.”

“I don’t feel so by myself since you come along.”

“Say came along,” Jake corrected.

“Since you came along,” Beth repeated with a smile.

“I hope this means an end to having to sleep with one eye open for your big butcher knife,” Jake responded, matching her smile.

Al and Janie came back in.

“We saw lots of light Jake,” Janie declared. “Especially around the front door.”

“Yeah, lots,” Al added, “and she saw some places I couldn’t see.”

“What about the side door?” Jake asked.

“Nope,” Janie said, “the little room with the other door blocks the light.”

“It’s called a vestibule,” Jake said.

“What’s a vegetable?” Janie asked, confused.

“No, honey, vestibule,” Jake corrected, pronouncing each syllable. “That little room stops the wind from coming in and helps keep bugs out.”

“That’s a funny word.”

“It sure is,” Jake agreed. “Al, you and Janie work at blocking the light while Beth and I get the food ready. Hurry it though, before the sun goes down. We’ll have to check again when it’s dark.”

They set to work, with Janie bossily directing Al.

“See what I mean.” Beth said. “We have to hide our light ‘cause we're afraid somebody will see it. I thought we were being watchful back at the farm, but since we joined with you, I know we didn’t know how.”

“You’re just kids.”

“But even Mamma and Daddy got killed. They weren’t careful, and that’s why they’re dead.”

“Beth, you asked me if I was married. I was. We had twin boys close to Janie’s age. I loved them and my wife deeply. They didn’t die of the death. They died because I wasn’t careful.” He grimaced, took a deep breath and let it out. “Supper can wait a few minutes. Let’s go outside and talk. It feels too tight in here to breathe.”

Jake led her to the back of the cabin to a wooden picnic table he had noticed on the small back deck while investigating the storage building. He moved the table away from the skeleton lying scattered in and around a chair beside it and placed it at the other end of the deck. After positioning two chairs at the table facing away from the bones, he motioned for Beth to sit. The porch faced the sun that had lowered to the treetops and lit a scattering of clouds with pink and gold. They sat for a moment in peaceful silence.

“It’s nice out here,” Beth said. “Sometimes I look at the world and wonder how it can be so beautiful, and people so nasty.”

“I know it’s hard to believe, given your experiences, but the majority of the survivors are decent people. People are widely scattered, but here and there, I found small groups gathered together for self-protection, trying to form a sense of community. Some are beginning to farm, now that things will grow again.

“It would be nice to meet up with people like that,” Beth said. “I reckon we were just unlucky there at the farm.”

“It is the lawless ones out roaming, taking rather than giving, destroying rather than building. Hurting rather than caring. Beth, I need to tell you a few things. We have been traveling together for three days, and it seems like we’ve been either too busy or too tired to talk... About being married … I’ll try not to get emotional, but it is painful to speak about this.

“A gang passed through the campus there in Wisconsin. It was towards the end of the long winter, a little over four years ago. My wife, Joan, and our boys, were outside enjoying a rare warm day. In their, having fun, they managed to wander out of view of the guards we had posted. I should have been with them.” He paused, visibly controlling his emotion.

“Instead of watching out for them, I was inside helping a scientist set up equipment for research he was doing,” he continued, his voice expressing anger at himself. “I lost track of time. When I went outside, they were dead. My wife, raped and beaten so badly, I... my boys—” Jake gasped for air, fighting the memory. “The bastards took their legs.”

“Why?” she asked. “Why would they take their legs?”

“You know why,” Jake said, fighting back the tears trying to form. “They hacked my boys’ legs like they were taking hams from a pig.”

“Oh God, no,” she gasped in understanding. “No wonder you have nightmares.”

“I went crazy. Followed their tracks in the snow... They were cooking when I went at them. I shot them all. Seven men and women died. I’ve been killing people like them ever since.”

Slow tears were easing down Beth’s face. “I’m sorry that happened to your family.”

Jake wiped his tears with his shirtsleeve. “And I’m sorry about what’s happened to you and yours. That’s why I lost it and went at the gang that night with Al. The woman, cutting meat from Willie’s leg, triggered a nightmare I thought I had suppressed. I lost control, and it was a stupid move. I should have listened to you and not gone back to investigate. I went looking for trouble.”

“Well, from what Al told me, they’s the ones that found trouble. I’m glad you killed them. I didn’t like Willie all that much, but he didn’t deserve to be somebody’s dinner.”

“I’m worried about the truck that left. It means there could still be members of the gang in the area,” Jake said.

“They could be part of the bunch Willie and Allen ran into in Bainbridge.”

“If they were, we probably killed most of them that night. There may only be the four of them left. I think the two I killed at your farm were out looking for homes to loot, and came on you all by accident.”

“Do you still want to go to Bainbridge?”

“Yes. The road leading east out of Bainbridge is the best route to Lakeland. You and I will go in alone tomorrow night for the things I want. We’ll use the opportunity to scout our best way east from there. I guess we should get back in—”

“In a minute. I want to ask you about some things. That scratch on your face wasn’t a streak of blood. I saw it clear, and it was cut pretty deep.”

“Yes it was and it healed overnight... Just before China started the nuclear exchange, researchers in France discovered the cause of the plague and … this is going to be hard to explain.”

“Supper can wait,” she, said, “I want to know how you can heal overnight. I want to know how come you’re forty-six and look and move like you’re thirty something, and I want to know why you sometimes smell like Old Spice like my daddy used to, and don’t go telling me about something blooming.”

“It’s all tied to the cause of the plague. Germs didn’t cause the die-off. Tiny machines called nanobots caused it. So tiny you can’t see them unless there are thousands of them grouped together.”

“Is that possible, how can a machine be that little?”

“Beth, the scientists shared their studies with me and the nanobots are real. Let me tell you about healing, and that will explain about what you asked. I was doing grunt labor for a group of researchers attempting to collect a sample from a huge cloud of the nanos that were doing something to the atomic core of a nuclear reactor. A tank of liquid nitrogen they were using ruptured while I was moving it. The force of the explosion threw me into the cloud of nanobots. The researchers said the blast from the tank tore my body apart and they thought I was dead. They abandoned their effort to collect a sample and left me rather than risk retrieving my body from where it was.”

“Why? Could the nanobot things hurt them? Would they give them the plague?

“No, they no longer give people the plague, but yes, they can hurt you. If you touch a cloud of them, even a small grouping, it stings like wasps. If you try to move or disturb them with instruments or machines, they can dissolve them. The only way we could collect samples of the nanos was to freeze them close to absolute zero. That’s what the liquid nitrogen was for.

“What happened to me after they left is what I’m getting to. The reason I was in charge of the ROTC program was because I lost my left arm in the Yemen conflict back in 2014, and they retired me from the field.”

“You lost your arm.’ Beth said, incredulously.

“Yes and my left eye. The left side of my face was so scarred, people would turn away rather than see me. An IED … a bomb... blew up the transport I was riding in. The explosion shredded and burned the entire left side of my body.”

“What happened after the scientists left you?”

“I lay unconscious in the cloud of nanobots for three days, and when I woke I was as you see me today, complete, and in perfect health.”

“They grew you a new arm and eye?”

“Yes, and removed every scar from my body and ever since then I heal without scarring, but the healing process was never overnight. Lately, I think they are taking a more active role in my life. I know what I’m telling you is hard to believe, but that is what happened. The nanobots are still inside me.”

“I believe you Jake because there isn’t any reason not to.” Her expression changed to alarm. “Wait a minute. Can we catch them from you? Those nanobots are scary.”

“More than scary, but to answer your question, I don’t know. That night in the cave was weird and there is a chance they already went into you.”

Jake told her about her face appearing to tell him not to rush into the Loggins cabin. “I think they are why you sometimes smell your father’s cologne, and sometimes when you are close to me, I taste chocolate in my mouth. They did something to us that night”

“That’s weird. Why would they make us smell and taste things?”

“I don’t know. Maybe they’re trying to make you like me so you don’t kill me while I’m sleeping.” Jake laughed wryly at his attempt at humor.

“That’s silly,” Beth said, “and besides, I already told you I’m not going to hurt you. I’m sorry now I said it, since you won’t shut up about it. I was mostly joking even then. We do need to get back inside. Janie’s probably starving by now.”

“And we need to button this place up before the sun’s gone,” Jake agreed. “We can talk more soon.”

*

Al and Janie finished with the windows about the same time the food was ready. The sun had set and after another trip outside, they returned to report no light was showing.

As promised, Janie had a package of spaghetti to herself. She finished her meal and requested some chili.

“The chili is good, but my mouth is burning,” she said. “I need to brush my teeth.”

“I’ll help her,” Beth said, pushing her chair back from the table. “It’s your turn to do the dishes, Al.”

Jake busied himself searching the place for anything that might come in handy. The only useful items were six plastic lighters in a kitchen drawer. One of them still held fuel. He gave it to Al. It was getting harder to find lighters that had not leaked over time.

“Al, Beth and I are going out to scout by the road. Would you mind getting Janie tucked in for the night?”

“You don’t want me with you?”

“Got nothing to do with want, it’s got to do with training. She’ll be going into Bainbridge with me tomorrow night.”

“I know Beth talked to you about me. I don't want you to think I'm afraid from what happened.”

“That never crossed my mind, Al. You handled yourself as good as any man I have known. To tell the truth, I like you the way you are. You’re thoughtful and kind. I wish this was a world where law still prevailed. When we get to where we’re going, we can give some thought to how to do something about the way things are.”

“Beth’s probably better for you anyways. She’s tougher than me and quicker too.”

“I think so too,” Jake said. “I’m going to snuff the lamps. You can relight one after we’re out. We’ll knock when we get back so you’ll know to put it out again.”

The night passed without incident. The next day they sorted their belongings, eliminating unnecessary items to keep their packs and bags as light as possible, but mostly they just rested. Janie especially needed a break from the pack. Her thin shoulders were rubbed raw. Beth saw that the straps needed more padding and wrapped them with strips torn from a bed sheet to soften and help spread the load.

Toward midafternoon, Jake advised Beth to take a nap, as they would be leaving for Bainbridge at sunset.

He took his own advice. Beth, tapping his shoulder, awakened him.

“The sun’s been set about a half hour.”

“Perfect,” he replied. She was dressed in her darkest clothing and a black stocking cap. She had her AK-47 slung on her shoulder, a sheathed hunting knife and canteen belted to her hip, and her pistol holstered on the other side.

“Damn, you’re pure dangerous,” he said, winking at her.

He removed a few items from his backpack and went into the bathroom. When he emerged, he looked very much like a commando ready for a mission. He even had black grease paint streaked helter-skelter on his face. He strapped pistol and knife to his waist.

“Beth, grab the nylon bag I emptied earlier and we’re out of here. Al, do the light thing again.”

Al snuffed the lamp and they left through the side door.

*

Jake told Beth they would use the road to travel.

“The main reason I like to travel at night is that most people seek shelter when it gets dark, and the ones who do travel at night like to have light.”

They walked a few minutes in silence. The evening air was crisp, the sky full of small clouds, and the moonlight came fitfully through the breaks.

“How far is it to Bainbridge?” Beth asked.

“I figure it’s about five miles to the outskirts, an hour and a half, maybe two.”

“What are we looking for?”

“I’d like some quality two-way radios. We’ll need rechargeable batteries and a way to recharge them.”

“I meant to ask what kind of place.”

“Oh. I guess my first choice would be a military surplus store. Then there’s Radio Shack, Walmart, pawnshops, any place that might still have electronics around. It’s going to be hard finding batteries that will hold a charge, but some of the exotic types that came out before the plague should.”

“I just wanted to know what to look for. Is this a big town?”

“According to my map, which isn’t the best, it appears to be medium sized. Before we get into town, we’ll probably pass a convenience store. We should be able to find a map of the town and a local phone book. I want to be able to go to the best places and not have to do a willy-nilly search. Remember what Al said happened when he and your uncle went there?”

“I haven’t forgot.”

They continued in silence, the sound of their footsteps seeming abnormally loud in the silence of the night.

“Jake,” Beth said, again breaking the silence, “Al said they called him and Willie, “niggers,” and said they were going to kill them if they caught them. Are there many black people left?”

Jake touched her shoulder. “Let’s sit for a moment. Back to back, you watch up the road behind us and I watch the front.”

“This feels weird,” Beth said after they were seated with their backs touching. “Is this something you learned in the army?”

“Yes. This is also a good way to sleep when the situation warrants it.... You asked me if there were many black people left. The answer is yes and no. The die-off from the plague was non-discriminatory and the races died in proportion to each other. The smart survivors left the heavily populated areas, but in the large cities I’ve visited during the years since the fall of civilization, I have found there are quite a few survivors still living in them. Chicago had at least a few thousand.

“The people who stayed in the cities separated into gangs, some race based and others religious based. The gangs wage senseless turf wars that continue even now. They kill the men and children of rival gangs, but usually keep the women as slaves to use anyway they choose. In big cities like L.A., Chicago, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Boston, I am sure you will find survivors of every racial and ethnic persuasion.

“Out in the rural, less populated areas things are very different. The survivors, based on racial proportions, were mostly white. Many of them consider anyone not white to be interlopers, as not belonging. As a result, in many places, the racial and ethnic peoples are shot on sight, and in some instances, purposefully hunted down and killed.”

“You’re white,” Beth stated accusingly.

“I think of myself as human. I think of you, Al and Janie as human. There are so few of us left, it would take a fool to think any other way. Beth, hatred, while misguided, is practiced by all kinds of people. The whites aren’t the only ones committing atrocities. The sons of bitches that killed my family were black, and you were assaulted by a group of blacks.”

“You used a bunch of words just to say I’m in more danger because I’m black?”

“We are all in danger every day, but in the rural areas, yes you are.”

“You gotta teach us how to fight. I mean how to kill. You learned in the Army didn’t you?”

“Yes, I was in the Special Forces…,” he stopped mid-sentence and made a shushing sound. “I think I saw a light ahead,” he whispered.

They cautiously stood, staring intently down the road.

“I see it,” Beth said. “It’s moonlight bouncing off glass.”

“I think you’re right. That close to the road, it’s most likely a business of some kind.”

The source of the reflected light proved to be a combination gas station and convenience store. It was obvious the place was deserted. The glass entrance door was shattered and there was no sound or movement from inside. Jake went in to check before motioning for Beth to join him.

“I saw what we need at the service counter,” he whispered, leading the way.”

“Why are we whispering?” she whispered.

“I don’t know,” he replied with a low chuckle. “Just habit.”

“I feel it too. Being around human places at night is creepy,” she said in a low voice. “Let’s find what we need and get out of here.”

Jake sorted through the maps displayed in a plastic stand near the counter, squinting in the dim light. Beth went around the end and rummaged the shelves behind the counter.

“I’ve got the Bainbridge phone book,” she said, moving to rejoin him. “Any luck?”

“Absolutely,” he said, grabbing his selections. “Let’s go outside so I can see.”

After looking up places in the phone book and referencing them on a map, Jake declared with evident relief. “We’re lucky. Every place we want is within a half-mile of each other and we’re coming in from the best direction. We won’t have to enter the main part of town.”

He paused, “Listen, do you hear a sound like water flowing?” He asked, pointing to the east.

She listened attentively for a few seconds.

“That’s the Flint River. If we can hear it, we can’t be more than a mile or so from Bainbridge.”

“Let’s be careful like you been teaching us,” she said. “Al and Willie came this way. Those men could still be here.”

“You know me,” he replied.

Caution paid off. The first place of interest was the Walmart. The doors were open. Jake had Beth hide behind an abandoned minivan while he went inside the immense building.

He was back within minutes and motioned with quick flicks of his hand for her to follow him. He kept close to the wall of the building, setting a rapid pace until they reached a corner and crossed an open parking area to a small stand of trees. Jake slowed and stopped.

“We can rule out the Walmart. They were in there, seven men and three women. I didn’t see any children. The inside of the place is filthy. I followed a trail of trash to a camp they have back in the furniture area. I could have killed every one of them while they slept.”

Beth shuddered. “Maybe you should have,” she said.

“I'm not positive they’re the ones who shot at Al and your uncle. I’d hate to kill them and find out later it was another group. They’re using a loading dock as part of their living area. That’s why there aren’t any signs of them out front. I looked out back for the army truck but didn’t see it. This bunch is so sorry, I doubt they were with the group we ran into. Judging from the empty liquor bottles strewn around their sleeping area, they drink themselves into a stupor every night.”

“Was this the most important place?”

“Only in volume,” he replied. “There’s a Radio Shack about a quarter mile from here. I doubt anyone will be in there.”

The Radio Shack was in a strip mall facing the main road. To their disappointment, they found the entire storefront secured with a metal security grid.

“I can’t believe no one broke in at least for some batteries during the long winter.” Jake said with exasperation. “Even if we had a pry bar, we’d make too much noise getting in.

“There was a sign under the big one by the road that said ‘EZ Pawn’. Do we want check it too?”

They found the pawnshop at the end of the long line of stores. It was bigger than Jake expected. There were obvious signs of looting. Through the open door, they saw merchandise strewn over the floor in front of the service counter. The gun and ammo areas behind the counter were empty. Most of the shelves in the main part of the shop still held goods. Beth stayed near the front to guard while he searched.

There was barely enough light to see by. He found the place almost to be a department store, there were many new items and most were oriented towards hunting, fishing and survival.

He almost shouted with joy at the contents of a long unit of shelves. Using his lighter to see better, he quickly pulled the things he wanted. In no time, the bag was too full. He unpacked and removed the items from their packaging. This allowed him to add more to the bag.

He moved among the shelves picking other things until he was satisfied he had everything he wanted.

“We can get out of here,” he said, keeping his voice low.

“Where to next, boss?” she asked.

“Back to the cabin. This place was a gold mine. I took more than we need because I doubt we’ll be coming back. I’ll sort it later.”

“Good,” she said with relief. “Now I know I don’t like people places, especially at night. Every noise or moving shadow makes me jump.”

“We’ve been lucky so far. Until we’re back on the road home, we need to keep a closer watch. I don’t know why, but I’m feeling spooked.”

They had to pass the Walmart again. They kept to the far side of the road and breathed a sigh of relief when it was out of sight behind them. They’d walked only a little further when Beth tugged Jake’s jacket with urgency.

“I hear something.”

He stopped and faced the direction she indicated. He heard it also. It was the unmistakable sound of engines running. The noise was faint, but after listening for a short time, it was obvious the vehicles were getting closer.

“They’re several miles away but we need to get out of this area,” he said. “If we hurry, we should be back at our road by the time they get here.”

Jake led the way, the heavy bag bouncing off his thigh with every step. Beth was hot at his heels. He didn’t throw caution to the wind, but they had scouted this road on the way in, and he felt confident it was still clear.

They arrived at the point where their road turned off and traveled several hundred feet along it before he led her into an over grown field. He scuffed at the weeds to make a place for them to sit. They were winded and sweaty. Even though they were further from town, the sound of the vehicles was louder.

“Will they come this way?” she asked.

“I doubt it. This late, they’ll probably stop in Bainbridge.” He paused a moment to listen. “They are coming from the west. Most likely, they passed through Colquitt on the way here. The bunch we had a run in with were probably an advance element of this group. It sounds like several heavy trucks, maybe buses, could even be military vehicles. I think I hear smaller vehicles too. Either way, there are a lot of people coming in.”

“Jesus, Jake, should we hurry back to Al and Janie? I don’t like being out here.”

“We have to stay for a while,” he replied. “We need to know if they stop or pass through.”

“You’re right. I’m just scared.”

“Me too,” he agreed.

They remained hidden in the tall brush by the roadside, the sound of the vehicles getting louder until Jake judged they must be at least to the outskirts of the town.

A few minutes later, the volume of the sound began to fade. It was obvious they were stopping and killing their engines. Even though they were at least a half mile or more away, the crisp night air carried sound well. He could hear vehicle doors slammed shut, and muted voices shouting.

“They’ve stopped near the edge of the town, close to where we were,” he said.

“I hope you’re not going to say we need to check’em out.”

“Oh no,” he answered emphatically, “there are way too many of them. The best thing we can do is get back to the cabin and make plans about how to avoid them.”

They were standing to leave, when a high-pitched whine began. Jake pulled Beth back down.

“That sounds like a loudspeaker,” he explained to Beth. She was obviously startled by the unfamiliar sound. “They may be getting ready to make some kind of announcement.”

“What’s a loudspeaker?” Beth asked.

“It’s a machine that makes voices extremely loud. Try not to be frightened if someone starts talking. Judging by the volume of the whine we heard, it’ll sound like the voice of God.”

To accent his statement, a voice boomed, causing them both to flinch.

“Testing, testing.”

“That’s good enough, let me up there.”

There were some shuffling sounds, and then another man began speaking.

“You people inside the Walmart. Do not try to leave. You will be processed in the morning. I repeat. We know you are in there. You will be shot if you try to leave.

“We are the Army of Saints. My name is John Saint. We are here to assimilate you. Our scouts tell us you are whites, and you will be treated fairly.

“Now hear this! If you are not a God fearing white American, you will be killed on sight. This is a warning to you niggers, Jews, chinks, and rag heads.

“If you report the whereabouts of any stranger who may have come around in the last three days, you will be granted immediate membership into the ranks of the Saints. Several of our Saints were ambushed and killed near here. It is possible the killers will have come this way.

“We have reason to believe the ones who did this were a bunch of cowardly, black assed niggers, who shot and burned our people to death. When we catch them, we will burn them alive.

“I will repeat one more time. Do not try to leave the building. You will be shot. The exits are targeted and search patrols will be out.

The sound from the speaker cut off sharply. Jake stood and motioned for Beth to follow.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” he said with urgency. “I know about the Saints.”

“What are the Saints?” she asked, hurrying to match his pace.”

“My words to you coming back to kick me. The Saints are the worst bunch of murdering scum we could run into. Save your breath and let’s get back to the kids. We can talk then. If we hear a vehicle coming, we’ll leave the road and stick to the woods.”

They arrived near the cabin without incident. They did their best to hide any trace of exiting the roadway. His training of the kids over the past days made the job easy.

At the cabin, Jake knocked to let Al know it was them. He allowed Beth to enter, then instructed Al to close the door and light one lamp at the back end of the cabin so he could inspect for light himself. When he was satisfied, he knocked again. Beth opened the door and quickly closed it behind him.

“Is it okay to light the lamp?” Al asked.

“It’s cool, we’re totally blacked out,” Jake said. He could hear Janie crying in the dark.

The light flickered on and grew brighter as Al adjusted the wick. Janie ran to grab onto Jake’s leg.

“We heard monster men,” she said.

“It’s okay honey,” Beth said, shaking her head at Jake, “It was just regular people speaking with a giant machine. You don’t have to be scared.”

Jake didn’t correct her on either point. “Janie, like she said, everything’s okay, but we need to leave here to make sure things stay that way. You want everything to be okay, don’t you?” he asked in a soft voice.

“Yes, but if everything’s okay, why do we have to leave? I like it here.”

Beth squatted and hugged Janie to her.

“I like it here too, but if Jake says we need to leave, we need to leave. Could you hear what the big voice was saying?”

“Some of it. It was loud.”

“I know it was. Now I want you to lie down, while us big people get things ready.” Beth stood and led Janie to the couch in the living area and shook out a dusty comforter to cover her.

“I’m still scared,” Janie said plaintively.

“You don’t need to be, Jake’s here,” Beth stated, as if to convince, both Janie and herself that being with him was all it would take to be safe.

Beth rejoined the others at the back of the cabin. She and Jake related to Al everything that happened. When they finished, Beth turned towards Jake.

“What do we need to do?” She asked in a low voice.

“We need to get as far from here as we can. The Saints are bad.”

“What are the Saints?” Al asked.

“They’re the worst gang we could have run into. Beth, I guess you know who he was referring to when he asked about strangers?”

“Yeah,” she said, “us niggers.”

“Don’t you ever use that word around me again,” Jake said in a harsh tone. “I mean it!”

“I’m sorry, it’s just the way he said it. He made me feel like nothing.”

“You are nothing to them, neither am I, but remember, they are nothing but a marauding bunch of criminals themselves. They’ll kill us if they catch us,” he said, keeping his voice low for Janie’s sake. “I met some men in Kansas who ran with John Saint until he became too crazy for them. He was an officer in the army for a while. After that, he worked with FEMA. He was sentenced to jail for committing crimes against humanity because of what he did in Haiti right after the quake of 2010. The government covered it up and the trial was held in secrecy. He buried over fifty orphaned children in a single mass grave while they were still alive.

“Saint was a prisoner in the Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary when the plague came. Somehow, in the confusion and chaos during the die-off, he got free and joined with a group of anarchists in Montana. He killed their leader and declared himself the ruler of America. One of the rites of initiation into his gang is the eating of human flesh. I didn’t know he’d traveled this far south."

“He buried children alive!” Al said.

“Specifically black children,” Jake clarified. “In his mind, he was killing useless breeders. His goal now is to purge humanity of anyone who’s not white.”

“Why?” Beth asked.

“Because he’s insane. The trouble is, there are lots of people who think the same way he does. His gang grows bigger every year.”

“The people we shot and burned, and those two who raped me and Beth, were they part of his gang?”

“I’m afraid so Al. If we get caught by them we’ll be in deep, deep trouble.”

Beth said, “Ever since we met you, we been running. I say this time we go so far away from here we never see or hear of the Saints again.”

“I couldn’t agree more. It’s for sure we need to get out of here before daylight. He’ll have patrols searching every home within miles.”

“I say we go to the place your friend built, as fast as we can. I’m tired of being scared. Janie needs a safe place, and so do I,” Beth said, fighting back tears.

“Yeah,” Al agreed. “I want to be where people aren’t going to eat us.”

“It’s settled, we’re leaving tonight.” Jake pulled the convenience store maps from his jacket pocket. He chose the one he wanted and sat on the floor. “Al, grab the lamp, you and Beth help can me with this,” he requested, unfolding the map and spreading it wide.

The two joined him around the map and Al set the lamp close.

“Turn the wick a little higher,” Jake requested.

Beth leaned over the map and stared at it intently. “We don’t know nothin’ about maps.”

“You're about to get a quick lesson. This is a map of the southern half of Georgia and part of Florida The top of the map is always north. Down here at the bottom where it says, ‘Legend’, shows the scale in miles and other symbols to designate road types, rivers, parks and such. A mile is how far an average person can walk in twenty minutes at a steady pace. This map shows the length of this line equals ten miles. That’s about four to six hours of walking with breaks to eat and rest.”

“Where are we?” Al asked.

“We’re here,” he replied, pointing, “Just a little north of Bainbridge, and here’s Colquitt.”

Beth put her finger on the map. “These black lines are roads?”

“Yes... and the blue lines are rivers.”

“So those men came down this road from Colquitt, and we came down just a little bit over from them on this road next to the river?”

“You catch on fast. What we need to do is try to make our best guess which way the Saints will go after they’ve gotten what they want from Bainbridge.”

Beth traced a line with her finger. “You think they’ll head to this place?” she asked, pointing.

They could, but Tallahassee, Florida, is a big city. From what I know about Saint, he tends to avoid big places.”

Beth traced another line with her finger. “Then he will probably stay on this road number 84. It goes to another small dot like Bainbridge.”

“I agree with you, there are several small towns within a short distance of each other. That’s the road we were going to use to go to Lakeland, but we’ll have to take another route.”

“Where’s the place you told us about?” Al asked. “Can you show us on the map?”

“It’s called Heaven,” Janie called from the sofa. “Beth always says, if I be good I can go to Heaven, and that’s where Jake said he’s taking us.”

“You’re supposed to be sleeping, little girl,” Beth said.

“I can’t sleep ‘cause ya’ll keep talking, and I can hear you good. I’m scared of the Saint man, and we need to go to Heaven.”

“Not much need in her going to sleep now,” Jake said. “We’ll be leaving soon. This is the place we’re headed for,” indicating on the map. “Even though it's out of our way, we'll head north to Highway 37,” he told them, moving his finger on the map. “Lakeland is here, and this is the Alapaha River. We’re going a bit to the south of Lakeland, to about here.”

“And that’s Heaven,” Janie said again.

“We can call it Heaven,” Beth said, standing.

Jake stood with her, not bothering to reaffirm the name Haven. “I say we leave now. We’ll follow the road back the way we came from your farm, then turn east. Whenever we can, we’ll stay on the roadway. Like I said, scum like them use lights when they travel at night and they never walk if they can ride. As long as we pay attention, we’ll have plenty of time to get out of sight. We’ll only travel at night.”

Beth folded the map and handed it to Jake. “Janie hasn’t had much sleep and the sun’ll be up in few hours. I don’t think we’ll get far tonight.”

“We’ll go as far as we can, and find a place to hide during the day,” Jake said. “No more staying in houses for a while. Let’s get the stuff from the pawnshop divided and packed away.”

Beth was right about them not getting very far before the sun began to rise. They found a place under a large tree out of sight from the road and rolled out their sleeping bags. Al volunteered to take the first guard shift and sneaked back to be nearer the road. The rest were soon asleep.

CHAPTER 6

Jake awoke because the sun was cooking him. He sat, pushed away the dark fabric of the cover and fluffed his shirt to cool himself. The others were seated on the ground watching him.

“We thought you were going to sleep forever,” Janie said, “we’re hungry.”

Jake climbed groggily to his feet. “Let me wander off to take care of some morning business and we’ll get you fed.”

He returned and fished in his bag for a packaged towelette to clean his hands.

“Could you toss me one of those napkin things for Janie’s face,” Beth asked. “She looks like she’s been sucking a sow.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Jake asked.

“I don’t know, just something Mamma used to say.”

“Three trucks went by early this morning while you was asleep,” Al stated.

Al’s unexpected voice grabbed Jake’s’ attention. Al was sitting on the limb of the oak tree three feet above his head.

“I see you found a different guard spot. How’s the view of the road from up there.”

“Real good. The trucks were painted with mixed up colors, green and brown mostly.”

“That’s called camouflage paint,” Jake informed him. “Were they driving slowly?”

“Yeah. I could tell they were looking for something.”

“Did they come back or are they still out there ahead of us?”

“All three trucks came back about an hour ago.” Al replied. “They were still driving slow.”

“Good. I wouldn’t want them out in the direction we’ll be going tonight.”

“I’m hungry,” Janie, reminded them.

“We’ll have to do something about that, won’t we,” Jake said.

“You need to,” Janie replied. “Beth says I’m skinny as a rail.”

“I figure, by stretching the dehydrated meals with the food we already have, we have about twenty days’ worth of good solid rations,” Jake said. “We can supplement those by hunting or fishing.”

“Aren’t you afraid someone will hear a shot?” Al asked.

“I was thinking more about your Whammo, Jake answered. Didn’t you tell me you could hit a running rabbit?”

“Not every time, but often enough.”

“What about breakfast,” Beth asked. “I didn’t know whether to use the stove or not?”

“The wind’s blowing towards us from the road,” Jake said. “If you and Al will get the stove going and fill the big pot half full of water we’ll have rice mixed with chili. There is a can of beef stew in my pack that is edible cold. Janie's welcome to that.”

“I’ve been wanting to ask you about your little stove,” Al said. “It sure don’t use much wood and after it gets going it don’t smoke. I think the way it's made it somehow cooks gas out of the wood ‘cause of how blue it burns.”

“Say doesn’t or does not,” Jake corrected smiling. “You're very smart to figure that out on your own. Yes, to answer your question, it’s a special design. It converts the wood to wood-gas. A friend of mine in Wisconsin made it.”

Beth took Jake's praise of Al and ran with it. “Al's smart about lots of things. He figured out how to trap fish with floating cages in the pond not far from the farm. This spring the fish seemed like they was... were coming back and we were beginning to eat better. I bet if those men didn't come, we wouldn't have been skinny by the end of summer. For a while, we had a windmill thing he made just from looking at a picture. It pumped water to the house through plastic pipes daddy had in the barn. A tornado came up. It didn't hit us, but it blew the windmill apart and winds blew off part of our roof, but I know he could have made an even better one.”

“I have to agree with you, those were good things to have, and I agree too that you would have been a lot better off food wise. The way plants and wildlife are coming back here in the South, it's almost as if the long winter never happened.”

Jake left it to them to prepare the meal and busied himself with the items from the pawnshop. He was reworking the wiring of a small, foldable solar panel, when Beth informed him the meal was ready. He ate and went back to work. An hour later, he was finished.

“I’ve got this solar panel set to charge the batteries for the two way radios. It’s slow, but if we keep the panel facing the sun it should charge eight batteries in about six hours.” He stood to move to the tree and tossed Al a device attached to a modified battery holder. It had a crank handle, giving it the appearance of a small meat grinder. “This is a hand operated charger. As long as you turn the handle it will be charging.”

“How fast do I need to turn it?” Al asked.

“Not fast, maybe thirty, thirty five times around each minute. There are eight batteries in the holder, so you’ll need to work it for about three hours or so.”

“We’ll take turns,” Beth said. “You want to do it too, don’t you Janie?”

“I want to do it after Al. Can I be next Jake?”

“I don’t see why not, but it’s sort of hard to turn. If you get tired let someone else take over so we get a good charge.”

“I will,” she promised. “But I’m a good turner.”

After Jake arranged the solar panel facing the sun he removed the map of the Bainbridge area from his pack, and spread it on the ground.

Beth joined him, sitting beside him. “What you studying?”

He positioned the map so she could see it.

“Last night I noticed this dotted line,” he said, indicating with his finger. “See how it runs off at an angle to this road we’re on and joins to Highway 37 about twenty miles further north?”

“What is the line?”

“If it was zigzaggy and curvy, I would say it was a logging road, but it’s so straight it has to be an electrical line right of way.”

“Is that good?” she asked.

“Depends how overgrown it is. In the past, the utility companies kept them clear-cut. Because of the long winter, any new growth should be small. If it’s passable, I think we should follow it to the other road. It takes us a bit out of the direction we need, but once we get to the 37, it’s a straight shot over to Lakeland. Best of all, it’ll put us further from the path the Saints will likely take when they leave Bainbridge.”

Beth traced her finger across the map. “If we don’t use the road we’re following and just head straight to it this way—.”

“Northeast,” Jake supplied.

“Northeast, we can stay off the road and go through the woods. I’ve learned to be afraid of roads, towns and people.”

“It is a nasty world Beth, but it will get better. There are some things I haven’t had time to tell you about.”

“Like what?” She asked. Tell me something to make me feel better. Safer.”

“I would rather wait until I can tell all of you together, but for one thing there will be other people joining us in Haven.”

“Good people?”

“Yes, good people, and smart too. They’ll be working on a plan to fix something very bad happening to our world.”

“What’s happening to the world?”

“It concerns the nanobots. Maybe tomorrow I can take time to tell more. For now, I need to sort and divide the rest of the material we got from Bainbridge, and we’ll need to get more sleep before we set out tonight.”

“I’ll hold you to that. I want to know what we’re getting ourselves into. I ain’t... I mean I’m not taking Janie and Al no place where they can get hurt.” She paused, “So do you think we should just head straight for the dotted line?”

“Since we’re traveling at night it will be hard to work our way cross country. Whatever it is on the map, it crosses this road about six miles further on. If it’s a trail we can use, we’ll only be on the road about four hours at most.”

“How many gangs do you think we’ll run into before we get to Heaven?”

Jake dismissed her use of the name Heaven as no big deal. “Hopefully no more. There aren’t many people left alive to form gangs. Saints’ is big because over the years they’ve been actively searching for people to assimilate. In my travels until now, about the worst I’ve run into are groups less than ten, and most gangs don’t tend to travel like the Saints.”

“Good,” she said, relieved. “They scare the hell out of me.”

“Me too,” he agreed, “but keep in mind, it only takes one person sneaking up to kill you.”

“I’m learning,” she replied. She paused in thought before continuing.

“I want you to know I appreciate how patient you are with us. Uncle Willie made fun of us for studying the books. We know how to talk better, but we have some bad habits because there wasn’t any reason to talk better … Another thing I haven’t gotten around to is thanking you for what you did the day the men were—”

He raised his hand to interrupt her. “Beth, I don’t need to be thanked for doing what any decent man should do. I’ll tell you what I’m thankful for. I’m glad I’m not alone anymore. Aside from my wife and boys, you are the best people I’ve ever known. We all got lucky I came along when I did.”

“You’re a good man Jake Markett. Sometimes I feel like…,” she cut her sentence short.

“Feel like what?” he prompted.

“Nothing, just a thought,” she replied, avoiding an answer. She stood and went to the cooking area to tidy. Janie was working the crank of the generator and was doing a surprisingly good job turning it.

Jake checked the solar panel output with a meter. He busied himself with other items from the pawnshop. As he worked, he strained to hear the sound of engines running or other noises to indicate people were in the area.

After a while, to the kids’ relief, Jake decided they’d cranked the generator enough. He removed the batteries from the holder and inserted two each into four, two-way radios.

The power light lit on all but one. He switched batteries from another one and it lit. By shuffling the batteries around, he found the battery that hadn’t taken a charge. After some basic instructions on radio etiquette, he let them practice with them.

“These radios have a range of about two miles, not bad for such small units. We have two sets that are more powerful but I haven’t rigged a charger for them yet. They have their own internal batteries, a new kind they invented a few years before the plague. They’re supposed to last practically forever.”

“I like these radios,” Al said. “It’ll sure make it easy to travel tonight.”

A little later Jake insisted the three of them get some sleep while he stood guard. He decided to forgo Al’s tree limb, and went closer to the road to watch. As he relaxed into a comfortable position, he noticed how nice the day was.

He loved nature, and the warm Georgia sunshine felt good on his back. The sky was a solid blue dome and birds were chirping and singing. Again, he marveled at how the plants and animals had survived the long winter.

A long time ago, in another life, he read a book called ‘The Earth Abides’. The proof was evident all around him, and since the death of most humans, even the air was cleaner.

After three hours, he caught himself nodding off and returned to camp to find Al awake.

“What’s the matter, Al, you couldn’t sleep?”

“I woke a minute ago. I was about to come let you get some rest. Did you see anything?”

“No,” Jake replied, “but I’m glad you’re up. I caught myself nodding off. If you get tired, come and wake Beth.”

Jake adjusted the solar panel before lying down.

*

Beth awoke. Seeing Jake and Janie were sleeping, she stealthily made her way to where Al was keeping watch near the road. She gave him a good startle when she touched his shoulder.

“Don’t do that, Beth, you scared me.”

She sat on the ground beside him. “I shouldn’t be able to sneak up on you.”

“Well you did,” he said. “Are they awake?”

“No. Jake hasn’t had much sleep, and Janie wore herself out cranking the battery thing. Besides, I want to talk to you about some things Jake told me.”

“Tell me while I keep watching. I thought I heard something a while ago.”

“What did you hear?”

“Sounded like voices from up the road,” he said. “It’s probably nothing. Every time I have guard I think I hear things.”

“You scared most of the time too?” Beth asked.

“When I’m by myself, like when it’s my turn to scout ahead. As soon as I get far away I start shaking.”

“If you want me to, I can talk to Jake so just us can do the scouting tonight.”

“No, I’ll take my turns. I know you said something to him about me. I’m a man now and I need to act like one. Anyways, we’ll be far away from that Saint guy pretty soon.”

“You’re not a man yet,” Beth asserted. “I told him to use me mostly. I’m older and meaner. Learn from him, but don’t be like him. The best thing about you is how good you are. You and Janie kept me strong in the bad times.” She paused for a moment in thought.

“Lately I been feeling better, like I’m stronger and I’m wider awake than I used to be. Even Janie’s looking better.”

“I‘ve been feeling different too. We’ve been eating more.”

“Probably it, but we only been with him five days … Al, do you trust Jake?”

“I guess so. He’s been good to us. I like him.”

“I think I do too. He don’t look at me like Uncle Willie did.”

“Jake said not to say don’t,” Al reminded her. “Anyway, Willie left you alone after you told him you’d cut off his pecker while he was sleeping if he bothered any of us.”

Beth had to smile. “It didn’t stop him from looking though. Jake seems like he’s only got one thing on his mind, and that’s getting to the place Janie calls Heaven.”

“I wonder what Heaven’s going to be like,” Al said. “I hope it’s a place where we can stay and not be scared.”

“He told us it is, and he told me we won’t be by ourselves there. Some other folks are joining with him.”

“Who?”

“He said he’d tell us about it tomorrow. Al, sometimes I feel like we don’t know anything. Mamma and Daddy didn’t know anything either.”

“Mamma was smart,” Al replied defensively.

“Yes she was, they both were, but we were stuck down here in the country, and after the television and radio stations quit working, they didn’t know what was happening to the world. I listen to everything Jake says. He was involved in something at the university he comes…came from. It has something to do with what happened back then, maybe dangerous things.”

“Do you think we shouldn’t go with him?”

“No,” Beth replied with certainty, “I’m just thinking if we get there, and Jake and those folk he’s meeting are doing something might be dangerous to us, we may have to leave out on our own.”

“We’ll know when we get there, won’t we?”

“I just thought maybe we should keep our eyes open for a safe place along the way, just so we’d have a place if we decided we needed one. We’ll keep learning everything we can from him. If you learn something I don’t know, you tell me, and I’ll do the same for you.”

“All right,” he agreed. “I think it’s about time to wake him, the sun’s getting pretty low.”

“We will in a minute. Let me tell you about what happened to his family. You need to know about teeny tiny monster machines he's infected with. I’m thinking maybe us too. There's other weird stuff he told me. He grew a new arm … and an eye.”

*

Jake awoke with a start. For a moment, he could still smell the stink of burning flesh, and feel the rage coursing through his mind. His eyes popped open to see Janie jumping back from him.

“It’s me, Jake,” she said, beginning to tear. “You were making bad noises.”

“It’s okay, honey,” he said, trying to calm her and escape from the remnants of his nightmare at the same time, “I was having a bad dream again.”

“You said you’d kill me.”

“I wasn’t talking to you. I was talking to the bad people in my dream.”

“You scared me.”

“I’m sorry, you know I’d never hurt you,” he said. Tell you what, next time I’m making bad noises you get Beth or Al to wake me.”

“I will. I shudda’ used a long stick like Beth said.”

“Are you hungry?” He asked to distract her.

“I’m always hungry,’ she replied, “’cause I’m skinny as a rail.”

To his relief, Beth and Al came into the camp area.

“Any sign of Saint’s men?” Jake asked.

“Al thought he heard voices,” Beth replied, “but we listened and didn’t hear anything again.”

“I wasn’t sure I heard anything,” Al clarified.

“When you’re keeping watch it’s easy to get false alarms.” Jake said.

“Probably because we keep straining to hear something. I guess we’re getting to be jumpy like you,” Beth agreed, smiling to let him know she was joking. “Al and I were talking about you down by the road. Do you remember when you asked me if we were friends? Well we are. We like you Jake, and we trust you.”

“Thank you,” he responded with a smile to match hers, “I promise I’ll never do anything to violate that trust.”

Beth started laughing. “Can’t you say something simple like, ‘I like you too?” You’re always so serious.”

“I suppose I am,” he replied with a chuckle, “but I do mean what I said, and to paraphrase, I like you all too.”

“I guess we need to eat and get ready,” Al suggested. “Beth told me about the new trail we’re going to look for.”

“Jake, how long will it take us to get to Heaven?” Janie asked.

“It’s hard to know for sure, honey,” he replied. “To be safe, I’d say at least twenty days, maybe even longer. We’ll be carrying a lot of weight, and your legs are pretty short.”

“I’ll walk fast and you can carry me sometimes. You carry me good.”

He had to chuckle, knowing how heavy the little bit of a girl could get after you carried her long enough. “Even so, it’s going to take a while, but as long as we keep going we will definitely get there.”

*

They were almost to the place where the utility line cut crossed the road. Al was taking his turn scouting ahead while the others waited. They heard men gunfire and men shouting.

“There he goes.”

“Don’t shoot him fool, Saint wants him alive.”

“I’ve got him. Shit! He bit me!”

“Git him Ralph.”

“I’ve got him. Grab his arm. Shit! He bit me again!”

“Hold him, don’t kill him.”

Beth was frantic. “They got Al.”

“Calm down,” Jake said in a coarse whisper. “Take Janie into the woods and hide. Stay there till I get back.”

He allowed his pack to drop to the ground, thumbed the safety off his rifle and raced towards the curve in the road where the altercation occurred. He slacked his pace when he got close to the bend and made his way cautiously forward. As he drew near, he could hear the men speaking and the sound of blows delivered.

“Where’re the rest of ‘em boy?”

Another voice spoke.

“You better talk to him, boy. I’ll beat the shit outta you.”

Al was pinned to the pavement by two large men holding his arms and legs. A third was sitting on Al’s belly, raining blows and slaps to his face to punctuate his questioning. A longhaired fat man was standing over them, asking more questions.

Jake’s rage surged. His nightmare awoke and overlaid the reality of the moment. Demons from his past were present, only this time he was going to save his family. He brought his rifle to bear, targeting the fat man. The man saw him, but had no time to react before a bullet entered his chest, dropping him like a stone. Tossing the rifle for fear of hitting Al, Jake stormed forward, pistol drawn.

He was among them before they could regain their wits, putting a round in the head of the man sitting on Al. He shot another of the assailants in the chest. He was turning to target the fourth man, but had to retarget the fat man who trying to get to his feet, clawing for the pistol holstered to his hip. Jake shot him in the face.

The last man took advantage of this delay and ran down the road in the direction Jake had come from. Jake fired twice as he gave chase, but the man was dodging and weaving, running for his life. Both shots missed.

As the man passed where the girls were hiding, Beth burst from the trees, firing her pistol as she ran towards him. He screamed in agony and lurched into her. She fired her pistol again as they fell. They landed with him on top, her arm pinned in such a way she could only shoot him in the side. She continued firing until her clip was empty, converting his scream to an unbroken squall of agony.

Jake was there. He yanked him off of her and put a bullet in his temple, killing him instantly. Beth scrambled to her feet.

“Are you all right?” he asked, looking at her blood soaked clothing.

“Yeah, the blood’s his. Where’s Al? What happened to him?”

“I think he’s okay. Stay with Janie, I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Jake ran, worried because he didn’t see Al coming. As he drew near, he could hear him moaning and saw he was still on his back. Al attempted to sit, but fell back with a low cry.

“The man broke my leg when he jumped me,” he said, his voice filled with pain. “I heard it snap.”

Jake squatted beside him. Al’s lips were split and bleeding and lumps were forming on his face. “Where do you think it broke?”

“Over there where he first got me.”

“Which leg, where?” Jake clarified.

“This leg here,” he said, gingerly touching the middle of his left thigh.

Jake slit Al’s pants leg with his knife and gently examined the thin leg.

“You heard it break?”

“Sounded like breaking a piece of wood. It hurts, Jake.”

“I know it does. At least it’s not a compound fracture, but I’m going to have to hurt you some more. After I drag these men off the road, I’ll have to drag you too. I can’t risk bending your leg... Then I’ll have to go to where your sisters are, and move one more body. As soon as it’s done we’ll come back here.”

“Just hurry, I don’t like being out here like this.”

He dragged the dead men into the high brush, grunting with the effort required to move the fat one. He had Al stretch his arms over his head and drug him through the same break in the brush. Al yelped a couple times, but not very loudly.

Jake ran back down the road and began dragging the last man. Beth came from hiding to help him and they made short work of concealing him.

“Beth, you and Janie grab your packs. As soon as you round the bend, you’ll see a break in the brush on the right side where I drug the bodies out of sight. Al’s in there too.”

“Is he okay?”

“He’s got a broken leg, and he’s beat up, but he’s alive.”

Jake took time to straighten the brush they had disturbed hiding the body. He moved to the other side of the road and straightened the brush Beth and Janie had disturbed, grabbed his pack, and hurried to the bend. He could hear Al, still moaning. Again, he took time to straighten the brush, working backwards to where Beth and Janie were kneeling beside their brother.

“His face,” Beth said with concern, “it’s swelling something awful where they hit him, and his mouth’s bleeding. I think they knocked some of his teeth loose.”

“I’ll look, but not right now. We have to get ready. They must have dropped these men off earlier hoping someone would fall into their ambush. Somebody’s sure to come eventually to relieve them. For all we know there may be others in the area who heard the ruckus.”

“Al can’t walk,” Beth stated.

“We’ll deal with it. I hate to take time, but you and I need to clean the blood off the pavement in case someone did hear the commotion and come before we’re ready. There’s not much, but enough to notice.”

Beth and Jake swabbed the blood from the pavement using bath towels and water from their canteens.

“This is bad isn’t it?” Beth asked as they worked.

“You know it is,” Jake replied, “John Saint may move his entire crew to hunt us down. By my count we’ve already killed twenty of his gang.”

“Do you have a plan?”

“Yeah, I do. We pray no one else is in the area to hear the ruckus. We’re going to play the ambush game too. We’ll kill whoever comes to relieve these people. Al’s broken leg complicates things. We need a vehicle.” Jake stood and reached to give Beth a hand. “That’s good enough.”

“What next boss?” Beth asked, holding the bloody towels out from her body in disgust.

“We make sure Janie knows she has to stay near Al, no matter how long we’re gone. I have some morphine injectors in my pack. He’s going to need one.”

Jake rummaged in his pack, while Beth, after throwing the bloody towels towards the dead men, engaged Janie, speaking in very serious tones. He tossed two towelettes to Beth and continued rummaging. After half emptying the pack he removed a plastic box filled with military issue squeeze tube units of morphine. Each tube had a sterile needle attached. He removed three and went to where Al lay quietly moaning as Beth gently cleaned his face.

“How are you doing, Champ?”

“My leg hurts, Jake.”

“I know it does. Your femur’s broken. It’s one of the biggest bones in your body. I’ve known grown men who cried like babies from that kind of pain.”

“The only reason I’m not is ‘cause Janie’s scared.”

“I’ve got something to help you,” he held one of the tubes where Al could see it. “Watch what I do. You hold it like this and bend it until it snaps.”

“I heard it snap,” he said. “It sounded like my leg breaking.”

Jake chuckled. “You’ve still got a sense of humor.”

“I wasn’t trying to be funny.”

“I know you weren’t,” Jake replied with sympathy. “Now watch, next you twist and pull the plastic cap off…this is going to sting…jab it straight in your leg like this.” Jake demonstrated by bracing Al’s broken leg and plunging the needle into the leg just below the hip. Al yelped in pain. “Then you squeeze the tube hard and pull it out when you’re finished.”

“That hurt,” Al, said angrily. “Why’d you stab me?”

“Count to twenty,” Jake instructed.

“What?”

“Just count,” Jake repeated.

Al began to count, but stopped when he got to eleven.

“I don’t hurt as much,” he said in amazement.

“That’s the beauty of morphine,” Jake said. “All the pain will be gone in a few minutes. I’m going to leave two of these with you. In about three hours or so, the pain will come back and you’re going to want another shot. Hold off doing it until you have to, because I don’t know how long we’ll be gone.”

Al turned his head to spit blood. “Where ya’ll going?” he asked worriedly.

“Not far, only a few hundred feet down the road. We need transportation. Beth and I are going to ambush whoever comes to relieve these guys and take their vehicle.”

Jake stood and went to where Beth was talking to Janie.

“We need to go,” he said. “She understands to stay here and keep quiet till we get back?”

“I know,” Janie answered for herself, “and I’m going to be brave like Beth says, but ya’ll need to stop leaving me and Al by ourselves.”

“Let’s hope this is the last time,” Jake said. “I know this is scary, but Beth and I are going to make it better. Would you mind putting the things back in my pack?”

He turned to Beth. “Grab your AK and a spare clip. Put a fresh clip in your pistol, get a full canteen and let’s do this.”

They returned to where Beth shot the man.

“I hate to say it, but we need to drag him back to the middle of the road.”

“We just finished dragging him off,” she said in exasperation.

“I know. I’m at a disadvantage here. Things keep happening and I’m making plans as I go. We need him out here as bait so whoever comes along will see him and stop.”

“Okay, okay, I see. Let’s get it done,” she said with a harsh tone. “I’m ready to kill some more of them sons a bitches.”

“Christ girl,” Jake said, surprised at the venom in her declaration. “You need to calm down.”

“Don’t you tell me to calm down,” she said, even more harshly. “I mean what I say. I want to kill them.” Her wild expression was enough to frighten even him.

“I mean calm down enough so we can do this without getting killed ourselves,” he said, in an attempt at placating her, “I know you hate them for what they’ve done to you three, but learn to hate in cold blood. We’ve got a job to do and we need to do it right for their sake.”

Beth made a visible effort to pull her emotions in check. “You want to kill them too, I see it in your face, but you’re right, I’m so mad all I can think about is pulling the trigger.”

“Mostly what you see is anger at myself. I should have listened to you and went cross country,” Jake said.

“Yeah, you should have... but who knows. We're almost at that shortcut. We could have come across that bunch anyway.”

They positioned the dead man in the center of the road where a vehicle coming from either direction would see it and have to stop. Jake took time picking positions for the ambush.

“I’ll be at my spot on the other side of the road. They’ll stop in front of the dead man. I hope they only send one truck, but there may be more.”

“How will I know when to start shooting?” Beth asked. She was much calmer.

“When I start shooting,” he answered. If you see a vehicle with someone still in the driver’s seat, shoot him first, otherwise, shoot at whoever is closest to you. Don’t stop shooting until everyone you can see is dead. I’ll do the same. Are you sure you’re good enough with a rifle to do this?”

“Daddy taught me and you’d best believe I’m good enough. I damn sure won’t stop till they’re dead.”

“Good, we don’t want anyone getting back to Saint. We need as much of a head start as we can get.”

CHAPTER 7

They settled down to wait. Clouds rolled in, and the night turned chilly. Hours later, shortly after sunrise, Jake heard the sound of an engine approaching.

“This is it,” he called to Beth, making sure she was awake. “They’re coming.”

Luck was with them and only one vehicle came into view. It was a military pickup with a canvas-covered cargo area. There were two men in the cab of the truck. The driver swerved and came to a stop beside the dead man. The canvas sides made it impossible to tell if anyone was in the back bed.

The man in the passenger’s seat got out cautiously, and stepped to the front to inspect the body, pulling a pistol from the holster at his hip as he moved. After kicking the body to make sure it was dead, he stood for a long moment observing the area.

“Okay, it’s clear,” he called out. “Let’s get him loaded and report back.”

The driver stayed put, but two big men climbed over the tailgate and joined him at the front. They had rifles slung over their shoulders and pistols like the first man.

“What about Ralph and the—.”

The bark of Jake’s rifle cut his sentence short. From his position, Jake could only see the driver’s arm and shoulder, so he targeted the man giving the orders, and shot him in the head.

A shot rang out as he swung to acquire another target. He fired his rifle, and another shot rang out. The two remaining men fell to the ground, one of them screaming and clutching his belly.

Jake broke cover as another shot rang out and the screaming stopped. Beth fired several more rounds into the downed men as he rushed to the driver’s door, pistol drawn. One glance at the small hole in the plastiglass windshield and driver’s brains splattered around what was left of the rear window, told him Beth had followed his instructions. The microphone of the dash-mounted radio was still in its berth.

Jake checked the other three bodies. They were dead. He heard thumping noises from the rear of the truck. As he turned to check it out, he saw Beth burst from concealment.

“Stay back and be ready,” he called out. “There’s somebody in the truck.”

Beth stopped in her tracks and brought her rifle to bear.

“No, don’t shoot,” he called again, “let me check it out.”

Jake returned to the front of the truck and squatted in order to have the metal of the engine shielding him from the back of the truck.

“Whoever is in the truck, throw out your weapons,” he shouted.

No weapons were thrown, but he did hear several more loud thumps.

“I mean it. There are eight men out here ready to cut this truck to ribbons. THROW OUT YOUR WEAPONS NOW!”

The thumping became stronger and faster paced. Jake gave Beth a cautionary wave. Keeping low, he worked slowly around to the back of the truck. Once there he popped up for a quick look, popped back down, then popped right back up.

“Come on over Beth,” he called, before climbing over the tailgate into the truck. A few seconds later, he scrambled frantically back out, almost falling onto Beth as she joined him.

“There’s a lady in there,” she said.

“Yeah,” Jake replied, rubbing his chin, “a crazy lady who tried to kick my head off.”

“She’s roped, and got a rag tied around her mouth. She’s probably scared half to death.”

“Well Beth, why don’t you climb in there and untie her. Watch out though, she can kick.”

Beth stepped onto the trailer hitch protruding from the bumper of the truck and leaned in over the tailgate.

“Lady, we ain…, don’t have much time. My brother's hurt and we need to get out of here. Don’t you be kicking at me!”

She responded by kicking the floorboards and uttering muffled words through the gag.

Beth climbed into the truck. Jake, worried about how much time was passing, went to the cab and dumped the driver onto the pavement.

Using a jacket he found on the seat, he swabbed away most of the gore. He felt the truck bouncing, and Beth came around to the driver’s side, a woman with a badly bruised face close behind her.

“This lady here is Agnes,” Beth said.

“I’m glad to meet you Agnes,” Jake responded. “You’ll have to forgive us, but we don’t have time to talk. We’ve got a boy with a broken leg we need to pick up, and we have to put some distance from this place. Do you have any injuries that need immediate attention?”

“I’m fine,” she responded. “Let me know what I can do to help.”

Jake tossed the jacket onto the pavement, cranked the truck and waited until the others were in. He drove rapidly to the bend in the road, shut the engine, and jumped out. Beth and Agnes joined him.

“Okay,” he said, “let’s get Al and our stuff loaded in a hurry.”

He led the way to where the kids were hiding. Al was sitting, his back braced by their packs. Jake ordered Janie to the edge of the road to stand guard.

“I’m sure glad to see ya’ll,” Al said, his voice laced with pain.

Jake went to him. “Are you out of morphine?”

“No, I’ve got one left. I was about to use it when we heard the shooting start. The last one put me to sleep and I was afraid to take it.”

“You can do it now, you’ll be glad you did when we move you.”

Jake turned to the others. “Let’s load up, don’t worry about being careful. It doesn’t matter if they find these bodies.”

They moved the packs in one trip and returned for Al. It was obvious he had taken his injection. His face no longer twisted in pain.

“We’re going to move you now,” Jake told him. “We’ll try not to hurt you son, I’ll find some place safe and get you better, just bear the pain as best you can.

“Let’s get him to the truck. We don’t want to bend his leg. I’m hoping it’s only fractured.” Jake turned, startled by a sound from behind him. Agnes was holding Al's rifle. The sound he heard was her releasing the clip and ejecting the chambered round.

She squatted beside Jake, handing him the clip and bullet. “We need to splint this boy's leg before he's moved. Judging from the bend, it’s broken, but it's not a compound fracture. Let's keep it that way. His rifle will serve well enough. We need some ties to bind it to his leg.”

Jake asked, “Are you a nurse?”

“Fifteen years of service,” she responded proudly.

“You have no idea how glad I am to hear that,” Jake said.

Using strips torn from one of Jake’s undershirts, it took only moments to secure Al's leg. He screamed as Agnes used her hands to force the leg straight so Beth could secure it to the makeshift splint. Together, they lifted him carefully into the bed of the truck. Janie helped by making sure they didn’t bump his head.

“Beth, you and Janie ride in front with me. Agnes, would you mind riding back here and make sure he doesn’t roll around?”

Agnes climbed into the back of the truck. Jake latched the tailgate and hustled Beth and Janie into the cab. He drove as fast as he could while taking into consideration he had passengers in the back.

From the crushed plants on the road, he could tell other trucks had driven even further than the ambush point. Within minutes, he slowed and stopped at a shallow, wide creek that passed through a double culvert under the road. He got out and surveyed the creek, noting the slant of the graveled embankment and the depth of the slowly flowing water. He returned to the cab and backed the truck several yards.

“What are you doing?” Beth asked.

“Maybe wasting time, I’m not sure. We need to get off this road. I saw this creek on the map. It crosses the cut not too far along it. If we turn off at the cut from the road, we’ll crush so much brush we may as well put up a sign. By the same token, if we stay on the road, the plants we'll be crushing will lead any pursuit straight to us.”

Jake shifted into four-wheel drive and eased off the roadway into the creek. The truck had no trouble with traction in the gravel bed of the shallow waters. He proceeded until they were out of sight from the road, before once again stopping and climbing out. The water only came to mid-calf.

“Wait while I check to make sure we didn’t leave signs we came this way.”

He used his hands to smooth the shallow marks the truck tires made in the gravel, working backwards from the road to the creek. As he returned, Agnes leaned over the tailgate to get his attention.

“This boy’s leg needs to be set soon,” she said.

“We’ll stop when we find a place to shelter and do what we can for him. Are you okay back here?”

“We’re fine,” she said.

He returned to the cab and continued along the creek bed.

“I’m hungry,” Janie said.

“I know you are, honey,” Jake responded. “We’ll be eating soon. This area’s pretty flat,” he continued, speaking to Beth, “if the creek stays like this we should be at the cut in a few minutes.”

Luck was with them. There was only one spot the water got deep enough to worry the engine could drown out. He kept the RPM’s high, so water couldn’t enter the tailpipe and they made it through.

Abruptly the woods on each side of the creek ended to reveal a wide, relatively clear area.

The massive steel towers supporting transmission lines validated Jake’s guess that the area shown on the map was an electrical right-of-way. The weeds and brush had grown thick, but the only tree growth was sapling pine.

Jake turned left, leaving the creek bed. The truck with its four-wheel drive had no trouble crushing a path. He continued for several more minutes before stopping to climb onto the truck’s cab. After climbing down, he returned to the driver’s seat and twisted around to speak through the blown out rear window.

“We’re on a utility right-of-way that leads to another road further north,” he said to Agnes. “I can’t see the road we were on, so we should be safe for a while. We’re going to get a little further away. When I see a good place, we’ll stop to eat, and set Al’s leg. It’s going to be a rough ride back there. Before we move out would, you mind rummaging through the big backpack? There’s a red plastic container with a bit of jerky in it. Just pass it through the window, the little one’s hungry. A couple bottles of water too. Help yourself to anything you need.”

The rough terrain made for a bumpy, noisy ride. Jake kept the pace slow because the brush might hide big potholes or washouts that could damage the truck.

“Is Al going to be all right?” Beth asked.

“Breaking a femur is very traumatic,” he replied, “but if we get it set and immobilized he should be okay.

They rode in silence as Jake fought the steering wheel. Somehow, Janie managed to fall asleep.

She woke about an hour later and immediately stated she was ‘really’ hungry. Jake told her they would stop as soon as they found a place. A minute later she said, “What about there?” pointing toward a low rise off to the right.

Jake stopped and looked in the direction she’d pointed. He could barely make out some kind of structure tucked in the trees about a hundred yards off the right of way.

“You do have good eyes girl,” he praised her. “This is the second time you’ve spotted something we didn’t see.”

He drove to the edge where the forest began and had the others wait while he went on foot to check out the structure. He found a single story building much longer than it was wide with an elevated covered porch across the entire front. The fact the leaves and other debris covering the steps weren’t disturbed told him no one had entered it in a long time.

The structure Janie had spotted was the pointed cover of a stainless steel water tank mounted on a tower behind the building. Near the tower was a windmill, the blades slowly turning on its own slender tower. At one end of the cabin, a huge propane tank rested on a concrete pad. The only road leading to the building was a badly rutted and overgrown dirt trail.

There was a sign attached to the door stating it was the property of the US Forest Service. On a nail beneath it was a crudely painted and weathered sign warning that anyone breaking in “would be shot.” The locked door opened after several hard kicks.

Inside, he found it to be a shelter, furnished like a barracks with a dozen sturdy cots lined along both sides, each with a footlocker. There was a combination cooking and dining area at the right end near the entrance door. At the other end were several doors, two bearing signs to indicate bathrooms. Jake was satisfied with what he saw and returned to the truck.

“The place is perfect,” he informed them. “I’m going to try to drive there. I'll have to crush though some thickets close to the edge and shove over a few small trees but I think this truck can handle it.”

A couple of the pines blocking the way were big enough that he had to caution Agnes to brace Al as he plowed through them. He backed the truck up to the front porch beside the steps.

Jake, with Agnes helping, used brute force to remove a section of the wood railing. When opened, the tailgate lay almost flat on the wooden surface of the porch. They made quick work unloading their backpacks and bags.

Beth found sheets and blankets in a footlocker and prepared one of the cots for Al. Jake and Agnes carried the cot into the truck bed and lifted the still unconscious boy onto it.

“He doesn’t have much weight,” Agnes said.

Beth and Janie were in the kitchen section heating water. Jake noticed the flame coming from the small range, again amazed a propane tank still held pressure after the years it sat without service.

“We need to get the boys’ leg set and splinted,” Agnes said.

“No better time than the present,” Jake agreed. “What do we need to get it done?”

“First thing we need is something to serve as splints,” she replied. “What he needs is a real cast.”

“I’ll see what I can find,” Jake said.

“Best would be something at least three feet or longer and rounded a bit to match the curve of his thigh,” she elaborated, “otherwise three narrow flat pieces of wood will do.”

Jake searched the cabin for a few minutes. Nothing useful caught his eye so he went outside. He saw something he thought would do and called for Agnes. She joined him on the porch.

“How about the plastic armrests,” he asked, pointing to two oversized folding chairs, “will they work?”

Agnes lifted a chair to inspect the rounded armrests. “Someone huge must have planned on being here. This is the biggest lawn chair I've ever seen. The armrests are wide enough, and they look like they’ll go from his crotch to his foot. Do you think we could use heat to bend them open a little further and maybe flatten one end so I can immobilize his foot too?”

“As long as we take it slow,” Jake replied.

“Two of these would be perfect. If you can open them, they will almost encase his skinny little leg... I have to ask you. How come you’re so much healthier than them?”

“They’ve only been with me a few days.”

“That’s good to know. If they were in their condition because of your neglect, I’d have to kill you. You have any pliers in your pack?”

“You could have mitigated that with a smile,” Jake responded, “but I respect your position. I’ve got a folding tool pouch.”

“Not a smiling subject,” she told him without a smile.

He returned with the tool pouch and Agnes began removing the armrests from the chair. This was the first real chance he had to look at her. What he saw was impressive. She was strongly built, not fat, just well muscled. Her reddish brown hair, graying at the temples, was cut short and parted as a man would. She was a bit shorter than his five feet eleven inches. Her face, peppered with freckles, while not unappealing, held a hard quality that didn’t attract him.

There was bruising on the left side of her face and neck, and she had a large lump on her forehead just above her right eye. The tissues around the eye were already darkening and swelling with the promise of a black eye.

She glanced from her work and noticed him staring at her. “How old are you Jake? That is your name, right?”

“Yes it is. To answer your question I’m forty-six. Why do you ask?”

“Just asking,” she replied. “You seem younger. I would have guessed less than forty. You’re not too old to be interested in women, are you?”

He chuckled at the question. “I’m a little too involved with staying alive to be thinking about sex.”

“Good,” she said, “but so you know, I don’t go for men. I swing the other way.”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Jake said.

“I like being up front about things.” She finished removing the second armrest from the chair. “You need to cut the end caps off these. I’m going to see what other damage those bastards did to the boy.”

“I’ll take care of the ends,” he agreed, glad she changed the subject.

Agnes went in while Jake remained to cut the end caps from the armrests. He didn’t have a saw, and it took some time using a knife, scoring his cuts repeatedly.

When he returned inside, Agnes and Beth were in deep conversation by the gas range. Janie was in a chair beside Al’s cot. Al was awake and sitting, his back propped with several pillows against the metal headboard. Jake moved a chair and sat on the other side.

“How are you feeling champ?” he asked as he leaned over to place a hand to his forehead.

“Okay I guess, the medicine makes me feel better,” Al replied, his swollen lips distorting his words. “Agnes said they knocked some of my teeth loose, but they’re not broke. My lip’s cut from them hitting me. Funny thing is I know my leg still hurts. I can sort of feel it hurting in my mind.”

“You don’t seem to be running a fever,” Jake said. “I think you’re going to live a while yet. After we eat, Agnes and I are going to set your leg.”

“How long do you think it will be until I can walk?” Al asked. “I don’t want to slow us down getting to Heaven.”

“It’s going to take at least thirty, maybe forty days for your leg to heal, maybe longer.

“That’s a long time,” Janie said. “Are we going to stay here?”

“We’re still too close to the Saints, aren’t we?” Al asked.

“We just got here,” Jake said, responding to both questions. “Let’s eat and get your leg set, and then we’ll have time to consider our options.” He went to join Beth and Agnes seated at a table in the kitchen area.

Jake leaned over the pot simmering on the range.

“This smells good. What are we having?”

“The last package of spaghetti mixed with two packages of macaroni and cheese with some of your rice thrown in,” Beth replied. “We’re hungry.”

“There’s an unopened jar of instant coffee in one of the cabinets,” Agnes said. “I think I’d like a cup, how about you Jake?”

“You have no idea how good that sounds. If you don’t mind, I’ll take it on the porch and my supper too. I need to keep watch for anything happening out there.”

“No problem,” Agnes said. “After we eat, Beth can spell you while we set the boy’s leg. I’ll bring the coffee out. The food’s almost ready.”

Jake went out and sat in the chair they hadn’t dismantled. The sky was still overcast with low grey clouds, but the morning chill had given way to nice pervading warmth and he instantly felt like nodding off. He stood and took some deep breaths, trying to energize himself. The woods around the cabin cut off much of a view, all he could do was watch the immediate area and listen for voices or vehicles. Thankfully, Agnes appeared within minutes with his food and a steaming cup of coffee.

“Bless you,” he said, reaching for the coffee, “you have no idea how badly I need this.”

“Oh, I think I do,” she replied, setting his plate on the porch rail. “Beth has been telling me about your adventures over the past few days. That’s a bad pack of animals in the neighborhood.”

“You know it.”

“Give me a minute Jake, I’ll grab my plate and cup and join you.”

Agnes returned and sat on the floor of the porch. Jake took his plate and cup from the porch rail and joined her.

“Where did you meet with those men?” Jake asked.

“You want the long story or short?”

“You’re the one telling it.”

“Annie and I, that was my wife’s name, we had a small place about six miles west of Colquitt. She loved growing things. She turned our three acres into the prettiest place you ever saw. She had a way with plants.”

Agnes paused to gingerly wipe away a tear forming in the corner of her damaged eye. She took a deep breath before continuing.

“Sorry about that, you people are the first I’ve talked to in over a year and telling this hurts. Anyway, I thought I was being careful. We had a run in with two men, an Asian and a black man. This was about two years ago. They thought we’d be easy pickings.

“The Asian had some martial training and he slowed me down. I killed him with my hands. The other bastard was holding Annie with a gun at her head. When he saw me break the Asian’s neck, he shot her. He should have shot me first. My ankle was sprained from the fight with the Asian and that slowed me, but I got to him and managed to disarm the son of a bitch. I know I hurt him as he was running away. I threw a rock and caught him in the back of his head but he didn’t go down. Annie was hurt bad...  bleeding...” Agnes voice broke but she still held her tears. “I did everything I knew, but she died three days later.”

“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Jake said with a catch in his voice. “It hurts so much when you lose someone you love. I wish you could have killed the other one. I hate it when vermin get away.”

“Thank you Jake, but as I was saying, that taught me to keep a low profile, but I guess it wasn’t low enough. I woke last night with those four men in the house. I fought, but in the end, they got me. They beat and raped me, and then beat me some more because I kept spitting on them.”

“You’re a feisty son of a bitch aren’t you?” Jake said, laughing.

Agnes gave Jake a look, and couldn’t help laughing herself.

“I guess I am closer to a son of a bitch than I am a daughter, even though Mom wasn’t a bitch. You’re kind of easy aren’t you? You didn’t blink an eye when I mentioned my wife and I’ve noticed you don’t let things that happen get in the way of your common sense. You don’t panic.”

“That's not true. I've been kicking myself since were drove away from the place where they attacked Al. We should have loaded those men's weapons and ammo so you'd be armed too. Believe me I panic as much as the next person.”

“Not so it shows. I was prepared to not like you, and not because I’m gay. Since the plague, men in general have dropped to animal status, plain out brutes. I made the mistake of lumping you in there with them. Beth told me about the last few days since you rescued them. She thinks you’re the best thing on two feet. You’re a blessing for these kids.”

“It may be the other way around, Agnes.”

“Be that as it may, I respect you for what you’ve done for them and for me too. Janie told me, please forgive me if I smile, you’re taking them to Heaven. If you wouldn’t mind a middle-aged lesbian along, I think I’d like to go to Heaven too.” She gave up and burst out laughing. “Oh, Jesus, laughing makes my face hurt.”

“It is kind of funny when you say it like that,” Jake said. The real name of the place we’re going is Haven. Janie has the others calling it Heaven, but seriously, you’re more than welcome to travel with us. It can’t hurt to have a nurse handy.”

Agnes stopped laughing. “Speaking of nursing, we need to get to work on the boy’s leg. The modern way, with a break like this would be to operate and insert a pin. The old-fashioned way was a cast from the hip to the foot to totally immobilize the leg and keep the muscles and tendons from pulling the leg out of alignment. We’re doing it the primitive way, and it’s going to take constant attention with the padding and bindings to keep his leg straight, and not cause sores to form. I’m telling you this so you can take those facts into account with any plans you’re making.”

“Thank you. That is something I need to keep in mind.”

“Let’s get at it then. The sooner we set it the sooner it can start healing. I’ll send Beth out to relieve you.”

It took almost an hour to gently warm the plastic armrests over the flame of the range to make them pliable. Eventually Jake was satisfied the sides were opened properly to fit the curves of Al’s leg. Agnes double-checked and had him flare the knee sections a little further.

Agnes used the time to get Al prepped. When Jake joined her, Al was almost nodding off. Janie was sitting in the chair watching everything. She stood as Jake came over.

“I think I’m old enough to watch for bad guys. Beth should be in here to help ya’ll.”

“You know what, I think you are old enough,” Jake agreed, “and besides, you have the best eyes.”

“I got good ears too,” she said as she rose to leave.

Beth joined them, and Agnes got down to business.

“Jake, there’s a rope by the back door. You need to tie it around Al’s chest and to the head rail of the cot. Tie it so you can brace against the foot of the bed and pull his leg without being able to drag him. Beth, he’ll need your help moving him.”

While they were doing that, Agnes ripped several bed sheets into strips. After they secured Al to the metal head frame, she had them remove his pants. The upper part of his leg was swollen and bruised and his thigh was bent slightly inward.

“It’s a good thing you had morphine,” Agnes said. “Otherwise this boy would be in a world of pain in a few minutes. I gave him as much as I’m comfortable with.”

“What do you need us to do?” Jake asked.

“He has a simple clean break of the femur bone,” she replied. “He’s so skinny I can feel the bone easily enough. The break’s offset, but thankfully, the ends are still sitting on each other, so there won’t be a lot of damage to the surrounding tissue. What I need you to do Jake, when we’re ready, is to provide a steady straight pull to the leg while I force the ends of the break into each other.”

“I can hear ya’ll talk,” Al said dopily. “This is going to hurt ain’t it?”

“Sorry about that Al, I was getting all clinical there,” Agnes put her hand on his arm. “Even with the morphine this is going to hurt worse than when it broke.”

“What if it hurts so bad I scream. People might hear me.”

Jake gave him a pillow from another bed.

“Hold the pillow over your mouth and scream all you like.”

“How long will it take?” Al asked, addressing Agnes.

“Not long once we get started.”

“How hard do I need to pull?” Jake asked.

“Damned hard,” she replied. His thigh muscles and tendons are tight with trauma. You’ll be surprised how hard it’ll be to stretch them.”

“What do I need to do?” Beth asked.

“Hold against his leg opposite where I push. When the bone is set, the muscles will pull back and hold the ends in place. We’ll have Jake keep the leg stretched, and you can help me wrap these padding strips, and hold the splints in place while I bind them.”

“Are we ready to do this?” Jake asked.

“Why don’t we stretch and breathe a minute before we start.”

“Good idea,” he said. “How many bones have you set?”

“None,” she replied, “I’m only a nurse, remember. I’ve assisted in several, though, and I know what I’m doing.”

“We believe you,” Jake said. “This is the first time for me too.”

“Pay close attention to what I do,” she said grimly. “This may not be the last bone you have to set.” She stretched once more, lifting her arms over her head and arching. Her back popped with a loud snap. “That felt good. Let’s do this.”

Jake positioned himself at the foot of the bed and grasped Al’s leg just above the ankle with both hands while Agnes positioned herself beside Al’s leg and began probing his thigh with her fingers.

“Beth, I’m going to need you to wrap your hands around here above the break to hold against me while I push the other end in place. Be prepared to push back only enough to keep me from pushing you,” she instructed. “Okay Jake, when I say now, you start pulling. Don’t jerk the leg, just a steady pull.”

“Got it,” Jake replied.

“Get ready with your pillow, Al. Okay Jake, ready…now.”

Jake braced his knees against the foot of the bed and began pulling while Agnes busied her fingers probing Al’s thigh. The pillow jerked to Al’s face and muffled his cries as he squirmed.

“You need to hold still, Al ... You’ve got to pull a lot harder than that, Jake,” Agnes chided.

“Okay Beth, hold against me. I know this hurts, but you need to breathe, Al.”

Agnes’ forehead broke into a sweat as she pushed at the bone. Al’s body quivered as he tried to obey her command not to move.

“Harder Jake,” she almost shouted, “just a little more, we’re almost there.”

Jake put his might into it and heard a soft nerve-jangling scraping sound followed by a barely audible click.

“That’s it,” Agnes shouted. “Ease the pressure off slowly, not much, only enough to keep the ends together. The poor boy passed out during the last bit, but he’s breathing normal.”

Jake eased off but was still in a strain. Agnes removed the pillow from Al’s face and went back to probing the leg until she was satisfied they had it right.

“Okay, it’s over but the wrapping and tying,” she said, obviously happy with herself.

It took nearly a half hour for Beth and Agnes to wrap several layers of ripped padding smoothly from Al’s foot to his crotch and to bind the homemade splints into place. Jake's arms were burning and trembling with the stress of having to maintain traction the entire time. When she finally told him he could let go, he spent a minute flexing and shaking the kinks out. Still working his arms, he went to the porch to check on Janie.

“Al’s fixed now,” he told her.

“I know. I could hear you in there.”

“Wow, you do have good ears.”

“That’s not all I heard,” she said. “I heard sounds like a truck way back the way we came from. It sounded very far away. I looked in to tell you, but ya’ll were busy with Al, so I just kept listening.”

“Did the engine stop?” he asked, very concerned.

“Yes it did,” she replied. I checked my watch. It was stopped for twelve minutes. Then it went back the way it came from, and kept going until I didn’t hear it no more.”

“Are you sure it went back the way it came from, it didn’t keep going in the same direction?”

“My ears told me it went back.”

Jake breathed a sigh of relief. “You did an excellent job of watching, especially checking how long they stopped. I’m very proud of you.”

Janie’s face beamed in response to the praise. “Can I go see Al now?”

“Absolutely you can, but he’s asleep.”

A short time later, Beth and Agnes, joined him on the porch. Agnes had a steaming cup of coffee in each hand.

“We thought you might be ready for another cup,” Agnes said.

Jake took it gratefully.

“I have to tell you, I’m dead tired,” he said. “Beth and I were awake till dawn waiting for the relief truck to come.”

“I am getting sleepy,” Beth agreed. “I was okay until we finished fixing Al’s leg.”

“Beth, maybe you could make two more cots so you and Jake can get some rest,” Agnes suggested. “I can take guard duty for now.”

“Okay,” she agreed. “Do we need to do anything for Al before we lie down?”

“No, he should be out for a while,” she replied. “When he does wake, he’s going to be in a lot of pain. I left a morphine tube on the chair by his bed where he can reach it.”

Beth left to make the cots. Jake and Agnes sipped their coffee in silence. Jake was deeply feeling the lack of sleep.

“You’re about ready to fall over, Jake. I checked your boy’s rifle and I think the barrel is bent. How about you leave your rifle with me and go in?”

“I don’t think I have a choice,” he agreed. He passed his rifle to her. “You know how to use this?”

“I was born and raised in rural Georgia, what do you think?”

“Just making sure. Janie said she heard a truck stop for a while back where the killing happened. You may want to be closer to the cut in case they dropped people off to search. Wake me if you notice anything odd.”

“I’ve got this covered. Tell your little one she can keep me company if she wants.”

Jakes fell asleep thinking about Agnes’ choice of words.

CHAPTER 8

Jake slept a long time, waking once to the sound of Al in agony. He started to get up, but Janie called out she was giving him an injection.

When he next awoke, the light coming through the windows was dimmer. He smelled something cooking, and it smelled so delicious he had to join Agnes and Beth in the cooking area. They were much cleaner and Agnes was dressed in man’s clothing that was obviously brand new. She had a pistol holstered at her side.

Beth had changed her bloody clothing and looked refreshed. She was turning slices of meat in a big skillet and Agnes was mixing vegetables into a bowl of rice.

“I swear it smells like ham frying, or am I still asleep, dreaming of ham?”

“Oh Jake,” Beth said, “Janie found a door over there none of us noticed because it’s just like the rest of the floor and guess what was in it?”

“A pig and Janie killed it with her bare hands and you two skinned it, cut it up and now we’re having it for supper,” Jake said, smiling.

“Funny, funny,” Agnes said. “Actually there’s a large basement full of goodies, but the best thing down there is shelf after shelf of irradiated canned foods, not to mention crates of MREs and irradiated freeze dried and dehydrated foods. There’s a bunch of firearms down there too. As you can see, I have a pistol and I’ve got a shotgun out on the porch. Lucky for me there’s clothing down there too, mens’, womens’ and childrens’. We haven’t found bones anywhere. I’d bet a group was preparing this place as a refuge, and they died before they could get here.”

“I think you may be right. This place is isolated enough.” Jake responded. “But what a find. Janie’s worth her weight in gold. Al woke me moaning and she’d already given him his shot. Now I hear she’s found the mother-lode of supplies. She deserves some kind of reward!”

“You needn’t worry about that,” Agnes said. “She’s on the porch keeping watch with a big can of chocolate covered cookies. There’s another can open,” she said, nodding towards the table.”

Jake glanced at the table and was tempted, but the smell of the frying ham drew him back.

“Thanks, maybe after supper. How’s Al doing?” he asked, glancing towards Agnes.

“He’s fine, but we’ll be out of morphine in a few days at this rate. There are only eight left. We need to start weaning him off it. I wish we had some antibiotics. His bruising around the break was deep. All we can do is pray infection doesn’t set in.”

“How long will it be before his pain lessens?” Jake asked.

“I think we can wait longer between shots starting tomorrow and only give him a quarter of a tube each time,” she said. “Maybe day after tomorrow we dose him only when the pain gets so bad he can’t stand it.”

“We’ll leave you in charge of nursing,” he said. “We need to get finished with this before it gets much darker,” indicating the food. “We can’t have any light showing while we’re still this close to the road.”

“Reading you loud and clear boss,” Agnes responded. “The food will be ready in less than ten minutes. In the meantime, could you bring some cases of bottled water from the basement?”

When the food was ready, he decided to keep Janie company while he ate, taking her plate with him. He found a very happy young girl with a chocolate covered face.

“You got room left in your belly for some supper?” He asked, noting the empty can beside her chair.

“I’m still hungry,” she said. “I’m always hungry.”

“I know you are,” he replied, “you’re still skinny as a rail.”

“I won’t be if we stay here and eat the food I found. I saw food down there I never even heard of... like the cookies. Can we stay here for a long time Jake, maybe thirty or forty days like you said, until Al’s leg gets better?”

As she was speaking, Agnes and Beth decided they would take their supper with them and were coming out the door.

“That’s a good question,” Agnes said, taking a place beside Janie, on the decking boards. “Have you given it any thought?”

“I have been thinking about it,” he replied, reaching to take Beth’s plate as she sat beside him. “The way I see it, John Saint knows we took the truck after we killed that last bunch. My guess is he’ll figure we high tailed it out of these parts. It’s what a normal person would do. I don’t think it will even cross his mind we stayed this close to the ambush point.”

“So you think we’ll be okay here?” Beth asked.

“I think if we are very, very careful about noise and lights, we may be okay here.”

“Then we’ll have to be careful,” Agnes, said. “I don’t think it would be wise to use the truck with his men out looking for us. It’s too noisy.”

“I agree,” Jake responded, “and by the same token, there’s no way we can travel on foot until Al can walk. Maybe I can make him a pair of crutches, even so, it’s going to be weeks before he can use them.”

“So it’s settled,” Agnes said. “I’d like to make a platform for Al’s leg tomorrow so we can keep it flat and elevated. We’ll also need some sort of frame to rig weights for traction.”

“You draw me a picture and I’ll make it,” Jake said. “I’m not half bad at making things.”

“Somebody’s bragging tonight,” Agnes said.

“Not bragging, ma’am, just stating a fact.”

“Okay, we’ll see tomorrow won’t we,” Agnes said, with a smile.

“Hush a minute,” Janie exclaimed. “Did ya’ll hear that?”

Faintly they heard a low rumbling in the distance.

“It’s thunder,” Beth said.

“You’re right,” Jake agreed. “I hope it means rain is coming. The best thing that could happen right now would be a good gully-washing thunderstorm.”

In answer to his request, there was another roll of thunder a little closer, and moments later, a strong breeze blew in, bending the pines and rustling the branches of the hardwoods surrounding them.

“Wow,” Jake exclaimed, “I think we need to finish eating, and get things ready for tonight. I believe my wish for rain is about to come true.”

“Yes, let’s,” Agnes agreed, “and Janie needs to brush her teeth after eating those cookies, not to mention the chocolate on her face.”

“Do I look like I been sucking a sow again?” Janie asked. The chocolate smeared around her smiling mouth gave her a clownish face.

“You certainly do,” Agnes responded, laughing. “By the way Jake. I checked the tower out back. It took me a minute to figure which valves to turn, but water comes out of the faucets and the toilet works. It’s too smelly to drink, but it’s plenty clean enough for a shower.”

“Lord knows I could use one. I assumed the tank out back would be rusted through by now. The water’s been sitting for almost a decade. It will probably clear up as we use it.”

“Beth and I washed while you were sleeping. We’re going to arrange the bed area and give Janie a good scrubbing.”

The women took the empty plates and water bottles in with them. Jake remained outside, listening to the roll of the thunder getting closer. The wind was getting stronger too. After a few minutes, Beth rejoined him.

“The beds are ready, and Agnes insisted on washing Janie. She loves mothering folks. It sure is sad she lost her kids.”

“She had kids?” Jake asked, confused.

“Two little girls she got from that Haiti place after the earthquake. At least, that’s two black orphans Saint didn’t bury alive. They died from the death, but her wife was killed.”

“Yeah, she told me about her wife but I didn’t know she lost her children too.”

“One was fifteen, and the other one was sixteen when they died. She said they were beautiful. It seems like everybody’s been hurt pretty bad.”

“Everyone has,” Jake agreed. “The death, and the things that happened after, touched every living human on the planet.”

“Do you really think Saint will think we’re not around?”

“Yes I do. Logic would tell him, if we have a truck, we probably took off for parts unknown. I have no doubt he’ll send search parties out every road leading from the ambush site. We’ve killed a lot of his men. The only thing I’m worried about is they may notice the tire tracks don’t continue much further on the road, but maybe they’ll figure we went the other way. A good tracker could figure it out though.”

“So they may be coming this way?”

“If they do have a good tracker it should be soon. We’ll need to keep a strong watch for a few days.”

“Was I cold-blooded enough with the killing this morning?”

“You did a good job.”

“I told you I was a better shot than Al. When he gets well, I don’t want him put where he can get hurt anymore. He’s not a killer like I am.”

“Killing’s not something to be proud of, Beth,” Jake said, somewhat taken aback.

“I’m not proud of killing, but it didn’t bother me none killin’ those men. I know what you’re worried about. You’re afraid I’ll get to liking killing as much as you do.”

Jake thought about what she said. “I won’t deny what you said. I do enjoy killing scum. Every time I do, I feel it’s one less person who will die like my wife and boys. I’d love to get to a place in my soul where I don’t think that way. I guess innocence died with the plague. I know you’re a grown woman, but in one aspect, I’m very much like Agnes, I want to baby the three of you. I am proud of the way you handled yourself this morning. You made every shot count and you picked the right targets. I take back what I said. I’m proud of the fact we killed those men. They deserved killing.”

“Yes they did,” Beth, agreed matter-of-factly. “If you want, you can go wash. I’ll take over out here. ”

Jake did as she suggested. Agnes was getting a squeaky-clean Janie dressed for bed. The thinness of her little naked body made him flinch. Agnes noticed his grimace, and nodded with understanding.

“Use the women's.” she told him, “There’s a candle and matches on the lavatory. You’ll find shampoo in there too.”

The flow of water from the showerhead was cold. He scrubbed fast and dried with a damp towel hanging from a hook, dressed quickly and left the bathroom. Agnes had Janie tucked in and was beside Al’s cot. He was awake and eating. Jake stopped to kiss Janie good night before joining Agnes beside his bed.

“How you feeling Champ?” he asked.

When Al answered, his voice was distorted. “My leg’s throbbing like a rattlesnake bit it, but I’m going to wait as long as I can before I get another shot. It makes the pain better, but I don’t like not knowing what’s happening around me. My jaw hurts where they hit me and it’s hard to eat because my teeth’s all loose. Agnes said we’re going to stay here awhile.”

“Yes we will,” Jake responded, suppressing a resurgence of rage at Al’s condition.

“I’m glad,” he said with relief. “Every time I try to move my leg it hurts like hell, and it itches like bugs are in there chewing on me.”

“Does it feel like ants, and chiggers, and fleas under the wrapping?’ Jake quipped, unable to stifle a laugh.

“That’s not funny, now it’s worse.”

Agnes gave Jake a look. “You’ve got an odd sense of humor.”

“It’s an inside joke, right Champ?” he said, patting Al’s shoulder.

“Yeah, but it’s still not funny. Now it itches even more.”

“Tell you what,” Jake said. “Tomorrow I’ll make you a scratcher stick you can slide under the padding.”

A bright flash, followed by a loud clap of thunder that rattled the cabin, caused them to jump. Al yelped in pain.

“Sounds like we got a real storm coming in,” Jake said. “You might start thinking about going to bed before it gets too dark to see.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Agnes said. “I do expect to pull my guard shift tonight.”

“I’ll send Beth in, and take the first watch.”

As he left, Agnes began positioning padding under Al’s leg to elevate it. Jake, joined Beth, who was standing by the porch rail. A light rain was beginning to fall.

“I’ll take the first watch, and Agnes can have the next,” he said. “You may as well go in to bed.”

“I will in a bit. I’m not sleepy yet, and I love thunderstorms. The sun will be down in a few minutes. Thunderstorms are exciting.”

As if to accent her words, the heavens lit, and a huge thunderclap shook the cabin. A strong gust of wind, filled with a chilly mist blew in. Beth jumped towards Jake, throwing her arms around his neck and clung to him.

“That was close,” she said, her breath caressing his ear as she still clung, her slender frame pressed against him.

Jake gently disengaged from her. “It wasn’t that close,” he said, making conversation to cover a feeling he’d felt with her contact, “the main storm is still a half mile away.”

Beth turned from him, looking out at the rain. “How do you know?” she asked.

“Know what?” he asked, still flustered.

“How far away the storm is?”

“Oh. You count the time between the flash of lightning and the first sound. Light travels almost instantly, but sound only travels about a thousand feet per second. There’s a little over five thousand feet in a mile. Five seconds would put it at about a mile, and a little over two seconds would put it at a half mile.”

Again, lightening flashed and thunder shook the porch and rattled the windows of the cabin. The wind blew a thick sheet of rain directly towards them, forcing them further back under the shelter of the porch roof. Beth pressed herself close beside him.

“That one was about a second,” Beth said, raising her voice above the rising torrent of rain pelting the metal roof

“Means the storm is practically on top of us,” he replied loudly. “I think we can take a night off from guard duty. I can’t imagine anyone being out in a rain like this. Lord knows this old man could use some more rest.”

“You’re not old,” Beth said. She turned and rushed inside, leaving him confused, once again savoring the taste of sweet chocolate in his mouth. “Damn,” he muttered to himself. He stayed out longer.

*

The storm turned out to be the gully washer had Jake wished for. Five full days the winds and thunder shook the cabin. The rain would, according to Agnes, “fizzle to a drizzle”, seem as though it was going to clear and then another storm front would come in, releasing several hours of torrential, thunderous downpour.

Jake, Beth, and Agnes spent many cold miserable hours pulling guard out by the edge of the utility line clearing. Al had several miserable days also. His leg stopped hurting after the second day, but the unbearable itching persisted for several more before finally subsiding.

On the sixth day, the skies cleared, and the sun reappeared as though it had never left. Spring came rushing in behind the clouds. The weather turned perfect, and the days passed smoothly, a week and then a month. Al steadily improved thanks to Agnes’ constant nursing, and the stringent physical therapy she made him endure. Janie’s basement provided a pair of aluminum crutches and Al quickly learned to move around on them like a daredevil.

Janie heard trucks on the highway several more times, but none of them stopped. It seemed, as Jake had suggested, Saint believed they had left the area and was searching further afield.

Because of the food in the basement, Al and Janie were filling out, and it seemed as though they were growing taller by the minute. To Jake’s discomfort, Beth was filling out too, and she was acting differently. He knew what was going on. The way she tied her shirttails across her midriff, the way her hair was growing out, and the pains she took to make it lay perfect, the fact she was always finding ways to be near him, all directed towards getting him to notice her. To make things worse, she was developing all the attributes of a full-grown woman, and it was impossible for him not to notice her.

Agnes Jake aside and set him straight.

“You know Beth’s in love with you?”

“I know she thinks she is,” he responded.

“Nope, she’s in love. You’re all she talks about when you’re not around. The first love is the strongest.”

“I’m doing my best to discourage her,” he replied defensively. “It’s difficult because I don’t want to hurt her feelings.”

“You’re getting me wrong. I’m not chiding you or telling you to discourage her. I’m saying, if you do respond, be sure it’s because you love her.”

“Christ Agnes, she’s only eighteen….”

“She had a birthday last Friday,” Agnes, said, interrupting him, “She’s twenty going on twenty one.”

“She told me she was eighteen,” Jake said, bewildered.

“I know she did. She lied when she first met you, hoping you would consider her too young to harm.”

“But she looked eighteen,” Jake said.

“Malnutrition... she’s developing with a vengeance now.”

“She’s still a child,” he said emphatically.

“Get real Jake,” Agnes said, “In our time, before the death, she would still be a child. In this world, she’s used a gun, and killed people. She’s been a mother for her siblings, not to mention several times raped and victimized. She’s a woman, and you need to treat her with the respect a full grown woman deserves.”

“So tell me how to handle this,” Jake pleaded. “I care for her deeply, and for Al and Janie and yes, you too. I don’t want to hurt or embarrass her.”

“You’re the man here, just flip your mind to where she’s not a child anymore and see where it goes. Treat her as an equal the same way you do me. Who knows, you may even fall in love with her and live happily ever after. I will say this though. If you do, it won’t be a sin. A woman would have to search hard to find a better man. Hell, you’re damned good looking too. I’d probably be chasing you if I wasn’t gay.”

“Jeez, life gets filled with complications no matter how hard you try to avoid them.”

“C’est la vie,” she said, laughing at him. “You can’t tell me you’re not attracted to her. I’ve seen the way you look at her sometimes. You act like the most confused man ever born.”

“I am,” he replied.

*

They profited from the forced delay in many ways. Agnes was highly skilled in several of the martial arts, and had won the regional championship in mixed martial two years in a row, “And I wasn’t fighting in the namby-pamby woman’s division either,” she stated with pride. “The first year I competed against women took care of that. The managers and sponsors sent a rep to ask me to kindly drop out, as I was unfair competition. I agreed, but with the condition, I could fight my weight class in the man’s division. They “agreed” to stop a discrimination suit.”

She held daily classes for them, including Al, even though he could mostly only watch. Jake added to their skills by teaching them several brute force methods of disabling or killing an adversary. Agnes declared them artless, but effective.

Janie found two lightweight compound bows, along with an assortment of practice and hunting arrows in her basement. They took turns practicing with them. Janie soon outstripped them in ability, especially Jake, who had little talent for it. Now Janie always had her bow with her. Agnes made her a quiver large enough to hold a dozen arrows, using the leg from a pair of denim pants and some stiff wire. Janie could put five arrows in or near the bulls-eye of a target at one hundred feet in less than fifteen seconds.

Jake spent time teaching them how to follow someone’s trail and how to conceal one’s own trail. Janie and Beth were soon better than he was in their tracking ability. When it was his turn to track either of them, he had to search to find the signs of their passing. He taught them how to improvise simple booby traps, like his favorite, which was to lay small twigs across a natural depression in the ground and cover the signs of his work with forest debris. Then he would plant, and conceal, short sharpened sticks protruding about three inches above the ground in the area where a person might fall. With practice, it took less than fifteen minutes to set this up. Frequently, when being trailed by them, he would set a trap of this nature without the stakes and, until they became aware of the tiny signs of his work, they would often find themselves flat on their faces, knowing if it had been a completed trap they would have been in a world of hurt. To their delight, they got him a few times too. He taught them other quick, nasty tricks that could maim or kill a pursuer. Their favorite was the bent sapling with a sharpened stake attached. They loved the few times he missed the signs of their work, and got whacked by tripping an unloaded trap.

Jake and Agnes took turns in the basement with kerosene lamps, teaching the others math, language, and science.

The three siblings were quick, Al especially. It was almost as if the ability to understand the logical concepts of math and science were inherent in his genes.

Jake had played chess since childhood and was a strong player. He made a crude chess set, using stones of different sizes and colors from a nearby creek bed. Agnes didn’t care for the game, but soon, to his bewilderment, the other three were as formidable opponents as anyone he had ever played.

He was about even in a contest with Beth or Janie, but after the first week of play, no one could defeat Al. His ability astounded Jake. He, himself, could see about five moves deep into the game, but sometimes it seemed as though Al could see clear to the end game after only a few moves.

One evening, about three weeks after arriving at the cabin, Agnes skipped teaching and joined Jake on guard at the edge of the cut.

“Jake, we’ve been talking about something.” She stated after sitting down.

“What’s that?” Jake asked, giving her his full attention.

“We want to know the whole deal about this place we’re going to. We want to know everything you know about the death, and what you and those scientists were doing there at the university in Wisconsin.”

“That’s a long story Agnes.”

“We’ve got time,” she said, “and we want to know what we’re getting ourselves into. There are some other things I want some answers to also.”

“Ask away, I don’t have any secrets.”

“I’m a nurse, and I’m going to speak from my years of knowledge. When I first met you, those three were so thin I could see their skeletons through their clothes.”

“They sure were,” Jake agreed, “but they’re filling out now.”

“I’m making a point here Jake. Three squares a day cannot account for the growth and improvement I’m seeing. Bones can’t grow that fast. It’s not just bones either. Al lost a tooth from the beating he took. It was a permanent tooth, Jake. It grew back, not only grew back, but did so in only a week. That’s impossible.”

“Agnes I….”

“Let me finish,” she said, interrupting him. “Just look at them. Janie and Al are at least three inches taller. They’ve put on weight at a phenomenal rate. Al still has his cast on, and normally it should stay on for at least twelve weeks, if not longer. I’m going to take off this evening to look at it, because I think the leg is well, and that’s impossible too.”

“Agnes…”

“I’m not done yet. You’re forty-six years old, and could pass for much younger, not a grey hair or a crow’s-foot on you. The four of you are so fast I doubt I could lay a hand on any of you in a real contest and I hold medals in the martial arts. Now, you can talk and I want to hear something I can believe.”

“I was only going to say maybe I was wrong and I do have secrets, but I didn’t realize I did until now. I think I have been denying what’s been staring me in the face. I think we can take a chance this evening and skip guard duty for a while. Let’s go to the basement so I can talk to all of you together.

CHAPTER 9

Excerpt from Diary by Agnes Loudermilk

The death and its causes as told by Jake Markett, April 11, 2026 or year 9 ATD (after the death)

The death was a simple disease. You got tired and more tired until you slipped into a coma and died. It didn’t take long either, five or six hours and that was it. My girls went that way. Oh Lord, it tears my heart out to write those words, I still see them in their beds, fading away. So helpless, hopeless, knowing there was nothing I could do to save them. I can still see their faces, beautiful even in death. It’s good the death was such an easy killer. If they had died in agony, I would’ve gone insane.

I had discounted as science fiction the reports that the plague was caused by machines, and assumed the plague was a man-made pathogen distributed by terrorists. Jake said that was a false assumption. He said it definitely wasn’t a pathogen. Jake isn’t crazy, and if he says we were attacked by machines, then by God, we were attacked by machines.

Jake isn’t dumb either. He was a ranking officer in the military and graduated from West Point. He suffered a severe wound in the Yemen conflict in 2014 and lost an eye and his left arm at the elbow. That’s how he ended up as the ROTC Commander at the University of Wisconsin.

About fifty people from the university and surrounding area who survived the death banded together to protect each other.

It seems there are things going on in the world I don't know about. Not only did the nanobots cause the death, but now they are dismantling our cities and other structures. They even destroy dams, reducing them from the top down so there’s no flooding.

He says you can actually see the nanobots at work. Even though they are microscopic, they look like a thick white fog because there are so many of them. The scientists speculate that these nanobots can make copies of themselves like von Neumann machines. I’m educated, but most of what he told us was way over my head.

A tank of liquid nitrogen Jake was moving ruptured. The blast threw him into a cloud of the nanobots. His injuries were so bad the researchers thought he was dead and didn’t attempt to remove him.

Jake doesn’t think he was dead, but he’s not sure. All he knows is, he awakened three days later in perfect health, and the arm and eye he lost in war had grown back.

He doesn't understand everything the researchers tried to explain, but what it came down to was that a cluster of the microscopic particles acting together, have very strong computing powers, along with the ability to manipulate matter at the atomic level. The technology behind the nanobots is beyond anything humans can equal.

The strangest thing he told us about was the death. The researchers figured out it wasn’t random. It was genetics based. If children survived, the parents survived as well. That’s why my adopted darlings died. Our genetics didn’t match. The nanobots spared individuals too. Jake said the machines used their own system to decide who died and who didn’t and the scientists couldn’t figure it out. Jake doesn't know why they let any humans live at all.

That’s it for now. It took him a long time to tell this part because we kept interrupting with questions. I’ll keep updating my diary, because it’s important a record is kept for history.

*

The death and its causes as told by Jake Markett, April 12, 2026 or 9 ATD (after the death)

I just finished wrapping Jake’s wrist. Today I was bragging about how good the girls were doing with their martial arts training. Jake decided to put it to the test. He told Janie to walk without looking back and he would come from behind and grab her. The next thing he knew, he was flat on his back staring at the sole of her little boot poised to stomp his face.

My respect for him grows constantly. A little girl tossing them to the ground would have been an ego blow to most men. His reaction was to smother her with praise.

His wrist began swelling from being tossed, thankfully only a minor sprain. Admittedly, he didn’t attack her aggressively, but the fact she executed the move perfectly fills me with pride for her and for myself. I am truly beginning to feel like I belong to a family.

A storm rolled in shortly after lunch and Janie pressed Jake to tell us more about Haven. She still calls it Heaven and so do I. To her, Heaven has become a mystical place, a dream place. I surely hope that’s what we find there.

Jake told us about his friend, Avis Johnson. Avis Johnson is the man who built Heaven. Jake said Avis was the sort of person who worried about things. He made a fortune from selling a virtual reality game engine he developed, and then added substantially to his fortune during what Jake called, the second great real estate bubble.

Jake met him at the university. Avis asked him many questions about weapons and defending an area. Jake said he thought at first he was dealing with a whacko, but as he came to know him, he realized Avis was simply a man worried about how to protect his family if something did go wrong with the world.

Jake says Avis spent over two hundred million dollars building Heaven and stocking it with things needed to survive and rebuild after a major disaster.

Jake came to share his concern and used his military connections to help Avis get weapons and other military equipment and supplies a civilian couldn’t acquire.

He and Avis became close friends, and planned to move their families to the sanctuary. The weather began to change with the beginning of the long winter caused by the nuclear weapons used over in Europe and Asia. By then there was so much chaos in the US, communications became non-existent most of the time.

When the facility (Haven) was finished, it took Avis a month to arrange transportation back to Wisconsin from Georgia. His family was staying at the university there, protected by Jake and the small security force he'd trained. Avis was frantic to get his family to the facility, hoping the seclusion of the area, and the ability to seal it from the outside environment might help them survive the death if it came to America.

The plague arrived in the USA and Avis had been back in Madison only a few days when the plague started there. Avis and his family were among the first to die. On his deathbed, Avis made Jake commit to a series of promises.

Jake says the facility is a chance to set humanity on a different course, a better and more humane way of being. He said, with the shallow gene pool and the limited choice of mates, people will become homogenized and there would be no such thing as different racial groups. He honestly wants to start a new world order.

He thinks the invaders may have come from another time, or dimension, perhaps to correct the self-destructive course we humans were following. He thinks family units survived in order for the selected young to have protection. He doesn’t know why women are infertile, but he believes that will be reversed sometime in the future.

Jake left Wisconsin with a twofold mission. His first priority was the see if Haven is a viable facility. His secondary mission was to visit university centers as he traveled, with the goal of further enhancing the brain pool at the facility.

He says he met with success, and beginning June or July, as many as a hundred and fifty people will be arriving at Haven. Of course he qualified that with an, “if they make it,” clause.

Al’s leg healed perfectly. I removed the wrappings last night, and unlike other legs I’ve seen after being in bindings for so long, the leg had none of the wasted look I expected to see. His leg was broken only a few days over three weeks ago. A three to four months’ recovery time was shortened by a factor of five. This lends credence to Jake’s nanobot’ theory. All three of the young ones must be infected with them, if perfect health can be called an infection. They are growing healthier by the minute. I mean this literally. Both Janie and Al have grown at an astounding rate. And Beth, she’s almost as tall as I am.

Jake is in for more trouble than he can handle where she’s concerned. The girl is in love with him. She asked me how a woman back in the “old days” got a man to notice her. I told her about makeup and perfume, and gave her a few pointers on woman’s wiles.

Boils down to, she and I are brewing some subtle feminine enhancements she can deploy in her conquest. Not that she’s going to need any. You should see the breasts and hips the sexy little thing is sporting now. I’ve never seen a woman blossom so quickly. I don’t feel sorry for Jake a tiny bit.

There are other things besides health going on. Janie is fast. A pack of wild dogs rushed us while I was in a clear area out in the cut teaching the kids Ju Jitsu. There were dogs, with a brute of a Rottweiler in the lead. Janie stepped between the dogs and us, and I swear, she was pulling and notching arrows faster than I could see. Her arm was a blur. From the time the pack began their rush, to the time they had arrows in them couldn’t have been more than eight seconds, and that’s including the three arrows it took to drop the Rottweiler.

***

Addendum: I put this here at the end because I want these statements in one place.

Jake told us what he thinks is happening. While Avis lay in his bed dying, he made Jake commit to several promises. One promise is that he finds who sent the machines to kill us. Jake vowed to destroy the machines and their makers.

Another promise is that he makes Haven the center of a new beginning for mankind. Avis came to believe that the reason the nanobots were sent was because of mankind’s destructive nature, not only killing each other, but killing the environment too. He made Jake promise to form a utopian society to counteract these tendencies.

I asked Jake how he could make an impossible commitment like that. He told us Avis was so intense and persistent, that he agreed simply to make him happy, but then Avis made him promise on the souls of their dead wives and children. Jake feels he is honor bound to make the attempt, even though he knows that all attempts at utopia are doomed to failure.

The worst thing Jake promised, I say worst based on the decayed condition of the worldwide infrastructure. He promised to bring all the survivors on the globe to one place so mankind could not decline into Babel. Jake has no idea how he’s going to keep that promise. He says it may not matter anyway. Unless births start again, mankind will soon be extinct.

He gave us the numbers surrounding the plague and war and I am still in shock. The estimated survival rate of the plague was one in six-hundred. The pre-plague global population was seven and a half billion. That would leave only twelve and a half million alive. He doesn’t know how to factor in the deaths that had to result from the nuclear exchange. He thinks another three million have died from natural causes and from the anarchy that’s been going on since the plague ended.

That would mean, if his estimates are true, there may be only six and a half million people left alive on the entire earth. Of all those billions, we have been reduced to barely enough to repopulate New York City!

Jake's healing from the nanobots came after he made the promises to Avis. He doesn’t think they can read his thoughts, but he does believe they can hear what he says, and that leads him to believe they are aware of the promises he made. He believes the machines are giving humans a second chance and are doing things to help him. Until now, he was the only one he knew affected as he is. Now he knows they are affecting/infecting Beth and her siblings. I'm guessing they are attempting to replace his family and supply him with enhanced helpers.

He’s not a superman or anything near one. All they have done to him, is restore his body and make it capable of performing to the limit of human possibility, and heightened his ability to heal.

Hot damn. It’s a little creepy but I know I'm infected too. My gray hairs are turning red. My breasts are firmer and perkier, and I simply feel great. I’m in the middle of a great undertaking and I’ll be double damned if we’re not going to Heaven. I'm excited and for the first time in years, I am looking forward to the future.

CHAPTER 10

After five weeks Agnes declared Al’s break completely healed and he was able to forgo the crutches altogether. Thanks to the nanobots and the daily therapy she lavished on him, the leg was as straight and strong as his other one.

The abundance of food and the exercise in the fresh spring air worked wonders for them, especially Janie, who no longer looked like an escapee from a refugee camp.

She was much taller but still thin, not the thinness of skinny, rather the wiriness of a healthy, well-exercised youth. She was so full of energy and enthusiasm none of them could outlast her in any physical activity.

It gladdened Jake’s heart to watch her run, skip, and laugh her way through the days.

There were lots of survival books in the basement, which they all read. They learned which plants were edible and collected greens, roots and other fresh fruits and vegetables on a daily basis.

Al spent most of his spare time reading the books he found inside a sealed metal case. The books were mainly philosophy and legal textbooks with a sprinkling of other social science subjects. There was also a framed copy of the declaration of independence and a glossy pamphlet of the Constitution and all its amendments.

Jake approached him one evening while he was studying and asked him if he had any questions about what he was reading. Al told him that he had a lot of questions, but he wasn't ready to ask any yet because he was still “reconciling a great deal of conflicting information.”

Jake was pleased and astounded by how quickly the three of the siblings absorbed and applied anything they was taught. The only thing bothering him was how fast time was passing.

His worry eventually prompted him to call a meeting to discuss the fact they had to prepare to leave. That evening, taking another chance on not having a guard posted, they gathered in Janie’s basement. Agnes and Beth prepared snacks and a jar of sun-brewed tea.

Janie spoke before Jake had a chance to start.

“We’re here to talk about leaving aren’t we Jake?”

“Why honey,” he responded with surprise, “that’s precognitive of you. Are you reading my mind?”

“I don’t know the other word you said, but I don’t have to read your mind to know it’s time to leave. I’ve seen the way you look at the calendar Agnes made on the wall upstairs, and I know we been here more than the thirty or forty days you said.”

Jake chuckled. “I guess we can go straight to the snacks. She’s just nailed it.”

“No, seriously,” Agnes said, “I figured this was the reason for the meeting too. What’s the plan?”

“This is May twentieth. Because of the groups scheduled to begin arriving at the end of June, we have to be in Haven by the middle of the month. We can stay about another week before we head out. That will give us time to sort our gear and plan our route.”

“I think Beth and Agnes should be in charge of the food we bring with us,” he continued. “Al, you and Janie can help with carrying things upstairs for them.”

“What will you be in charge of, Commander?” Beth asked, smiling.

“I’m thinking to scout the other end of the right of way and check out the road it crosses.”

“Not by yourself. I’m going with you. You need someone to back trail you.”

“It’ll be all right, Agnes will need help.”

“I don’t need help with something as simple as selecting food,” Agnes said with a mischievous smile. “Besides, Beth’s right, it’s not safe to travel alone.”

“I agree, but if she goes, it will leave you shorthanded for guard detail.”

“The three of us can split that chore for a couple of days,” Agnes stated. “Besides, we have Janie’s ears and eyes. We'll be quite all right.”

“Okay, it’s settled,” Jake, replied, giving Agnes an, I could just kill you, expression. “We’ll leave tomorrow morning. I estimate it’s about a twenty mile round trip, plus a bit of time to scout the road each way. We’ll be gone at least two full days.”

“We’ll get things sorted and separated downstairs,” Agnes said. “You two have fun and take care of each other.”

Jake gave her another look, but she only smiled.

The next day dawned clear and bright. Jake put Al in charge of keeping one of the big two-way radios charged and ready to receive. By nine, he and Beth were packed and moving north along the utility cut.

Beth took the lead for the first hour with Jake trailing behind a hundred yards. The pace she set through the waist high brush and the weight of his pack and the other radio had him sweating.

As he walked, he was again amazed at how the forest and undergrowth had recovered from the long three-year winter. So many birds had managed to survive and multiply, the air was full of their songs. High in the clear blue sky a red-tailed hawk soared, and amidst the branches of the trees, he saw the occasional squirrel. He constantly flushed rabbits and quail from hiding. It was a day that made him glad to be alive.

When he changed places with Beth, he noticed something odd, but could not put his finger to it. When his time on point was done, and she came to where he was waiting, it struck him.

“You smell like a flower,” he blurted and then blushed like a boy.

“You smell like sweat,” she replied past her smile of pleasure. She left him there, his mind whirling and planning a multitude of ways to get even with Agnes.

Beth stopped short of her hour, and when Jake came to where she waited, she pointed out a structure barely visible off to the right of the wide utility cut they were following.

“That looks like a barn,” she said, “should we check it out?”

“You know me. I can’t pass a place without at least a look.”

The structure proved to be a very large, modern barn. Inside were the normal things you would expect to find, a tractor, and assorted attachments arranged along one side. Sitting out in the middle was a huge enclosed utility-trailer that looked brand new. Even the tires were so good Jake had to take a closer look.

“Whoa, the farmer had money to spend. This trailer’s state of the art. The body and chassis are made of Carbon Nano Synthsteel and the tires are the Wearever synthetic that came out just before the plague. This thing’s practically indestructible.”

Beth regarded him with amusement. “I don’t have the slightest idea about what’s got you so excited, but I’m glad it makes you happy. You want to see if we can find the farmhouse that goes with this barn?”

“I just enjoy looking at something well made,” he said, doing his best not to look at something in front of him, very well made, packed in tight camouflaged jeans.

They followed a graveled drive barely negotiable because of the encroaching weeds. The house was a good distance from the barn, tucked into a patch of old growth hardwoods.

The farmhouse turned out to be a huge mansion constructed of stone and stucco, stunningly majestic and in reasonable condition considering the years of neglect. Even the windows were intact. Again, the undisturbed dust and windblown debris on the steps and the porch indicated no one had entered through the door in the recent past.

Parked in the paved circular drive in front of the house was a Rolls Royce sedan with the passengers’ door open. It hurt Jake to see the toll the elements had exacted on such a fine automobile. There was a pile of bones scattered in and around the drivers’ seat. A human skull with a hole in the forehead, with a bigger hole in the back, lay in the spokes of the steering wheel.

Beth stood in awe, looking at the huge tiled front porch with its massive pink-granite columns and oversized stained glass entrance doors.

“What a beautiful place,” she said. “One day I wish we could have a place like this.” She caught herself, “I mean,” she stammered, “for all of us. Janie and Al would love it too.” She ran up the wide stairs leading to the porch, leaving Jake to deal with the confusion.

“Come on,” she called from the doorway, “it’s not locked. Let’s look inside.”

Jake raised his hand and shook his head. “Hold up. Let me scout around the place. Keep guard where you are.”

Minutes later, Jake joined her at the door and let her know he’d seen no signs the house was being used. At the left side of the entrance was an ornate plaque with the name, Fredrick Walsh, in raised brass letters.

“I recognize the name,” he told her. “If it’s who I think it is, he was an executive with a mercenary group. They had a bit of trouble, and went through a few name changes, but they took a load of money off the taxpayers. That would explain the wealth.”

The inside of the home was breathtakingly opulent. The huge foyer led to an open area large enough and high enough to hold a small home. The furnishings were heavy and ornately carved. Many were inlaid with precious metals, ivory, and mother of pearl. Ornate tapestries adorned the walls. Everything was of Mid-Eastern origins. Wide marble staircases on each side rose to a balcony that lent access to the rooms above. Beth fairly swooned at the grandeur.

“How could anyone have so much?” she asked.

“Lots of people had this kind of lifestyle before the death. Most of them earned it with their talents and skills. This particular piece of trash earned his with the blood of humans spilled in a dozen different countries. I never had much respect for those mercenaries. They were too often out of control.”

“He’s probably dead now, but this is still a beautiful place. Can we take a little more time? I may never get a chance to see a place like this again.”

“Go ahead, I’ll wait here.”

Beth let her pack slide from her shoulders and took off at a run, headed for the stairs, taking them two at a time. Jake shrugged off his pack, settled into a comfortable, but dusty armchair that gave him a view of the door and most of the room. He settled his rifle across his knees and checked the contents of a humidor on a side table. The Cubans inside it were dry as tinder, the aromatic oils long since volatilized off. After a few minutes, Beth came rushing back down the stairs.

“The rooms upstairs are wonderful,” she called to him as she ran through an open set of double doors leading off to the right. A moment later he heard her shout his name. He found her standing in a man’s office furnished in heavy oak with walnut wainscoting.

Sitting in a chair behind the wide leather-topped desk was a skeleton, which, though it had settled a bit, was somehow still erect. On the desk in front of the skeleton were a pen and a sheet of paper with writing on it. The wall behind the skeleton held a large tapestry with the words, ‘TO THE VICTOR GO THE SPOILS,’ woven into it.

Jake went around the desk, suppressing a shiver. He stood beside the bizarre skeleton to see the writing on the paper and began reading it aloud for Beth’s benefit.

*

“The death is upon me. I am very weak. I don’t deserve this. Behind the scenes, I was one of the most powerful men in the world. I thought surely I would be one of the few left alive and I prepared well for the aftermath. The survivors will need people like me to lead and rebuild. My wife and daughter are dead. John drove us to the barn and I locked their bodies in a cubicle inside the vault. We’re both infected and didn’t have the energy to bury them. I shot John so I could be alone with my thoughts without his whining. I barely made it to my desk. Even as I write I am feeling weaker so sleepy. I know if I close my eyes, I will never wake. It had been my intention to burn this place to the ground. The thought of a common person occupying it disgusts me. It’s too late now. I’ll never leave my chair. I will leave this one last thought. I know what—.”

*

“He ran out of energy in mid-sentence. The bastard shot his helper just so he could be alone.”

Beth shuddered. “He sure thought he was better than other people. He didn’t deserve to live in such beauty.”

“There were a lot of people like him, still are if John Saint is an example.”

“I’m glad you’re not like him,” she said. “I’m glad you’re who you are.”

“You know there’s some things we need to talk about.”

“I know we need to talk, but not right now. Is that okay, Jake?”

“There’s no rush… You know, I don’t remember seeing a door inside the barn.”

“You’re right. Now I think about it, the barn was a lot smaller inside than it was outside. You want to go look?”

“Yeah, I do. The word vault is intriguing.”

As they passed through the doors of the office, they heard a clattering from behind them. Startled, they turned in time to witness Walsh’s bones scattering across the oak flooring.

“I guess he left that chair after all,” Beth said, deadpan. They looked at each other and burst out laughing.

The vault was simply a cleverly concealed roll-up door at the back of the barn. A huge armored truck with a machine-gun turret dominated the opened space, the top of it towering above them. Taking up one sidewall were four steel cubicles with padlocked close-fitting metal doors. The vehicle grabbed Jake’s attention.

“I can’t believe it,” he said in amazement, “this is a Navistar MaxxPro transport vehicle. I haven’t seen one of these since Afghanistan in 2012. This is a later model. Fredrick had some expensive toys. This had to set him back a million or better. It’s for sure this unit never saw combat, it’s like brand new.”

“It sure is big and heavy looking.”

“You bet,” he replied. It weighs over twenty five thousand pounds. The best armored-transport ever made. I’ve got to check it out.” He climbed aboard the huge vehicle and disappeared inside. He exited a few minutes later, and went to inspect a row of metal shelving on a sidewall that held dozens of metal cans. Beth noticed his puzzled expression, and followed him.

“What’s wrong Jake?”

“Nothings wrong, it’s just that Walsh had a company do some modifications to the engine. See these big canisters of vegetable fats and turpentine and chemicals on the lower shelves. On the drivers seat I found a booklet with instructions on how to prepare the oil and turpentine to run in the diesel engine. A bunch of other instructions too on how to fire up an add-on preheater for the fuel. The small containers on the upper shelves are ethanol... pure grain alcohol. The preheater uses ethanol for a heat source. We could fuel it up and drive it out of here.”

“Is that good... I mean, do you think we can use it?

“There’s no physical reason why we couldn’t. The batteries are dry and ready for acid and the plastic bottles near them are the sulfuric acid they need. Even the machinegun is loaded. It has lots of new features too, a telescoping gunner’s mount attached to the deck and the machinegun uses caseless ammo in canisters.”

“Would all that stuff still be good?”

“The booklet claimed the materials have a practically unlimited shelf-life as long as they remain sealed.”

“I guess you’re ready to mix some fuel. We could go after John Saint and his army,” Beth joked.”

“Yeah right,” he responded in kind, “even with a MaxxPro, I’m not a Mad Max.”

“What’s a Mad Max?”

“It’s from an old movie. A character named Mad Max was always taking on odds too big for him.”

“Oh,” she responded. “I wouldn’t know about that. I barely even remember seeing movies, and they were mostly kids’ movies.”

“You didn’t miss much.” Jake retrieved his rifle from where he’d leaned it when he mounted the vehicle. “This vehicle is nice, but it’s useless to us, way too noisy. We’ve done enough sightseeing. We need to make some miles before dark.”

They were soon at the cut. Jake took the point position. There were no further distractions. When they had only an hour of daylight left, he spotted a relatively clear location to set camp for the night and waited for Beth to come from her trailing position. Again, he noticed a strong scent of flowers. Deep down in his soul he knew Agnes had something to do with Beth’s use of perfume. The scent was having the exact effect they’d planned. He couldn’t help noticing her as a woman.

“It must be camp time,” she said, setting her pack down beside his, “because my belly says it sure is supper time.”

“Yeah, I’m getting a little hungry myself. We're not that far from the end of the cut but I'd rather approach it in the morning when we'll have plenty of daylight. How about I set camp while you get our little stove ready.”

“I thought it was your stove,” Beth said.

“What?” Jake asked confused.

“The stove. You called it our stove.”

He looked at her for a moment before speaking. “First of all, saying “our stove” was not a Freudian slip. Second, these little innuendos you keep sliding into our conversations are not very subtle.”

“I like it when you use big words,” she responded, laughing. “I have no idea what you’re saying but they make me shivery inside.”

He couldn’t help laughing along with her. “You’re right, I did sound pompous, but I want you to cool off the chase. I’m not ready for it.” He took one of her hands in his. “To me it was only yesterday you were a skinny little girl. Now I see a beautiful young lady in full bloom.”

“I’m sorry I lied about my age, but I am a full woman.”

“I know you are, but in my mind I still see the child inside the body and it will take a while for the image to pass. Do you understand what I mean? I need time to adjust.”

Beth stared at him and he could almost see the thoughts passing through her mind.

“I understand the words, but it doesn’t change how I feel about us. Take your time, but not too much. In this world, death could be around the next bend. Hell, it could come right now while we’re talking. You know it as well as me. I don’t feel like I’ve got a lot of time, and I want to live what I do have. Think about that while you’re adjusting. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get, ‘our’ supper ready.” With that, she turned her back to him and began rummaging through the packs.

A minute later, he had one more thing to ponder. Agnes and Beth only packed one lightweight single-person tent instead of the two he had assumed he'd find. They would be practically sleeping on top of each other. He began clearing an area to place it. Beth called to him as he was setting the last stay line.

“Did you mean it when you said you see a beautiful young lady when you look at me?”

He finished tying the stay and went to where she was squatting beside the little stove. He sat across from her and spent a moment studying her face.

He saw her full lips, her wide-set soft brown eyes, her high cheekbones. He noticed the way her nostrils flared as she breathed. A feeling of déjà vu swept through his mind causing a mental shiver. It dawned on him he was seeing the same beautiful woman he had envisioned in a small cave by lamplight, brought to life in every detail.

“You’re making me feel strange, staring like that,” she said.

Jake collected his thoughts and responded. “You asked me a question and I want to answer fully. You’re beautiful because of who you are. Things have happened to you and you’ve seen things and done things that would have destroyed the soul and spirit of a lesser person, yet you’re still complete.

“That’s part of your beauty. However, you asked if I meant it when I said you were a beautiful woman. The answer to that is, yes, I think you are very beautiful. For the last month, it has taken all my control not to see you as that. I felt seeing you as a woman would be a betrayal of how I should behold you.”

Her face lit with a huge smile.

“You’re so serious. Can’t you just say something simple like, ‘Wow, you’re really beautiful’?”

Smiling, he stood and struck a theatrical pose. “Wow, you’re really beautiful!”

“Thank you,” she responded, “and may I say that I find you to be very handsome?

“Yes you may, and might I also say you’re not making much progress getting our supper ready. I’m hungry.

“If I have to wait for you to think about us, I reckon you can wait a few more minutes for your supper.”

After the meal, dusk set in. Jake cleared an area close to the tent and unrolled his sleeping bag.

“It’s such a nice night I’ll sleep out here so I can see the stars. You can have the tent if you like.”

“As pretty as the stars will be, I’ll be sleeping in the tent. You get too cold you’re welcome to join me.”

He was right about the stars. Nine years of nature washing humankind’s pollutants from the air made them seem brightly huge and close. When he fell asleep, the full moon was beginning to peek over the tops of the pines on the opposite side of the cut.

The sound of Beth softly calling his name drew him from sleep.

“Huh,” he grunted, struggling to sit, “is everything okay?”

“Hush Jake, everything’s okay.”

“What are—?

“Shush now. I’ve lain hours working for the courage to do this. I need to tell you something and then you can go back to sleep.”

She moved to where the light of the full moon fell directly upon her. She was dressed only in a sweatshirt and panties.

“I have something to say and I want you to listen to me. Are you awake?

“I’m awake.”

“Don't say anything else, just listen.

“It hurts to talk about my mother,” she began. “I loved her, and I miss her so bad. When I was little, she would say things to me that were like moral sayings.

“The two sayings I remember that are right for tonight are, ‘people perceive you to be as you present yourself’. The other thing she said was, ‘Bold people do bold things’. I’m going to change how you perceive me by doing a bold thing. I want you to honestly listen to me and watch me, and let me change your perception.”

She’d captured his attention. He felt a bit of resentment at her tenacity, but the biggest part of him was flattered she felt him worthy of her persistence.

“You think of me as a child, but in truth, you’ve never seen a child in me, only a small human. A child plays and skips.

“The playing and skipping skipped right out of me the day my mamma and daddy were killed.

“My childhood left when I was raped. It left when you splattered me with the blood of a man who was on top of me yet again. I’m not a child.”

Beth turned her back to him and removed her panties and sweatshirt. She raised her arms above her head and turned, her firm breasts, momentarily silhouetted in the moonlight. She continued to turn until she faced him again, the full moon highlighting and enhancing every aspect of her face and body.

She cupped a breast in each hand and held them in a manner that displayed the full ripeness of them.

“These breasts are new. I didn’t have them before I met you. They grew for you, and they belong to you.”

With one hand, she reached to her crotch and parted the thin growth of hair to reveal her labia.

“In my mind this part of me is new for you.

“There is one other part of me that belongs to you,” she said, touching her chest. “My heart is yours. I love you, Jake. I’m going back to bed. Just remember one thing Agnes said to tell you. If you say those three words to me, you better mean them, or she’s going to cut your balls off.”

With that, she gathered her panties and sweatshirt and re-entered the tent.

*

Beth was awake and busy by the cook stove. He sat, rubbing his eyes before squirming from his sleeping bag. He’d slept in the clothes he wore the day before.

“Good morning sleepy head,” she called out. “You have time to wash before we eat. If you go straight back from the tent, you’ll find a little creek. There’s not much to it, but there’s enough flow to use a washcloth.”

He did as she suggested. The water was cold and by the time he was clean he was refreshed and ready for the day.

They had leftover rice and corned beef for breakfast. By an unspoken agreement, neither of them mentioned what had happened during the night. Jake had to admit, the event changed how he perceived her. He tried not to, but his eyes followed her every move. By the flirtatious, slightly embarrassed smiles she cast his way, he could tell she noticed,

They continued the procedure of the previous day, taking turns trailing each other. Three hours after starting out, Beth was in the lead when Jake topped a small rise and saw the paved road was within sight just beyond her position.

As he was keying his small two-way to signal her to hold, a form rushed from the edge of the woods and tackled her. They went down, disappearing from view in the brush.

Jake threw caution to the wind and bolted towards them. As he ran he tried to see what was happening, but no one had regained footing.

He was moving so fast he almost tripped over the still form of a man lying on his back. Beth was close to him, kneeling in the tall brush, trying to get to her feet. He moved to help her.

“Are you okay?” he asked, panic-stricken. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay,” she replied hoarsely, “He knocked the air out of me.” She struggled to stand, drawing ragged breaths.

Drawing his pistol, Jake turned to the burly man lying on the ground and kicked him as hard as he could in the side. “Get up you bastard!”

“You can kick all you want mister, won’t do you no good. The bitch done gone and broke something in my back. I can’t feel none of my body.”

“Serves you right. Where’s the rest of your gang?”

“Ain’t no rest of us mister,” he answered. Just me and a gal I got tied up in the woods.”

Beth regained her breath and moved to stand beside Jake.

“He talks like low class trash doesn’t he? I see why you want us to speak better English than this filthy animal. It does set us apart.”

“Shut up, you uppity nigger bitch.”

Jake kicked him in the side again. “You shut up,” he said vehemently.

“I told you,” the man said, laughing like an idiot, “kick all you want, I don’t feel nothing.”

Jake knelt close to his face. “Will you feel it if I gouge out one of your eyes, because that’s what I’ll do if you don’t shut your mouth.”

“What do I care, I’m good as dead anyways, so fuck you!”

Beth bent to pull Jake away. “Leave him alone. Don’t get his blood on you. Like he said, he’ll be dead soon enough.”

Jake stood and saw her face for the first time. She had a lump forming over her left eye. The same side of her face was abraded and bleeding from her struggle.

“Damn it,” he cried out in anguish. “This can’t keep happening.”

“I’m okay, just bruised, and scraped.”

“I thought he’d killed you, he hit you so hard. I don’t know what I’d do if something bad happened to you. This has to stop.”

Beth stepped closer to him.

“Are you saying I mean a lot to you?”

“Yes you mean a lot to me,” he replied. “What do you think? I thought I’d lost you.”

Beth stepped even closer, standing face to face with him, tilting her head slightly to see his eyes.

“Tell me how you’d feel if you lost me Jake.”

“Yeah Jake, tell the nigger bitch how you’d feel if you lost her.”

Beth planted her booted foot over the man’s mouth, pushed down hard, and kept it there. She wrapped her arms around Jake and pressed her body tightly to him without breaking contact with his eyes.

“Tell me how you’d feel if you lost me, ‘cause you haven’t lost me, I’m right here.”

His eyes entangled with hers and his mouth flooded with the taste of chocolate. His entire world was composed of her and the scent of flowers. “I’d feel lost damn it. I’d be lost!” He tilted his head. Their lips touched and they kissed. A kiss that lasted forever. Forever passed and they kissed again and again. When their lips parted, the man was dead.

CHAPTER 11

By backtracking from where the man had emerged from the tree line, they found the ‘other gal’ lying on the ground, gagged and bound. He’d leashed her like a dog with a rope from her neck tied to a tree. Her face was bloody as was her ripped and shredded blouse.

“She’s about been beat to death,” Beth said as she knelt. “Her face is so swollen you can’t tell she’s got one.”

“Not dead,” the woman managed to say past the loose gag and her swollen lips, her words barely recognizable.

Jake removed the gag and cut the rope binding her. They helped her to a sitting position with her back braced against the tree.

Pillow-like puffiness surrounded her eyes. Her nose lay sideways on her face and was still bleeding. Her lips were a split bloody mess. Her ripped flannel shirt exposed her blood covered breasts and stomach.

She sat, clumsily trying to rub flow into her hands. Beth took over and soon the woman was moaning with the pain of feeling returning. Again, she attempted to speak. Beth bent closer to hear.

“Dry mouth... Water.”

Jake handed Beth his canteen and watched as the lady took several sips.

“Better now,” she said with a stronger voice.

Jake asked, “Do you think you can stand?”

“I don’t know,” she answered, “is there a doctor in the house?” She began to laugh and cry at the same time causing a stronger stream of blood to flow from her nose.

Beth wrapped her arms around her and began rocking the lady back and forth, trying to comfort her. “You’re okay now. We’ll take care of you.”

The woman let Beth rock her and it seemed to comfort her.

“It hurts to talk,” she mumbled. “My jaw is bruised, maybe fractured. Is that man—?”

“He’s dead,” Jake, answered.

“You killed him?”

“I didn’t kill him,” Jake replied.

The woman turned to Beth. “You?”

“She broke the bastard’s back,” Jake said. “I hate to ask, but do you think you can walk?”

“I can walk, but I don’t know how far. It’s hard to breathe.”

Beth used a face cloth and water from her flask to clean the woman as much as possible. Jake went to retrieve the packs they had left beside the dead man. When he returned, Beth had him turn away while she dressed her in some of his clothing.

She was as tall as him, but much thinner. Beth used a section of rope as a belt to cinch the pants. Cleaned, and dressed in baggy clothing, she looked like an abused scarecrow.

“He beat the hell out of you,” Jake said.

“I made him mad,” she answered, struggling to form the words. “He tried to rape me but couldn’t get it up. I laughed at him and he beat me. Said he couldn’t fuck an old uppity Yankee Jew bitch. That was what he called me, Uppity Yankee Jew bitch.”

“Welcome to the group,” Beth said. I’m an uppity nigger bitch according to him. What’s your name?”

“Eva Herman.”

“My name is Beth, and he's Jake. Do you feel like going now? We need to get you to our cabin. We have a friend there. She’s a nurse. She can get you fixed.”

"Are you hurt inside or just you face?" Jake asked.

“He kicked me. I'm bruised all over, but nothing internal,” she replied, her words slurred with pain. “We’ll have to move slowly, and you’ll need to lead me. I can’t see out of my left eye, and swelling will soon block the other.”

“We’ll help,” Jake said. “You set your own pace and we’ll guide you. You don’t need to talk. It sounds like every word is killing you.”

They didn’t make much distance. As Eva predicted, her other eye swelled shut soon after they started back towards the cabin. She had to pick every step with care. Even with Beth guiding and supporting her, she stumbled a lot.

Jake saw the place he and Beth had camped the night before. He hurried to set the tent in the same spot. Eva said she could not eat and needed to rest. Beth helped her into the tent and into a sleeping bag.

“Jake,” Beth called out. “She says she needs a lot of fluids. Could you hand me some bottles of water.”

He did as requested and Beth soon came out to join him.

“She’s done in,” she stated. “I hope she’s better by tomorrow.”

“She won’t be,” he replied. "Her face is going to swell even more and I guarantee her jaw’s going to be so stiff she won’t even be able to mumble. She’s in bad shape.”

“So what do we do?”

“We call for help. I tried the big radio while getting our packs. We’re out of range, but probably not by much. I’m going to head towards the cabin and keep trying it until someone answers. We need the truck to get Eva back to the camp. She can’t make it in her condition. Besides, she needs Agnes ASAP, her face is a mess.”

“We can't leave her alone. I'll stay with her to make sure she doesn’t choke to death or something.”

“That would be best. I shouldn’t be more than two, maybe three hours.”

“Just hurry back, I don’t like it when you’re not near.”

“Beth, last night you paid me the highest compliment a man could receive. You want three words from me. Those words will be yours. Not now, but soon, said in the right way. You gave me your heart, and now you hold mine.”

“Please hurry,” she replied, rising on her toes to kiss his cheek.

Jake moved at a steady trot, picking his footing through the rough terrain with care. As he ran, he keyed his radio every hundred yards or so, hoping to get a return signal.

The sun lowered to almost the treetops before he received a return squeal from the radio.

*

“Hello Jake, over,” Janie’s voice came weakly through the static.

“Yes, can you hear me okay?”

“I hear you good. Are you all right, over?”

“Yes, can you get Agnes on the radio?”

“She’s in the basement. I’ll get her.”

Seconds later Agnes spoke.

“Agnes here, what’s up?”

“Agnes, we’ve got a lady here beat up pretty badly and she’s not able to walk to the cabin. I need you to bring the truck as early as daylight allows tomorrow morning. Do you copy?”

“I copy. Bring the truck at first light, over.”

“Yes. Have Janie use those ears of hers and listen for any vehicles on the road before you crank it. Drive careful, there are some bad washed-out spots, over.”

“I copy, what exactly is wrong with the lady?”

“She has a broken nose, possible fractured jaw, eyes so swollen up she can’t see.”

“I copy, over.”

“See you in the morning. We’ll be watching for you.”

*

The sun was set by the time Jake returned to the campsite. Beth heard him and came out of the tent. Her hands were bloody and her pullover spotted as well.

“You’ve got to be hungry,” she said, “I know I am.”

“I’m starved... How’s she doing?” he asked, nodding towards the tent.

“She’s asleep. She was choking up a lot of blood, but she had me soak some gauze from your first aid kit in salt water, and she stuffed it in her nose. I helped her.”

“That had to be rough.”

“It was horrible. It worked though. The bleeding stopped and she finally went to sleep. She seems like she’s breathing all right.”

“I’m glad she knew what to do.”

“She should, she told me she’s a doctor. You got through to Agnes?”

“Yep, she’ll be headed our way at first light.”

“What about the noise?”

“Can’t be helped, we’ll just hope we get lucky and none of Saints men are in the area.”

Beth went to the creek to wash. Neither of them felt like cooking so they made do with what they had in canned goods. Beth rolled out Jake’s sleeping bag in the place he had prepared the night before.

He eyed the sleeping bag with amusement. “Are you thinking we can both fit in there?”

“If you can stand my smell, I can stand yours. Otherwise, you’re in for a cold night. Just try not to bump my bruised head.” They did fit, and after a bit of squirming to get comfortable, and after a good bit of kissing, they fell asleep.

*

Just after dawn the next morning, sitting by the camp stove drinking coffee, they heard the roar of the truck approaching. A few minutes later Jake was directing Agnes to the campsite. Al and Janie were in the cab with her.

“I brought the crew with me,” she stated as she stepped from the truck. “I figured you wouldn’t want me to leave them back there.”

Jake nodded his agreement. “You thought right. Your patient is in the tent.”

Agnes went to the tent and peered inside.

“We’ll have to get her out into the light. I can’t see a thing in there.”

She and Jake manhandled Eva from the tent. Eva was not able to help and could only moan. They laid her on Jake’s sleeping bag. Her face was swollen to the point it no longer looked human.”

“My God,” Agnes exclaimed, shocked. “Did someone beat her with a hammer?”

“She’s in bad shape,” Jake agreed. “What can we do for her?”

“Nothing here, we need to get her back to the cabin. What we need is ice to bring down the swelling.”

“Let’s get her to the cabin, and I’ll see what can be done about some ice. There’s a diesel generator in a shed behind our barracks. There’s a chance I can get it working.”

"Give me a few minutes to examine her. In the meantime, perhaps you all could put some padding for her in the back. You were right about it being a rough ride."

They moved Eva onto the bed of the truck. Agnes and Beth climbed in with her, Al and Janie rode up front with Jake.

Janie asked what happened to Beth’s eye. After Jake finished telling them, Janie declared she was glad Beth had killed the man.

“Beth’s real good at killing,”

He almost responded with some words to moderate her statement, but changed his mind.

“Yes she is Janie, and it’s a good thing she is, otherwise that bad man might have hurt her.”

“I’m going to learn how to kill good too so the bad men can’t hurt me.”

“That’s why Agnes and I are teaching you how to fight. I know sometimes it feels like a game, but it is very important that you learn.”

At the cabin, Jake again backed the truck to the porch. He had Janie retrieve her bow, go to the edge of the cut, and listen hard for any engines or people. He told Al to grab his rifle to keep her company.

Agnes and Jake loaded Eva onto a cot Beth prepared, and carried her inside.

“You two do what you can for her,” he said after they placed the bed where Agnes wanted it. “I’ll be out back seeing if I can get the generator started. It’ll probably take a while.”

He checked with the two down by the cut before getting started. After being assured they had not heard or seen anything, Jake went behind the cabin to the generator shed.

The fuel in the tank had mostly evaporated, leaving a gelled, discolored residue. A wooden box in the shed held an assortment of tools. He made short work of removing the tank and removed the fuel filter for good measure. Using fuel from an extra container attached to the truck, he flushed the filter and the tank. The abraded end of a flexible green twig served as a brush to further scrub out the scum from the reservoir. After reassembling the components, he filled the tank and attempted to start the generator.

His first few pulls on the starting cord were unrewarding. A quick examination of the generator revealed a small pump handle to prime the lines. Just in case they were clogged, he removed the fuel lines and blew through them. More old, gelled fuel shot from the ends. After about fifty pulls and a few false starts, the generator rewarded him with a loud ‘POW’ and roared to life. An acrid billowing of black smoke from the exhaust made him rush for the door, coughing and gasping to breathe. The generator continued running. The smoke from the exhaust slowly diminished until there was none, but the engine continued to spew out a smell that brought back memories of french fries.

He shut the generator down. With Al’s aid, Jake carried the spare mattresses to the small shed, and attached them to the walls to deaden the sound. It wasn’t perfect, but it did block the noise considerably when he restarted the engine.

“Al, run inside and tell them to turn off anything electrical except the refrigerator. I’ll be in in a few minutes.”

Jake went to join Janie at the edge of the cut.

“Is everything still clear?” He asked.

“I don’t hear or see anything.”

“If you were at the road we came here from, could you hear the generator?” he asked, nodding towards the cabin.

She listened to the sound intently for a few seconds.

“Maybe I could,” she answered, but I don’t think most people could.”

“I sure hope you’re right, honey. I’ll send Al back to keep you company.”

“Could you have him bring a can of peaches with him?”

“I sure will,” Jake said, smiling, “anything else?”

“Maybe some crackers too?”

Jake was delighted to find the refrigerator running and cold air blowing in the freezer compartment. Agnes was filling the ice trays with water and Beth was folding wet face cloths to freeze.

“You’re a blessing Jake,” Agnes said. “I gave Eva a half dose of morphine. She was so exhausted it knocked her out. I need to set her nose as soon as possible, but we have to get the swelling down first. About all I can do now is some basic reshaping and control the bleeding. Beth can help me with that.”

“I hope the swelling goes down quick. I don’t like how much noise the generator is making. There’s a good chance it could seize up, it’s been sitting a long time and the oil has probably deteriorated.”

“If we fill a lot of small containers and freeze them, we could store them in one of the picnic coolers from downstairs and we won’t have to run it that often,” she suggested. “It could take as long as four or five days to reduce the swelling to where I can cast it.”

“Good idea,” Jake responded. “Do a good job on her. We could use a doctor in our crew.”

Jake returned outside, and spent time finding and adding material to the sides and top of the generator shed. When he was satisfied there was nothing else to add, the shed, mainly because of the addition of the plastic bags of garbage they had filled in the time they had been there, resembled a huge pile of trash, but he had managed to get the noise level down much further. Janie assured him no one at the road could hear it.

He hung out with her and Al for a time, making small talk. Once he felt comfortable and relaxed he turned the conversation to another topic.

“Al, Janie, I’ve got something very special to tell you.

They stopped talking and gave him their attention.

“I’m in love with your sister, and she loves me. I want to ask her to marry me, but I wanted to see how you two felt about it.”

“I knew you would,” Janie exclaimed excitedly. “Beth told me she was going to catch you.”

Jake burst out laughing, “She did?”

“Yep, she told us plenty of times she was going to make you her man.”

“What do you think about me asking her to marry me?”

“I think it’s wonderful. She told me she loves you.”

“You’re being quiet Al. How do you feel about it?”

“If you marry her that will make us like family.”

“It will make us family,” Jake replied, “You will be my brother-in-law and Janie will be my sister-in-law.”

Al paused a moment before speaking.

“That’s not what Janie and me want. While you were gone, and lots of times before, me and Janie were, wishing you was our daddy. If you marry Beth, and we get to choose what we can be, we want to be your children. Beth can still be our sister, but you can be our daddy.”

In that moment, he realized what Beth had been telling him. Al was still an innocent child. Jake did not have to think about his reply.

“You two beautiful wonderful children have just made me the happiest man in the world. I would be proud to be your daddy.”

“If you’re so happy,” Janie asked, “why are you crying?”

“I’m crying because this happy goes way beyond a smile.” He reached out to pull them both into his embrace.

CHAPTER 12

Jake was worried about the noise the truck made using it to rescue Eva, and the noise the generator made whenever he cranked it to make more ice. He told everyone to remain extra alert while on guard duty. He also prescribed there would be two on guard at all times, separated, not only looking for any strangers coming up the cut, but also to guard each other. On the third day after the rescue of Eva, early in the morning, Janie burst into the barracks, ashen faced and frightened. Only the women were inside. Jake was in the forest working on a project.

“You’ve gotta come,” she said, “I had to kill a man.”

They went, with Eva trailing behind, holding an icepack to her face. They expected to follow her to the edge of the utility cut. Instead, she led them a few feet into the tree line about thirty feet in front of the cabin. A man was lying on his back with an arrow through his neck and another buried in his chest. His chest humped from a large radio carried as a backpack, causing his head to hang at a grotesque angle. The arrow in the neck cut an artery allowing blood to spray out both front and back where the arrow pierced. He was obviously dead but Eva bent to check his pulse to be sure.

“Where’s Al?” Beth asked.

“He went back to the cut to guard, and told me to get ya’ll. He’s scared there’s others maybe.”

“Are you okay Janie?” Agnes asked.

“I’m okay. I had to shoot him because he was about to tell Saint where we are. Al couldn’t shoot because his rifle would make too much noise.”

“Eva, find Jake and meet us down by the cut where Al is,” Beth directed. “I want us all in one place.”

Jake and Eva arrived at the cut and found the others kneeling in a close square formation, watching every approach.

Jake set the radio he had removed from the dead man, on the ground. “Everyone remain in position... Eva, are you okay to take Janie’s place?”

Eva nodded.

He took Janie’s hand, and moved into the guarded square the other four made. Their backs were mere feet from them. He sat, pulling her down with him.

“Janie, the first thing I want to say is thank you for doing what you had to do. You probably saved all our lives today. I’d like you to tell us exactly what happened.”

“Al and I saw the man coming from where we first came the day we took the truck. He was walking right in the path you made when you drove over the bushes and trees. He was sneaking good, and he was real close before we saw him. We moved away and followed him. Al told me I’d be the one to kill him if we had to because he couldn’t shoot his rifle. The man snuck up to where he could see the house and started talking on his radio to John Saint?”

“Did you hear what he said to Saint?”

“He said, ‘Jerome, get Saint on the radio right now. Tell him I’m going to make his day’. Saint came on the radio and said ‘what you got.’

“Then the man said, ‘I tell you what I got John, I got the ones what’s been killin’ our men. What’s it worth to you?’

“Saint said, ‘Don’t mess with me Puckett, where are you?’ and the man Puckett said, ‘I ain’t messing with you John, but I want ten extra days with the white whores.’

“Saint said… do you want me to say the bad words?”

“Only this time,” Jake said.

“He said, ‘Hell, you can have twenty days with the fucking whores. Tell me where they are you son of a bitch.’

“That’s when Al gave me the signal to kill him. I shot him in the neck first so he couldn’t talk anymore, and then I shot him in the chest like you told Al to do with the gun.”

“Janie, Al, you two handled a scary situation perfectly, and I’m right that you probably saved our lives. I’m so proud of you, I don’t know the right words to say. Al, are you okay?”

“I’m okay. It’s her did the killing.”

“Al told me we couldn’t kill him till we were sure he was a bad man. He thinks the good people are trying to hide, but maybe some are trying to get to safe places like we are.” Janie said.

“He’s right, but most of the ones roaming are up to no good. This is a sorry point we’ve come to for kids to have to decide who lives or dies. I’m sick of it.” Jake said.

“I’m taking the two young ones to the cabin,” Eva said. “I need a new icepack, and I want a few minutes alone with them. The rest of you can make sure there isn’t anyone else creeping up on us.”

Jake stood. “Thank you Eva. Beth, you and Agnes stay on guard and watch each other’s backs. I’m taking a hike the way he came from. From the conversation Janie related, I believe he was alone, but I rather not go on an assumption.”

When Jake returned, he relieved Agnes, and remained at the edge of the cut on guard with Beth. Beth informed him that someone, she assumed, John Saint, had spoken twice on the radio trying to get Puckett to talk to him.

Jake looked at the radio and a smile formed on his face. He removed the microphone from its clasp.

“What do you think Beth, should we talk to Saint?”

“Why would we? What would we say to him?”

“This could be an opportunity to mislead him, misdirect him. It will also be fun in a gruesome sort of way.”

“You just want to mess with him.” Beth said, with a smile on her face to match his. “I want to talk too.”

Jake keyed the microphone. “Are you there John?”

There was a long pause before a voice came from the radio.

“Who the hell is this?”

“I’m the man who’s going to kill you. Name’s Markett, Jake Markett. You keep calling for your man Puckett. Well John, Puckett can’t speak anymore, a friend of mine cut his throat.”

“You son of a bitch, I’ll do worse than that when I get my hands on you.”

“Those are mighty brave words for a sissy. We killed your man not a half mile from where you are. The lady who killed him is sitting right beside me on top of a building. We’re watching your camp.”

Beth could not help laughing. She reached for the microphone.

“Hello John, this is Beth. We haven’t met yet, but I hope to meet you late at night. I’m going to cut you with the same knife I used on Puckett and I’m not even going to wipe his blood off it.”

“Fuck you bitch, we’ll catch you two before you get out of town and my men can have a party in your ass.”

“We’re the ones been having the party. After we killed your four on the road, I’m the one who shot your truck driver in the face. We killed your gang of rapists at the farm house, and burned up a bunch of cannibals later that night.”

Beth passed the microphone back to Jake.

“John, are you still there?”

“I’m here, you bastard.”

“We have to go now. Don’t want your men to catch us. How many of you have we killed already? My count’s at twenty-four, but I may be missing a few. It’s so easy, we’ll probably kill a few more before we come for you.”

Beth reached with her hand, indicating she wanted to speak again. Jake passed the microphone to her.

“Hello John, we have to go now, but I needed to correct Jake. He forgot to include Puckett. That makes twenty-five of your men dead. You'll see me standing over you one night with my bloody butcher knife in my hand... Oh, by the way, I’m a black woman. When we bury you that’s what we’ll write on your grave. John Saint dead by the hand of a black woman.”

“You fuckin' bitch, when I—.

Jake turned the radio off.

“Saint will have his men searching every building in Bainbridge,” he said, unable to suppress a laugh. “That should keep him confused as to our whereabouts.” He laughed again. “I bet he has nightmares for a while.”

*

It took five days for the swelling to reduce enough for Agnes to repair Eva’s nose. The time weighed heavily on Jake’s mind, but Eva’s condition was such, the delay was mandatory. To keep his mind off it, he found ways to occupy himself. It was while working in the forest nearby the cabin, Agnes and Eva came to him, interrupting his vigorous machete attack on the underbrush and small trees.

“I figured we’d find you here. You’re making progress.” Agnes said, looking back along the path he was making through the forest. She handed him a bottle of water. “Would you mind taking a break for a few minutes?”

He accepted the water gratefully, wiping sweat from his face with a rag, motioning for them to sit in a cleared section he was working on.

“Jake, Eva has some information to pass on to you, and I have a few questions to ask.”

“Sounds serious,” Jake, responded. He turned to Eva. “What’s up?”

“Nothing bad, just some information I need to relate. Yesterday Beth had her first period.”

“But that’s impossible… wait a minute, you’re serious aren’t you?”

“I’m dead serious. In the time since the plague, she is the only female I’ve encountered to have a monthly cycle.”

“That’s one of the effects of the nanobot infection.”

“I know about your theory concerning the infection.”

“Not a theory,” he interjected, “a proven fact.”

“I’m not denying it, what I’m saying is, having had her period, it’s possible she could get pregnant. I thought you should know. I’ve already explained this to her.”

“I’m glad you told me.”

“There are some other things,” Eva continued. "Agnes gave Beth a physical yesterday. Her report to me indicated she is a virgin. I examined her myself. Her hymen is intact. I don’t have any explanation for this. Jake, I’m not a psychiatrist, so I can’t speak professionally, but as we examined her this morning, just from bits of the general conversation, her emotional frame of mind is that she is a virgin. You know her past, Agnes has told me as well. There’s something going on here that I can’t conceptualize.”

“Has Agnes told you about the studies the researchers in Wisconsin are doing and that I had an accident involving them?”

“Yes she has, and she’s detailed the phenomenon involving the four of you.”

“Good. Agnes, you may recall, the researchers discovered even people unaffected by the plague have nanobots inside them masquerading as normal cells. One of the lab technicians took a fall and banged his head. They ran an MRI on him. As you know, a MRI generates a very strong magnetic field. When they examined his results, they found a large number of what they called hot spots. They couldn’t get a fine resolution of the cause, but they knew anything that could disrupt the field had to be generating a field of its own. They ran several more people through the machine, targeting different areas, and found them to have hotspots scattered throughout their bodies.”

“So you’re saying, right now, the three of us sitting here have these machines inside us. I find that to be very disturbing,” Eva said.

“It is to me too… no… especially to me.” Jake agreed. “I know they are affecting the three siblings, changing them and Agnes too.”

“They do more than promote good health.” Agnes stated.

“Yes they do,” Jake agreed. “I thought that was all they did, but now I’m not so sure. I think listen to us talk, and they are infecting and altering the people close to me, for a purpose.

“I am worried about one thing, and it’s a big worry. Is what’s happening between Beth and me being influenced by the nanobots for their own ends? Are the feelings we came to have for each other nothing more than manipulations by some damn, murderous machines?”

“”I’m aghast at the thought they would be capable of that,” Eva said.

“Hold up there a minute, Jake,” Agnes said. “I watched the two of you fall in love and it was a natural progression. I’ll admit it was a fast romance, but—.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Jake interjected. “I’m in head over heels, and I’m asking her to marry me.”

“Considering they made her a virgin for you, you'd be remiss not doing so.” Eva said, contritely.

“No, they did that for her, because she wanted to be one for me. Let me explain something else I believe is happening. I think the nanobots are acting on words I say. I compliment Janie’s eyesight, and it gets even better, same thing with her martial arts skills. I tell Al he’s smart, and he gets smarter. Beth subconsciously wanted to be a virgin and now she is. There’s another thing. When I first met Beth, we had a strange experience. I saw her as she is now, fully mature. I also related her skin color to chocolate, and now, I often get the distinct flavor of milk chocolate in my mouth when she comes close. It’s weird, like magic, and I don’t know why it’s happening.”

“Beth told me about your, 'look in my eyes, thing',” Agnes said. “She came away from the experience smelling Old Spice when she’s near you, the same cologne her father used.

“I find all this rather frightening,” Eva said.

“Well, I don’t,” Agnes, disagreed, “So far, now that they're not killing people, all they’re doing is good stuff. I would be careful though, Jake. If they can read your mind and hear your words, they may not take kindly to you calling them murdering machines.”

“If they are reading my mind they have heard worse than that,” Jake replied grimly.

“Well, unless Doctor Herman has a cure, I guess we’re stuck with them. Agnes stood and offered Eva a hand up. You may as well get back to chopping Jake. We’re no less confused, but what the hell. I’m going to check on the rest of our infected tribe.”

“I’ll join you in a minute Agnes,” Eva, said. “I want a private word with Jake.” She watched her until she was out of sight before turning to speak to him.

“Jake, I haven’t had an opportunity to thank you for what you’ve done for me. I want you to know I appreciate and thank you for taking this, uppity old Yankee Jew, in from the wilds.”

Jake laughed, “You have a way about you. You know, now that your swelling has gone down, you remind me of someone.”

“Katherine Hepburn. I get that all the time.”

“Now that you mention it, yeah, and you sound a lot like her.”

“Just about the same heritage and upbringing,” she replied. “Uh, er… Jake, I wonder if I could ask a favor of you.”

“You’ve got it, if it’s within my power,” he said.

“It’s kind of silly, you would think a forty three year old woman would be more mature, but I get flustered when I’m around Agnes. Do you think you could let it slip that I think she’s cute.”

“Eva,” Jake said, laughing. “You’re blushing. Yes, I’ll let it ‘slip’ for you.”

Jake returned to wielding his machete only to be interrupted again by the arrival of Al. Al stopped near him, and looked back the way he'd come.

“Why are you cutting a trail through the woods?”

Jake laid down his machete, mopped his forehead with a rag and took a swallow from the water bottle. “Mostly for something to do. How's Janie holding up?” he asked, sitting on the ground and motioning Al to join him.

“She's okay, but in a way she's not okay. I came out here to talk to you about her.”

Jake shifted his position to face him. “Sounds like you've got something serious on your mind. Is she having a problem dealing with what she had to do?”

“No, and that's the problem. Killing that man means nothing at all to her. I asked her the next day if she was having any bad dreams about it, and she told me she wasn’t, and that she didn't even think about him unless somebody mentions him. To her, she killed a bad man, and that it is not the same thing as killing a real person. She told me bad people don't count at all.”

Jake looked at the young boy in front of him. Al seemed almost ready to cry.

“What do you think about that and how do you feel about your part in what happened?” he asked in a gentle tone.

“I think about him, about how he looked around at us when Janie shot him in the neck. I saw how hurt and surprised he was, and I could see his fear. He was afraid of us, and afraid of dying. It was like I was seeing everything slower than normal. Janie notched and fired her second arrow so fast he didn't have time to even try to speak, but I could see his face, and his whole body screaming for her not to kill him. I did have a nightmare the first night after.”

Jake reached for Al's hand and held it in both of his. “I am so sorry protecting us fell on you and Janie, but this is the world we have to survive in. Can you think of anything that could have been done differently?”

Al shook his head. “No. We did what needed to be done, and from reading the books, I realize that justice has to be dealt, but what I don't like is that it doesn't bother Janie.”

“Is she acting differently?”

Again, Al shook his head. “No, she's the same as always.”

Jake realized Al needed an answer to something very difficult to explain, but knew he had to make the attempt.

“Al, I want you to listen carefully. Everyone is different, and their differences allow them to handle the experiences in life in many diverse ways. People are complicated. There are those like John Saint, who have no respect for life at all, but love themselves above everything and everyone. There are those like Eva who would rather heal than harm. There are people like me and Beth, so full of hate, that we want to kill those who harm us, and would go out of our way to do it. You have Janie. She doesn't want to kill, but she will if it means keeping us from harm. Thankfully, it doesn't weight heavy on her mind. There is you. You would kill also to keep us from harm, but it would weigh on you.

“You have been reading the books on philosophy and law. The search for life’s meaning has eluded even the greatest of minds, but laws have not. Law, in its simplest form, is based on the premise, live your life how you see fit, but don't do anything to harm others... What does all this I said mean to you?”

Al thought for a minute. “If people were all the same and thought just alike, we wouldn't need laws.”

Jake, smiled. “No laws at all?

Al thought again before answering. “Are rules the same thing as laws?

“Rules can be considered laws, but not absolute laws.”

“I think I understand better about people. Janie and I are together so much that I thought she should be more like me. I guess I should be glad she doesn't have nightmares about killing that man. I'm going to keep reading the books, and maybe when we get to Heaven, there will be more. If there are going to be a lot of people there, then we're going to have to have rules and laws. I want us to be where people live by laws.”

Jake gave Al's hand a squeeze before letting go of it. “That's why we're fighting to get there, and why we can't let anyone stop us. When we arrive, we will have a huge job ahead of us and you will be a big part of whether we succeed or fail. I commend you and recommend that you continue your studies. Perhaps guidance and governance is the role the nanobots see for you.”

“If it is, I don't mind.” Al stood. “I need to talk to Janie. I hurt her feelings when I told her she should feel bad about killing. I know she never thinks about hurting anyone, and it was his fault for coming here, and wanting to hurt us. She killed a bad man and that's all. She doesn't need to hurt herself because of him.”

“You summed our conversation perfectly. I'm glad we had this talk. It helped me too.

Al left. Jake watched him walk away, his mind still on their talk, and on how the younger ones had changed, since the day he had gathered them from the farm.

*

Janie, noted at dinner one evening, Eva was beginning to have a face again. Eva laughed, but assured her much of the swelling would return as soon as her nose was set.

Agnes used one of the two remaining morphine injectors, and, as Eva would be guiding her through the process, she gave her only enough to deaden the pain.

She requested Jake and Al be on hand to watch the procedure as a learning experience. With Beth assisting her, the entire process took nearly an hour. It was a bloody mess, and Jake was almost gagging at some parts of it. Toward the end, Eva passed out from the pain. Agnes was finally satisfied with the shape of the nose. Beth held it in place with a gauze wrapped screwdriver inserted in each nostril while Agnes stuffed treated gauze into Eva’s nose, packing it tight against the screwdrivers before carefully removing them. She coated Eva’s nose and surrounding area with petroleum jelly and applied casting material shaped like the letter T. It was made from gauze soaked in plaster-of-Paris they found in Janie’s’ miracle basement. She took care to mold it as it set before taping it in place.

Jake wanted to know how such a simple cast could hold the shape of the nose. Agnes explained that the material fit so closely to the nose, it actually formed a vacuum. She also explained that she would have to change the cast when the swelling went down again.

*

Three days later, Jake asked Beth to take a walk with him. Hand in hand, he led her along the path he had laboriously hacked though the underbrush. Within a short distance, they emerged from the path into a large natural clearing. It was an almost circular area surrounded by tall oaks festooned with Spanish moss, their massive branches forming a dense dome over the entire space. The bright Georgia sun filtered through as rays, giving the space a beautiful dim glow. Jake paused at the entrance and waved Beth on.

Beth went to the middle of the clearing and slowly turned.

“This is wonderful.”

“I had to find a special place to say some special words,” he replied, moving to her, reaching for her hand.

“Oh Jake,” she said in a soft voice.

“Beth Simpson, you have captured my heart in a very deep way. I’m tired of being alone and lonely. Beth, I have three special words to say to you.

Jake lowered himself to one knee, still holding her hand.

“Beth Simpson, I love you. Will you do me the honor of being my wife?”

She dropped to both knees, looked at him with eyes full of love, and punched his shoulder very hard. “What took you so long? Yes, I’ll be your wife!”

The wedding took place the next day in the same clearing. Jake declared himself the mayor of a newly established township, officially named Haven, but proclaimed the common name, Heaven, allowable. He appointed Agnes to the position of Justice of the Peace, an honor she readily accepted, stating she would be delighted to make an ‘honest man’ of him.

Immediately after breakfast, the women evicted Jake from the cabin. He went to join Al at the edge of the cut, making small talk to pass the time. A short time later, a very excited Janie joined them.

“Wait till you see Beth. They finished putting on Eva’s new nose cast, and now they’re making Beth beautiful.”

“Janie, you’re not supposed to tell,” Al said.

“I didn’t say how, did I?” she retorted.

“Don’t worry about it kiddo,” Jake said, “I sort of know what’s going on in there. Women love occasions like this, it brings out the woman in them. They want to make it a special day for Beth and for me.”

“And for me too,” Janie said, “I’ve never been to a wedding before. I’ve got to hurry back and practice my part.” She took off at her usual flat out run.

“You better hurry back,” Al, called, “I need to practice too.”

They gathered in the clearing after lunch. The day was cloudy, but not overcast. The light filtering through the trees would slowly change as the clouds drifted past the sun. A slight cooling breeze was blowing.

Agnes, with her rifle slung from her shoulder, stood with Jake in the center of the clearing, facing the entrance to the path. Eva, her nose stuffed with gauze, and Janie with her bow and quiver, stood together off to one side.

“Jake Markett,” Agnes said in a loud voice, “why are we gathered here today?”

“We’re here for you to marry us.”

“You have to do better than that,” Agnes said in a whisper, “There’s a young lady out there listening for your reply, and by God, you better make it special for her!”

Jake nodded his understanding.

“We are gathered here for a ceremony that will bind my life to the woman I love.”

Agnes smiled at him before continuing, “Does Beth Simpson wish to bind her life with this man, if so, please join us here in this sacred place.”

A few seconds later Beth and Al appeared at the entrance to the clearing. Al, with his rifle slung from his shoulder, was holding his sister’s arm, leading her slowly forward.

Beth was dressed, neck to ankles, in a white gown. Her head was adorned with a wreath of wild flowers braided into a white band of cloth. Artfully crafted long ribbons of white flowed behind her from the headband of the wreath. They had wrapped her feet with the same white cloth. Jake’s heart skipped a beat at the sight of her, and he knew, no matter how much time passed, this memory would never fade.

Agnes began to whistle the melody for the bridal march, with Eva and Janie singing the words. Eva, despite the cast and the gauze plugging her nose, sang with her soul, and Janie sounded just as lovely. Al led Beth to stand beside Jake, and moved to join the others. When the song was finished, Agnes began speaking.

“I know the words that are typically said at a wedding,” Agnes began, “but a glance at us tells this is not a typical wedding. Two of the people we love and care about most in this world are soon to be joined.” Agnes paused for a moment to take a breath and to wipe a tear from her cheek, “I’m sorry, I’ve never felt so girly in my life... Would the two of you face each other and hold hands. Let us get this done so we can get guards back out.”

They did as requested, standing close, Jake taking a hand in each of his.

“I know it’s usually said that the minister of the ceremony joins two people but I’m not doing it that way. You two are going to join yourselves.

“Beth, tell Jake why you want to marry him.”

Beth smiled and squeezed his hands.

“Before I met you I lived in fear. Every person we met after the death harmed us. When I first met you Jake, I was afraid of you. That first day you shot and killed two men who attacked us. You said we weren’t safe there at our house and that we could travel with you. I offered myself to you. You said you didn’t want any of what I had. I didn’t believe you, but we went with you.

“We have been on the run ever since, and we’ve killed more people. Along the way, we rescued two more people, Agnes and Eva, that became members of our family. You accepted responsibility for their lives too. I came to realize you would give your life, without thought, to keep us safe. I am not afraid of you now. I am in awe of you. You are what my mamma would call ‘true blue” and my daddy would ‘call a man among men’.

“One day, I heard my brother and sister wishing you could be their daddy, and it came to me, I didn’t want you that way. I wanted you the way a woman wants a man. Jake Markett, you are a good man, a strong man and a gentle man. I know, in the embrace of your heart, you will be true to me. I love you Jake Markett for the man you are. I love you with every fiber of my soul.”

“Jake,” Agnes said, “tell Beth why you want to marry her.”

Jake blinked the moisture from his eyes, and taking a deep breath, began to speak.

“Beth, I didn’t want to love you. I saw you as a child and I thought of you as a child. I saw your feelings for me were changing. I thought it was an infatuation and would pass with time. It didn’t, and I found myself captivated by you. It took a wise woman,” he said, with a nod towards Agnes, “to straighten out my thinking. It took you, and some bold moves on your part,” he said, with a broad smile, “to change my perception of you. I will never see you as a child again.

“The question asked was why I want to marry you. When I met you, you were such a skinny little thing. Even so, there was strength about you. I still think about that big butcher knife you kept close those first few days. As time went by, the depth of your spirit, and your soul, became even more evident. I saw the way you grew intellectually. I saw the way you changed physically. I saw the way you cared for your brother and sister. I fell in love with you a long time ago, and denied it. Still, my love for you grew with every passing day. I love you because you have the courage to entrust your heart to me. I love you because I always want you near me. I love you Beth Simpson, with every fiber of my soul.”

They stood face to face, their eyes entwined with the enchantment of their feelings. Agnes broke the spell.

“Damn, this is a happy day. I pronounce you bound. Al, it’s time for the rings.”

Al stepped forward and handed Agnes three rings.

“Beth, as you requested, the rings which once bound your mother and father will now be used to bind the two of you.” She handed a heavy gold ring to her. “Beth, would you please place this ring onto Jake’s’ finger.”

She took the ring and slid it onto his finger.

“You’re my man. I love you Jake Markett.”

Agnes handed Jake two rings. “Jake, would you please place these rings onto Beth’s finger.”

He slid to rings onto Beth’s finger.

“You’re my woman, I love you Beth Markett.”

“Now for God’s sake, kiss,” Agnes said. “Don’t take forever about it. You’ll have an entire lifetime for that. We’ve got one more piece of business to take care of.”

They kissed and even though it was hard, they kept it modest. When they separated, Agnes requested, Al and Janie, to join them.

“Al Simpson, Janie Simpson, you have brought a request before the Justice of the Peace of the township known as Haven.”

“Yes we have your Honor,” Al said with an obviously practiced reply, “We request that Jake Markett be allowed to adopt us as his children. To honor our mother and father, we request that the name Markett be added to follow our surname of Simpson.”

“Your request is recognized by this court. What say you, Jake Markett, to this petition for adoption?”

Jake opened his arms for the two smiling kids. “I say, hello Allen Simpson Markett, hello Janie Simpson Markett. Welcome to my life.”

Janie gave a gleeful shout, leapt into his arms, and smothered him with kisses.

Agnes stepped back and began laughing. “Jake Markett, you are either the dumbest man alive or else the luckiest. I pronounce you man, wife, and family. Now I think it’s time to leave these two lovebirds to their honeymoon. On the other side of this clearing, behind that clump of Sassafras, you will find everything you two will need for a short stay here. We love the two of you… Jake, Eva wants to have a private word with you. Now if you will excuse the rest of us, we’re going back to our duties. I’m getting nervous as hell with no one on guard.”

Jake nodded and turned to Beth.

“You two talk,” she said. “This dress may be made from bed sheets, but it’s my wedding dress and it’s precious. I’ve got to put it somewhere safe.” She kissed his cheek and followed the others out of the clearing.

CHAPTER 13

Jake turned to Eva who was standing beside him.

“Congratulations, Jake, you have a beautiful new wife. Do you recall our conversation about the resumption of Beth’s menses?”

“I do, I hope you’re not going to say this would be a bad time to consummate our marriage? Lord knows we don’t have any birth control handy.”

“No” she said laughing and then grimaced in pain, “That’s what I wanted to tell you. All we have to go by is the old-fashioned rhythm method. Based on it, she should be in a safe zone for three more days."

"I remember hearing my mother tell a friend that using the rhythm method was a pregnancy waiting to happen."

"No doubt it wasn't the best guide, but it was right often enough.

“Thanks for telling me. We may want children later, but now is not the time. When you see Agnes, let her know we’ll be having a meeting tomorrow, around noon. We’ll be leaving this area permanently in a couple of days. Tell her we can strip the place of anything that will fit into the back of the truck. I mean overload it, if she thinks we can use something in Heaven.”

“Will do, Mr. Mayor of Heaven.”

“Jeez, that sounds tacky. I can’t believe we let it stick.”

“You keep saying it too. Haven is more fitting, but to Janie and the rest of us, I think the unofficial name Heaven will do.”

She left him standing there. It felt like forever waiting for Beth to return. When she did appear at the entrance to the clearing he suddenly felt bashful. Thankfully, in her excitement, she did not notice, and the feeling passed.

“Let’s set the tent right in the middle of the clearing,” she said. “This is the most beautiful spot in the whole world.”

“It is beautiful,” he agreed. Let’s make a deal to celebrate our ten year anniversary here.”

“I don’t know what that is, but let’s get the things they stashed for us and set up our honeymoon camp so we have something to celebrate ten years from now.”

“Somebody’s in a hurry to consummate this marriage.”

“If that word means what I think it does, that’s been my goal ever since I decided to get you, so be a gentleman and hurry.”

Jake hurried.

Their lovemaking was a slow starting affair. There was just enough light in the tent to see. They spent a long time, touching, and feeling, and kissing, gradually getting to know each other in an intimate way. The heat in the tent built from the heat of the sun. The heat of their naked bodies stoked the furnace. The sweat lent an erotic aspect to their foreplay, their bodies slipping and sliding upon each other. When Jake entered her, she screamed, and pulled him deeper in a frenzied rush. A moment later, she screamed once more as her passion released in a climatic explosion that pulled him along with her.

“Oh, Jake,” she said, sitting. “I never dreamed it could feel so good.”

He responded by cupping a breast in his hand and began flicking the nipple with the tip of his tongue.

Beth began to moan.

“You need to lie back down,” Jake said. “We have the day and night ahead of us.”

“It can happen again?”

“More times than you can imagine,” he answered, “and it only gets better.”

“Oh, God,” she said.

They sank into the essence of each other and did not come up to breathe.

*

Agnes and Eva were in the kitchen area drinking hot tea.

“I make that five,” Agnes said, as the sounds from the clearing abruptly stopped.

“You say that with so much pride, one would think you had something to do with it.”

“Oh I did, Eva. What that girl didn’t know about catching a man would fill a book.”

“And you know about ‘catching a man’.”

“Man, woman, doesn’t matter. You just have to know when the right time comes to make a move.”

“One would think feelings for another would simply grow in a natural way without artificial prompting.”

“One would think, huh. You know, you are an uppity Yankee Jew aren’t you? You remind me of Rose Sayer, the heroine in the ‘African Queen’ movie. She was so haughty, but in such a clean cut way. I had a crush on her for years. She sure knew how to wrap poor Charlie Allnut around her little finger. For such a goody two shoes she made some pretty bold moves on him.”

“So you think Beth made bold moves on Jake?”

“I know she did, but I don’t think she made any as overt as this.” Agnes reached to pull Eva to her and kissed her lips, taking care not to bump her nose.

“Why Agnes,” Eva said, breathlessly, when Agnes released her, “That certainly gives one something to think about.”

“It certainly gives me something to think about. I’m thinking about doing it again.” She did, and Eva didn’t pull away.

The two of them were earnestly chatting when two things happened almost at once. The sounds from the clearing once again reached an abrupt crescendo, and Janie came rushing through the door.

“That would be six,” Eva said, as she turned to the sound of Janie coming into the room. “Whoa youngster, slow down before you fall and break something. Why are you in such a rush?”

“I keep hearing Beth screaming, something must be wrong!”

“Honey, that’s just the way people act when they get married,” Eva said. “They’re probably telling each other scary stories.”

Agnes rolled her eyes. “Jake and Beth are making love, and it makes her feel so good, she has to scream.”

“Oh,” Janie said, relieved. “She’s okay then?”

“Yes she is, sugar, and judging from the amplitude of her screams, she’s more than okay. Are you hungry?”

“Nope, I used to be hungry all the time, but nowadays I’m mostly full. I am bored though. Aren’t you?”

Agnes and Eva looked at each other and burst out laughing.

“No, honey,” Agnes said, “we’re not bored."

Janie was confused. “Did I say something funny?”

“No, I did,” Agnes replied. “When you go outside, tell Al we’ll be down shortly to relieve him.”

“I just left him. He said he wouldn’t mind watching a while longer. He’s carving hiking sticks for him and me. I’m supposed to ask if he’s old enough to have a cup of coffee, and I want some more of the orange drink we had yesterday.”

“The orange juice for sure, but I’ll have to defer to the doctor about the coffee. Doctor Herman, what is your profound opinion as to Al’s request?”

“Let’s see, I believe you told me the young man in question will soon be fifteen years of age. It is my profound opinion that he has reached an age where a little caffeine in the line of duty can be allowed.”

“Does that mean yes or no?”

“It means yes, honey.”

“Then just say yes. You two are weird today.”

“Yes we are, aren’t we, Eva?”

“Why is Eva turning red?” Janie asked, “Is she getting sick or something?”

“Mostly or something,” Agnes answered. This answer caused Eva to burst out laughing again, grimacing with pain at the same time. Agnes lost control and joined her. At that moment, the sounds from the clearing again reached a peak and died away.

“I make that six.” Agnes said, smiling, even though tears were flowing down her cheeks.

“No, that’s seven,” Eva replied, “I called six the last time." For some reason this caused them to laugh even harder. Janie stalked past them in a huff, and began mixing the powdered orange drink herself.

“You two are silly today.”

*

Jake and Beth made their entrance the following morning into the kitchen. Agnes and Eva were at the sink cleaning the breakfast dishes. Beth had made an effort to make her hair presentable, but it was obviously a hurried attempt.

“Jake, married life is suiting you.” Agnes declared, “But girl, we’ve got to do something with your hair. You look like you stuck your head in a blender.”

“I did,” she replied with a wide smile, digging a brush from the bag she was carrying, and handing it to Agnes. “Would you mind fixing me, I can barely lift my arms?”

“I wonder why,” Agnes said, returning her smile, taking the brush and guiding her to a chair. “You want to take a seat too, Jake?”

“No, I’m fine… on second thought, maybe I will, I’m starving. Is there anything left over from breakfast?”

Eva went to the oven and removed two plates piled with ham and reconstituted powdered eggs.

“I knew you two would be hungry when you showed up. You can have your coffee after you drink two glasses of water or orange drink.”

“Doctor’s orders huh?” Jake said, glancing at her.

“Doctor’s orders.” she replied, “By the way, that favor I asked of you? Things have occurred that it’s not needed.” Eva moved close to where Agnes was busy unweaving the knots in Beth’s hair, and put her arm around her waist. “Things sort of took care of themselves.”

“Oh?” Jake replied, smiling, I see that,” he said, not mentioning he had dutifully passed on her message. A thought came to him. “Al and Janie are on guard together?"

“We tried to separate them so they would each have an adult partner, but separating them would require the use of force,” Agnes said.

“Well, we can’t fault their teamwork,” Jake responded. “Is she having any problems dealing with killing the man?" he asked, addressing Eva, seeking a second opinion on Al's comments about her.

“No problems at all. She told me it was her job to protect us when she is on duty. The little girl sounded so grownup when she said it. I think all of us are developing disaffected personalities. Death and violence seem to have become the norm."

“That’s a cycle that’s going to stop. I won’t get into depth about how, but I’m hoping all of you will be major players in my plans once we get to Haven.”

“Beth’s a given,” Agnes replied, “but understand this Jake, you should know that my participation in any effort you undertake is also a given. I believe I speak for Eva as well.” She gave Beth’s shoulder a pat. “You’re done... You know, you may as well tell the nanobots to install a permanent relaxer in your hair. Tell them it’s for Jake, and they’ll probably do it,” she suggested with a chuckle.

“That’s a good idea,” Beth replied. “I should have thought of that.”

“Jesus,” Jake said, “you three are treating the nanobots like pets. They killed over seven billion people!”

“We’re aware of that Jake, but that part of them seems to be over. All we see now is their benevolence,” Eva said. “I believe as you do that the humans left alive are mankind’s second chance.”

“They may be showing benevolence now, but all they will get from me is malevolence. The research teams will find out who sent them and they will get a taste of what they fed us.”

“Damn right,” Agnes agreed. “But in the meantime we’ll use them any way we can if it helps keep the few surviving humans alive.”

Jake threw his arms up in surrender. “At this point we may as well. As soon as Beth and I finish eating, I’d like us all to join Al and Janie at the cut.”

*

“All quiet?” Jake asked as they approached the two on guard.

“We haven’t heard or seen anything,” Janie answered.

“Eva told us we’re leaving,” Al said. “Are we really taking the truck?”

“Only a few miles up the cut to a place Beth and I found,” Jake, said, as he motioned them all to take a seat on the ground. “Time is getting short. We need to be in Haven by the middle of June. There are groups of people who should be arriving near the end of the month. We don’t know what the conditions are there, and I want time to prepare the place to receive them. This is the end of May. We could probably walk it in the time remaining, but we can’t rely on probably. Anything can happen on the road, and, as we’ve experienced, things that ‘happen,’ usually mean delays.”

“That’s for sure,” Agnes interjected.

Jake nodded to her. “Anyway, about three miles from here, Beth and I, discovered an armored military transport vehicle called a MaxxPro. There’s also a huge covered trailer to pull behind it. I figure we can put everything useful here into our truck and transfer the load into the trailer. That will leave the big transport with plenty of room for us. Without getting into the technical details, I will tell you it would take a massive attack to stop us once we get the beast rolling.”

“Wait until you see that MaxxPro thing,” Beth said. “It’s as big as a house and it’s got a machine gun on top.”

“It is huge,” Jake agreed, “but we’ll be traveling in style. If we load the truck tomorrow, we can leave the next morning, transfer the load from the truck to the trailer, and be in the vicinity of Haven in two, maybe three days.”

“What about the noise factor and what you said about keeping out of sight?” Al asked.

“Let’s review that,” Jake replied. We’ve been very careful, and in being very careful, you’ve suffered a broken leg and Beth was attacked while doing a simple patrol. Just recently, you and Janie had to eliminate a man trying to sneak into our camp and only your quick action preserved our safety.

“Not to mention that we’re still only about twenty five miles from our home after all this time,” Beth added.

“You know,” Eva interjected, “maybe you were supposed to be delayed. I mean what are the chances, out of the so few people left alive in this world, the two people you rescue just happen to be a nurse and a doctor. What are the odds?”

“I have to say, that thought has crossed my mind,” Jake said. “I’m going to call it luck of the draw because I would not want to even consider the nanobot are able to direct long term plans to manipulate us, I’m glad you two are with us. I just hope nothing else happens to cause delays."

“I see what you mean about using the MaxxPro,” Al said, returning to his original subject, “but what happens if we run into a bunch of Saint’s men?”

“Not too long ago, your sister told me that your mother had a saying, ‘Bold people do bold things’. If we do run into any of Saint’s men, we fight and we kill them. No more running and hiding. If we have to fight them every inch of the way to Haven, then so be it.”

“Bravo, bravo,” Eva shouted.

“I agree, and I say bravo too,” Beth said. “It’s time they learned to fear us.”

“Jesus, Jake,” Agnes said, laughing. “You’re running with a crew of blood thirsty Amazons. I say kill anybody who gets in our way. Let’s ride.”

“We could start bringing things from the basement today,” Al said. “There’s a lot of food and water, and tools, and other stuff down there. I don’t think the truck can hold everything.”

“We’ll bring it out and make our decisions as to what gets loaded,” Agnes said.

“We may as well start now,” Beth said. “I guess our honeymoon is over, Jake. We have work to do. Before we go to the barracks, I want say something while we’re together. The day we found Eva, the day that man ran from the woods and tackled me, made me think about something important. He should have never been able to get that close to me.

“To be honest, my thoughts were on Jake. My mind should have been on our safety and our mission. If I wasn’t thinking about Jake, I would have put a bullet in that filthy son of a bitch before he got within twenty feet of me.

“What I’m saying is, this is a dangerous world, and even when we get to Heaven it will still be dangerous. We can’t let our guard down unless we know someone is watching our backs.”

“You’re right of course,” Jake agreed, “Even here we should have been more cautious than we have been. I let myself be lulled into a sense of false security because no one had come up this cut until the day Puckett did. The truth is, we could have been attacked at any moment.”

“You’ve got that right,” Agnes agreed. “I guess we need to put our personal lives on hold until we know we’re in safe places.”

“We want to help load the truck,” Janie said. “Anyways, mine and Al’s guard time is up.”

“Jake, why don’t you stay here on guard, we can handle moving the supplies,” Agnes suggested. “I think the young ones are a bit too excited about moving day to leave them here.”

They left Jake alone at the cut and he settled in a comfortable position behind a screening veil of foliage. He looked out at the lush, sun-warmed landscape, and let his thoughts run free. An image of his dead wife and sons came, and his eyes closed. He remembered taking the picture of them grouped together by their Christmas tree. The moment passed, the image faded, and he shed his only real tears since their deaths, lost in the joy of seeing his family whole and complete for the first time after so many years. His inner vision expanded and now he was walking from the curb to their house. Joan and the boys had seen his approach and came rushing out the front door into his welcoming embrace.

“Joan, Ben, Bobby, I wish you could meet Beth, and Al, and Janie. I know you would love them, and they would love you. I miss you three and think of you every day. I have your fullness in a part of me where you dwell. I am not complete, but I can taste the feel of it. I can put my lust for vengeance aside. Your memory will live by telling my new family about you, about the life you three gave me, about the love we shared. I love you Joan. You and our boys rest easy.”

*

Several hours later, Janie and Al returned to the cut and informed Jake he was needed at the barracks.

Everything of any value was stacked on the front porch. Jake stared in amazement at the mountains of food and water that was left after the amount of time they had spent there.

Agnes surveyed the stacks and piles with him. “If we leave off most of the water, we can bring all this with us.”

“You think so?” Jake asked.

“I do, and I’m wondering why we should wait to load. I say we do it now and head out at first light tomorrow instead of waiting until the next day. I don’t know about you, but I’m getting kind of spooked staying here, since our talk earlier. I say we get to Heaven as fast as possible.”

“I agree,” Beth said. “Is there any reason we can’t leave tomorrow?”

“No reason, I just didn’t want to rush things. I’m for getting out of this area too.”

“It’s agreed then. Let’s get stepping before we stiffen.” Agnes ducked into the bed of the truck. “I’ll stack. Make a line and start passing.”

CHAPTER 14

Agnes and Eva were awake before dawn and prepared breakfast so they could get an early start. The cab of the truck would not hold them all. Jake and Janie remained behind while the others hiked to the barn. A couple hours later Beth radioed to let them know to come ahead.

Jake drove the overloaded truck to the site and parked it near the opening to the barn and joined the others waiting inside.

“We want to keep our time here as short as possible,” he said, “but I want to break into those padlocked storage rooms. If Mister Walsh, the guy who owned this place had a MaxxPro, it stands to reason he will have other military supplies.”

“Let’s get them open then,” Agnes said. “Maybe we’ll find bazookas or machine guns in there.”

“Could be,” he replied, “but I have to warn you, Walsh put the bodies of his wife and daughter inside one of them. We’ll probably find their remains.”

He found a stout steel bar and wedged it in the lock. With Agnes helping, they managed to rip the hasp from the first door. This cubicle contained a goldmine of compact military issue MREs or, 'Meals-Ready-to-Eat', in answer to Beth's question. There were also cartons of freeze dried meats and vegetables, and irradiated canned goods “Whoa,” Agnes exclaimed,” We definitely want this to go with us. We could feed a small army.”

Jake agreed. "I'll move the truck next to the trailer. While you all transfer the load from the truck, I'll start mixing fuel for the transport.

While the others labored at transferring the supplies from their truck to the trailer, Jake gathered the tools and materials he would need and set to work. Using the booklet he'd found on their previous excursion, he began mixing the ingredients for the bio-diesel. According to the instructions and constrained by the size of the available containers, he could only prepare five gallons at a time. The guide stressed that the liquids had to be thoroughly mixed for thirty minutes utilizing the provided paddle he found on the shelf with the oil. Within a short time, he was covered in sweat. He finished the first batch, poured it into the transport’s tank, and sat wearily on the concrete floor. A few minutes later, the others joined him. They were as drenched in sweat as he.

Agnes sat with her back against one of transport's tires and wiped the moisture from her face with a rag. The rest sat nearby. Al tossed Jake a rag.

"Whew, it's hot and humid in here. Feels like summer. This is going to take a while," Agnes said.

Jake dabbed at the sweat running down his neck. "A lot longer than I thought it would. The tank holds seventy gallons of fuel. I can only make five gallons at a time, and each mix has to be stirred for thirty minutes. I'll need fourteen batches, and that's seven hours without breaks. Looks like we'll have to overnight here."

"So much for being on the road today," Eva said. "Do you think we should have guards out?"

Jake considered her question. “Yes I do. You nose is much better, but I can tell you're having difficulty breathing. I think it would be a good idea for you and Janie to guard while the rest of us do the prep."

"I don't know how to use a firearm."

"That's okay. Just use your eyes and ears. If you two spot anyone or hear something, run in and let us know... Janie, you have your bow, Al will loan you his pistol. He can go with you to help pick a spot to guard from and show you how to engage and disengage the safety. If you see you've got an emergency on your hands, just fire a round into the air, and we’ll come running."

Before Jake went back to mixing fuel, he removed two, very heavy, lead-acid battery-shells from a shelf. He carefully filled them with acid, before putting them in an out of the way place. The batteries needed to condition for a few hours before being charged.

When the others finished transferring the material from the truck, they began moving the food supplies from the cubicle. Jake finished the second batch of fuel, and poured it into the transport to free up his container. He set the empty can down, and retrieved the steel bar they had used to force the lock on the first cubicle.

"Agnes, let's get these other doors open so we know what we have."

The second cubicle yielded cases of military issue rocket propelled grenades, hand grenades, and M-79 grenade launchers.

They found the mother and child lying on the floor inside the third cubicle, their clothing collapsed over their skeletal remains. This cubicle was full of cases packed with military fatigues and boots.

There were no bazookas in the last space they opened, but it did yield ten cases containing four M-72 LAWs each, which, Jake informed Agnes, stood for Light Anti-Armor Weapon, compact shoulder fired missiles. There were also cases of M-16 automatic rifles, Beretta nine-millimeter pistols and many cases of ammunition.

Agnes looked at the opened spaces. "Damn. That's a lot of material. Walsh must have planned on outfitting a small army... I think we should put the clothing inside the trailer now, and then sort of mix the remaining food cartons in among the weapons. It may be we have to leave some of this behind."

Jake, was on his ninth batch, when Agnes called out they were finished loading the trailer. By dent of her careful packing, they had managed to clear the cubicles. It took all of them pushing to close and latch the trailer doors.

"Break time, wash up time and food time," Beth declared.

"Yeah, maybe even nap time," Al echoed. "I'm tired."

"I agree to all of it," Jake said, pulling his rag from his back pocket to wipe his face. "Why don't you three cool off for a bit? I'll relieve Eva and Janie so they can prepare a meal. I can rest while I'm guarding.”

It was early evening before everything needing to be done was completed. Al and Eva took over from a weary Jake and finished stirring the last two batches of fuel. Since the pouring container had a sealable lid, Jake decided they might as well prepare one more mix to take with them.

Janie said she could hear running water behind the barn. Jake sent Al out to search for the source. He found a small creek a little over a hundred yards away. Two at a time, they made the trip to the creek to wash and cool off.

After dinner, Jake drove the pickup out of the barn and hooked up jumper cables to charge the new batteries. He and Beth took the first guard shift. The others bedded down on the seats and benches of the vehicles.

*

While Beth and Janie prepared breakfast, Al and Jake installed the batteries in the transport. Agnes and Eva were on guard duty by the utility cut. Jake radioed them to come inside to eat.

After the meal, it didn’t take much coaching by Agnes to get everyone to agree to a few minutes of stretching and exercise. They were all weary from the previous day’s labor and stiff due to the very uncomfortable sleeping arrangements.

Beth was worried about the amount of time spent without a guard on duty. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m ready to get away from here. We’ve been making a lot of noise ever since we got here and the truck outside running half the night was risky.”

Agnes agreed. “Nothing holding us back... I hope. Are you sure that big monster truck of yours will run?

Jake replied. “I’m ready to leave this place too. Beth’s right about the noise we’ve been making. Let’s get rolling.” He went to the transport, climbed into the driver’s seat and engaged the starter. The engine turned over, but didn’t start. He smacked himself on the head and climbed from the cab.”

“Forgot to fill the fuel preheater with ethanol,” he said, in answer to their questioning expressions.

His second attempt at starting the vehicle was successful. It roared to life with an outpouring of rancid smelling black smoke that sent the other’s scurrying from the barn. He left the transport running, and joined them.

“We’ll give if a few minutes to warm up. Mixing all the fuel for this monster makes me wonder how Saint keeps so many vehicles moving.”

The smoke from the exhaust diminished, and after several minutes, they were able to reenter the barn. Jake backed the MaxxPro into position and they attached the heavily loaded trailer.

Jake took the driver’s seat with Beth riding shotgun. The rest found seats in the troop area, securing their weapons with the Velcro straps provided beside each seat.

“Let me warn you,” Jake said before starting the vehicle. “The suspension isn’t made for comfort, and I guarantee a rough ride until we get to the road. Everyone find something to hang on to.”

The transport chewed its way through the underbrush and sapling pines as if plowing through straw, the inside of the vehicle strangely quiet compared to the noise it made outside. The ride was as rough as he had warned, making the passengers in the rear thankful for the padded seats. A little over two hours later, he swung the wheels sharply to the right onto a paved road and the ride smoothed out. Jake centered the vehicle on the pavement and stopped.

“Beth, come with me to the rear compartment, it’s time for some basic gunnery training.” He requested Janie go to the front to keep an eye out and asked Agnes to keep a watch to the rear.

“We’re into this head over heels now,” he said to the group at large. “I’m the only one qualified to drive, and someone needs to know how to man the turret and use the machinegun. Beth will get a gunnery lesson now. Al and Agnes will get a lesson at another time. If any of Saint’s men are within earshot, we’re about to get their attention. From here on out, we’ll need to pay close attention front and rear.”

He pulled a telescoping platform from the floor of the vehicle, mounted it, and unlatched the roof hatch to give access to the gun turret.

“Get on the gunner’s platform Beth,” he said, stepping out of her way.

Beth did as he requested, and Jake went out and climbed to a position beside the bulletproof, glass and steel turret.

“You sure are cute in there, beautiful.”

“You need to pay attention to business, Mister,” she replied, flashing him a huge smile. “How come this road is so much more overgrown than the other roads we been on?” she asked, looking at the forest that crowded to the edge of the road, and the thick mass of weeds and small pines taking advantage of the cracks and breaks in the pavement, turning large portions the roadway into a tangled green carpet.

“This road runs east to west, and it’s a lot wider, so it gets more sun than the roads running north and south.”

“I can see that,” she agreed, squinting at the early morning sun. She reached for the twin grips of the machine gun. “Show me how to use this thing.”

“This is the newest model of the M-240 machinegun. The major difference is the two handed grip and the canister ammo feed. Do you feel that lever you’re squeezing on the right hand grip?”

“Yes.”

“That’s the trigger. If the safety wasn’t engaged you’d be spraying the countryside with lead right now.”

“Oh,” she said, yanking her hand off the grip.

“Keep hold of the left grip, right here is the safety lever,” Jake continued, reaching to touch it. “Flip it up, grasp the right hand grip, and squeeze the trigger. That’s all there is to firing it. Keep your head back, sight down the barrel and swivel to aim it. You can make a full circle with this turret by turning with your feet. Remember, the sights are only a guide. This is a machine gun, so in reality, you adjust your aiming point based on where you see your rounds hitting. Every fifth round is what’s called a tracer. It makes a streak of light as it travels. That feature allows you to adjust your aim at night. You got all that?”

“Got it,” she replied. What if I run out of bullets?”

“That’s a good question,” Jake leaned over the edge of the bulletproof glass surround of the turret. “Hey Al, Beth’s going to hand you an ammo canister. See the round canisters in the overhead rack. Pull one loose and pass it to her.”

Jake showed Beth how to release the canister. She lowered it to Al and took the one he passed to her. Jake leaned over and demonstrated the procedure to reload.

“See that big pine over there with a broken limb sticking out from it?” Jake asked, pointing to a tree about a hundred feet away. “I'll move so you don't knock me off. Pivot and see if you can shoot the rest of the limb off where it joins the trunk. Trigger short bursts of about three or four rounds each.”

Beth flipped off the safety, reached for the right hand grip and doing as Jake instructed, pivoted the turret. She fired a short burst and hit the tree about three feet below the limb.

“I see what you mean,” she said. She fired another short burst. More chips flew from the tree, made an adjustment and fired two more bursts. The limb splintered and fell, severed neatly at the trunk.

“All right, I pronounce you gunner first-class. I’ll join you back inside. Leave the hatch open and the platform up.”

Jake kept the speed low, avoiding washouts and large potholes in the road. Six years of neglect and the long winter had taken its toll. Brush and skinny little pines took advantage of every crack in the pavement. The area was so rural they encountered few abandoned vehicles. Jake figured, in another five or six years, most roads in the US would be impassable. It reminded him again of the book he read many years ago. “Yep, ‘The Earth Abides’.”

Beth interrupted his thoughts.

“You sure know a lot about this big truck.”

“You bet. This was the workhorse of the Middle East.”

“It seems pretty easy to drive. Do you think I could learn how?”

“How about right now?” he suggested.

“Right now?”

“Why not,” he replied, “It’s not as if we’re trying for a speed record. I’ll show you the basics and we’ll switch sides.”

A short time later, Beth was in the drivers’ seat.

“Just remember what I said. Foot on the brake, drop it into gear and easy on the gas pedal.”

Jake had her start, stop and, though limited by her inexperience with the difficulties of backing with a trailer attached, go a short distance in reverse a few times. As she became acquainted with the positions of the fuel and brake pedals and the feel of the steering wheel, her initial nervousness turned to growing confidence. After a while, she braked to a stop.

“I like driving,” she said. “It makes me feel free from the world.”

“That it does,” Jake agreed. “You can keep driving if you like. Watch out for ruts and holes, and increase your speed as it feels comfortable.”

They drove in silence, with Beth intently watching the road ahead for nature's obstacles, and Jake intently watching for humans. The trouble came from behind them.

“Jake,” Eva called out, “we’ve got a motorcycle about a half mile back coming on fast.”

Jake instructed Beth to stop and put the gear in park. As soon as the forward motion ceased, he rushed to the platform and swiveled the turret to face the rear, checking to be sure the safety was off the machine gun. The motorcycle, a Harley, slowed and came to a halt about thirty feet behind them, to the right of the trailer. An obese bearded man, with sand colored hair, climbed off and pulled a forty-five caliber pistol from his side holster. He was dressed in a well-worn and faded Alabama State Patrol uniform.

“Who the hell are you?” He shouted above the noisy engine of the transport, looking at Jake high above him.

“Jake Markett,” he shouted back. “Who the hell are you?”

“You don’t ask the questions here Mister, I do. John Saint’s looking for you.”

Jake called down for Beth to turn off the ignition.

“Well sir,” Jake said in a conversational voice, “this machine gun you see pointed at you says I ask the questions. My advice to you would be for you to toss your pistol over towards the truck or I’m going to cut you down.”

“You don’t know who I am,” the man blustered. “I told you, I’m with Saint's group. You better climb down here if you know what’s good for you.”

“Are you an idiot? I’m going to tell you again to toss your pistol or you are a dead man. I’d rather you be alive, but dead will be just as good. You’re running with a gang of rapists, cold-blooded killers and cannibals. You’ve got five seconds to make up your mind before I cut you in half.”

Jake took aim and began to count a quick cadence, as if in a hurry to get to five. At four the man called out, “Hold it, hold it,” and tossed the pistol.

“That was very wise of you, Mister. Now stand where you are if you want to see the sun rise again. I enjoy killing John Saint’s men. I’ve already killed a bunch of you sons of bitches.” Jake called down through the turret. “Agnes, would you mind stepping out of the truck and coming around back, I’ve got a little job for you?”

Agnes appeared at the back of the truck a few moments later.

“What you need done, boss?” she asked.

“Walk over to where you’re fairly close to him, stay to the side out of my line of fire and about ten feet away will do.”

Agnes stepped over the trailer hitch and did as requested, keeping her eyes glued to the man.

Jake spoke to her. “The man you're looking at is stupid. I think he's dumb enough to lie to me. Do you think you can hurt him without getting hurt yourself?”

Agnes sized him. “No problem boss.” She strode purposely to the man and at the last moment turned to deliver a powerful sidekick to his knee. From thirty feet away Jake heard it break. The big man fell to the ground, cursing and writhing in pain.

“You fucking bitch. God damn you to hell!” he screamed, reaching desperately for the pants cuff of his broken leg.

Agnes moved and brought her booted foot down with a vicious stomp to his forearm. Once again, Jake heard a bone snap. The man screamed even louder and started crying.

“Stop hurting me, goddamn it,” he blubbered.

“He was reaching for a pistol in an ankle holster,” Jake said. “Take it off him, and if you don’t mind Agnes, would you rip the microphone off his cycle?”

She did and she removed a sheath of paper protruding from his saddlebag before returning to the rear of the transport. “You want me to hurt him some more?”

“No, I think he understands we don’t give a damn who he works for. You can come back in. By the way, thanks, that was very nicely done.”

“Anytime boss, my pleasure.” she replied.

Jake, spoke to the man squirming in pain.

“I’m going to ask you one more time. Who are you?”

“James Baker. My name’s James Baker!” His voice was shrill and filled with pain.

“I’m not glad to meet you, Baker, but now that I have, let me ask you. What do you do for a living?”

“Mister,” the man said, still blubbering. “What the hell are you asking?”

“I asked you what you do for a living.”

“I work for John Saint. I’m the Captain of the third platoon.”

“Thank you sir, and may I ask you, what are doing out here?”

“Goddamn it man, I'm hurting... I’m just out riding.”

“Oh I see, riding, enjoying the fresh air, getting close to nature. That’s a good answer, but I believe you’re lying. I don't care if you're hurting. As a matter of fact you need to hurt more ... Agnes, would you mind coming back out?”

The man cried out desperately, “No! I’ll tell you.”

“Hold up Agnes, I get the feeling he doesn’t like you,” Jake said. “What are you doing out here. Don’t lie. A lie will cost you another bone.”

“The roadblock ahead called they heard shooting down this way. I was sent to check it out.”

“How much further is the roadblock?”

“I don’t know,” he answered, maybe three or four miles.” The pain hit him even worse. He curled into a fetal position, trying to sooth his knee and his broken arm at the same time. His blubbering and crying grew louder.

Jake paused a moment before continuing, looking at him lying there, searching for a trace of compassion within himself and finding none. “I believe you, Baker. How many men and vehicles are at the roadblock? You’re doing okay so far, but don’t make me call out the lady again.”

“Two motorcycles, a truck and eight men, that’s the truth Mister, I swear it.”

“One more question,” Jake said. "How many people does John Saint have now and how many are soldiers?”

“If I answer, will you let me go?”

“Absolutely,” Jake assured him.

“The last head count was three hundred thirty eight and he's got six platoons of soldiers with twenty each.”

“Is that all,” Jake said sarcastically, “I thought he had an army. If you are indicative of the quality of his men, he’s leading a gang of losers I’ve got a message for you to deliver to the punk. Tell him the ones who have been killing his men say for him not to cross Interstate 75, and we’ll let him live for a while longer. If he crosses the interstate, the Angels of Heaven will kill him and his men. Do you think you can remember that?”

“Yes sir,” he replied plaintively, “I can remember that.”

“Do you remember my name?”

“Do you want me to?”

“Oh yes.”

“Jake Markett.”

“Do you remember the name of the lady that broke your bones?”

“Agnees.”

“Close enough. Before we drive away and kill the men at the roadblock, you need to apologize for calling her a bad name. Call her by name and make me believe it or I’ll have someone else out who’ll hurt you even worse.”

“Miss Agnees,” he called out, “I’ll be begging your pardon for calling you a bad name.”

“That was very nicely said, Mister Baker. I know she doesn’t forgive you, but you bought your life. I bid you goodbye for now. Tell John I’ll pay him a visit when I have time to waste on killing him. Have a nice day.”

Jake climbed back inside,

“What do you think,” he asked everyone, “did I sound crazy.”

“Crazy as a loon, and scary as hell,” Eva answered for them. “That was very strange.”

“That was for Saint’s benefit. We’re about to move, and some bad things are going to happen.”

Jake resumed his seat and had Beth restart the transport.

“Take it slow and drive to about thirty or forty feet from them before you stop. They’re going to want to ask questions. I’m going to kill them. You can put your head down when the shooting starts, but I doubt they have anything that can penetrate three inches of bullet proof Lamglass.”

CHAPTER 15

Three miles later, they rounded a bend, and saw the roadblock ahead. It was at the far end of a short bridge crossing a creek. Saint's men had parked their pickup sideways, effectively blocking the two lanes. Beth drove to the near end of the bridge and brought the vehicle to a stop. Jake reached for the microphone clipped to the dashboard, flipped a switch over to the outside speakers and turned the volume to full. His voice boomed when he spoke.

“You need to move your vehicle to the side. Saint sent us to check the next roadblock up ahead.”

Jake handed the microphone to Beth.

“Leave the switch open,” he instructed as he left his seat and moved towards the rear. “All of you move to the front and scream like crazy people when I start shooting. Janie, you stay behind the others so you can’t see.” He climbed into the turret and swung to face the roadblock.

“I told you to move the truck,” he shouted.

“You’re a damn liar, Mister,” someone shouted from behind the truck. “There ain’t no more roadblocks, and we see the nigger gal driving that tank you’re riding in. Saint ain’t sending a nigger out on his business.”

Jake’s eyes were searching for the positions of the men. Two were using their cycles as ineffective shields, and several were standing behind the truck. His count was up to six before he replied.

“Gentleman, I was hoping we could have a nice conversation, but the beautiful woman you see is my wife, and I have to tell you, she doesn’t like it when people say the word ain’t.” As he was speaking he managed to spot another man crouched in concealment behind some bushes off to the left, bringing his count to seven. They all had rifles pointed towards the MaxxPro. “She’ll be mad if I don’t kill you for misusing our beautiful language.”

Jake opened fire, killing a man squatting behind a motorcycle and swinging to kill the man behind the other one. A man leaning over the hood of the truck managed to get off a shot, the bullet spanging the metal frame of the turret aperture. A row of holes appeared in the hood of the pickup as Jake walked a line of bullets to him. His head exploded in a froth of blood. More bullets hit the armored turret. A bullet, from a shooter at the rear of the pickup truck, pocked the glass to the left of the machine gun aperture.

From the loudspeakers, there came such a hideous din, it sent a creepy chill up his spine. One man behind the truck broke from concealment and began running from the fight. Jake cut him down in mid-stride and swung to shoot at movement he saw from the corner of his eye. He had not spotted the man squatting behind the concrete edge-barrier of the bridge. The man made the mistake of standing to target Jake. Eight rounds from the machine gun chewed into his chest. The man crouching in the weeds sent a bullet through the aperture of the turret at an oblique angle, missing Jake, pinging off the glass beside him. Another man held his rifle over the edge of the pickup’s bed and loosed a stream of un-aimed automatic fire.

Jake, ignored the shooting from the truck and pivoted the turret. The man behind the bushes was still firing and had not the sense to shift to another place of concealment after firing his rifle. His mistake cost him.

Above the din, Jake heard a shout of surrender, but paid no attention. The remaining men were hiding behind the truck. Because of the distance, he could clearly see their boots. He swept three bursts under the bed of truck. Bullets tore into their feet and ankles. Several sweeps more finished them off as they fell.

“Okay,” he shouted to the others, “it’s done.”

The din from the loudspeakers cut off sharply and the ensuing silence seemed strangely out of place. Jake climbed from the turret.

“Why did we have to scream like that?” Janie asked as she moved past him towards the passenger’s seats.

“To frighten and confuse those men who were trying to block us from getting to Haven.”

“I bet it did. It was scary sounding in here.

“You all did a good job.

Jake returned to the passenger’s seat and twisted to call back to the others. “One of them said there aren’t any more roadblocks ahead. Its smooth sailing from here to Haven.”

“That was quick,” Beth whispered. “You sure are a cold blooded killer Mister Markett. They shouldn’t have said, ain’t”

“I have to tell you, there was a little hot blood mixed in there. We’re not in a position to take prisoners. They were going to die no matter what, but it was easier after what they said, and it wasn’t the word, ain’t.”

"You want to switch seats now?”

“You tired of driving?”

“No, I thought you might want to be the one to push the truck out of the way.”

“You’re the one learning to drive. Take it slow and push it over the edge. This big truck won’t notice the weight of that pickup.”

Beth put the transport in gear and drove across the bridge. She hesitantly began pushing the blocking truck out of the way. She caught sight of a slight movement on the pavement as the pickup began to slide. She stopped the transport.

“One of them’s still alive down there. If I keep going, the tire will go over him.”

“Nothing we can do for him and we aren’t prepared to take prisoners. He chose to be here,” Jake, said, his tone cold as ice.

She hesitated a moment, looking at his face, before nodding and shifting back into gear. Their vehicle was so heavy they did not feel the man’s body as it crushed him, but his short-lived scream echoed in all their minds for several seconds. She continued pushing until the pickup slid off the embankment. It rolled onto its’ top as it went over. Beth straightened the transport and called back to the others.

“The road’s clear. We’re on our way to Heaven.”

Jake spent time studying the map as she drove. She was becoming proficient at avoiding the numerous potholes, washouts and an occasional abandoned vehicle. There were places where there was no way around an obstacle. When warranted, she would call back for the others to brace themselves, while she carefully pushed aside or negotiated over downed trees and other obstacles. Sometimes she would have to get Jake’s advice, but so far, they had encountered nothing the four-wheel drive couldn’t handle.

In the back, Agnes and Eva were teaching Janie the words to children’s songs. Jake often found himself humming along. He saw a road sign showing the town of Newton was twelve miles ahead. An hour later, they passed a group of houses, and he saw a sign that said Newton city limits. Beth slowed to a stop.

“Do you want to drive through this town?”

“I do,” Jake replied. A little way further, this road intersects with highway 37. The 37 takes us all the way to Lakeland.”

“I mean, do you want to take over driving?” she asked, flexing her shoulders and stretching her arms. “My shoulders are knotted.”

“Having to watch every foot of the road can get to you,” Jake agreed. “Why don’t you slide past me, and we’ll change seats?”

Beth did as requested with more body contact than was needed.

“You keep that up and we’ll be changing seats every ten minutes,” he said.

“Keep what up?” she asked, feigning innocence.”

“You know what I’m talking about, you little devil,” Jake leaned over and kissed her.

She returned the kiss and then pushed him away. “Hey mister, you better keep your mind where it belongs,” she said, smiling her pleasure. “I think I’ll ride in the turret while we pass through town.”

“Good idea,” he agreed.

“Hey you love birds,” Agnes called out, “We’re getting pretty hungry back here. That dinky little breakfast wasn’t near enough for the work we did this morning.”

“I hear that,” Jake agreed. “We’ll stop on the other side of this town and eat.”

There was not much to the town. When he got to the intersection at Highway 37, he stopped and cut the engine.

“We’ll be moving in a minute,” he called towards the rear. “I need to make a quick announcement.”

He keyed the microphone, leaving the volume on full.

“If anyone can hear me, please listen closely, there’s a bad gang of people headed this way. The leader is a killer and a cannibal, named John Saint. We are headed East down the 37. Just past Interstate 75 is Ray City. I will be checking there two weeks from today. I will lead anyone I find there to a place of refuge. If you are a bad person or a bigot, don’t bother to show.”

Jake restarted the engine and turned onto highway 37. Beth remained in the turret until the houses thinned, before returning to the passenger’s seat.

“I guess I know where we’ll be in two weeks,” she said.

“I don’t recall saying we,” Jake said, mischievously.

Beth gave him a face that said volumes. “You remember when you told the man to tell John Saint the Angels from Heaven would be coming for him. The way I see it, you and I are the Angels from Heaven.”

They rode in silence for a few minutes, both deep inside their own thoughts. The roadway past Newton was in much better condition, with clear areas for longer stretches, and they were able to make better time. Eventually, Jake pulled into the parking lot of what was once a country store and bait shop, just outside the town of Camilla.

“Give me a minute to check this place out, and we can stretch and eat.”

“Hurry, I need to pee,” Janie said.

“I’m coming with you to check the place,” Agnes said, removing her rifle from the restraints.

They did a thorough survey before calling the rest to join them. While getting things together for a meal, Agnes waited for an opportunity to pull Jake aside.

“Jake, I know you and Beth are into each other right now, but the rest of us are feeling left out.”

“How do you mean?” he asked.

“I can tell Al would like an opportunity to learn to drive, and we couldn’t help but hear when you two declared yourselves the ‘Angels of Heaven’.”

“It wasn’t my intention to make anyone feel left out.”

“I know that Jake, but you have to realize you are the mainstay of our little group. We all, and I include myself, consider you to be our leader. We look to you to guide us and to lift our spirits. There is something about you, as bumbling as you are, that radiates strength.

“Jeez Agnes, I’m just a man... Hey ... Bumbling?”

“Yeah. In many way you’re very calculating, but mostly you depend on the element of surprise, and you’re just plain lucky on the outcomes of situations. Still though, you’ve managed to earn my respect. It stems from the fact you are, deep down rooted, in decency. Do you think I would have done what you had me do for any other man in this world?

“I’m not comfortable with this, Agnes. I don’t belong on a pedestal.”

“You need to get used to it, where do you think you are in Janie’s eyes? You’re a hundred feet tall to her. I made Al your son, his name is Allen Simpson Markett. You need to feel that name deep down where it counts.”

He considered what Agnes said.

“You’re right, of course. I have some readjustment and rearranging to do inside my head. I appreciate you calling me out.”

“Just fulfilling my function as justice of the peace,” she replied, smiling. “By the way, I appreciate you letting me have a go at that fellow this morning. It went a long ways towards emptying my bottle of hate.”

“You sure did a good job of it. He never saw it coming.”

“Oh, he saw it. He was nothing but a simple-minded bully. People like him are very confident when they have someone at a disadvantage, but they don’t know how to act when the shoe’s on the other foot... As for the ‘Angels from Heaven’ thing, we’re happy to let you and Beth, own that title. Frankly, the two of you are downright frightening. I don’t know what my reaction would have been, if it was me you told to run over the man back at the road block, but she took it in stride.”

After eating, Jake spent a few moments in conversation with Beth before calling Al to join them.

“Son,” he said, draping an arm across his shoulder, “I think Beth has driving down pat. You ready to have a go at it?”

Al glanced at the big vehicle. “I thought I did, but maybe after we get to Heaven you can teach me. Janie gets scared when I’m not with her. Besides,” he said, nodding at Beth, “she’s better there with you if something happens.”

“I think you’d be okay with me, but if you feel Janie needs you, then maybe we should wait.”

Jake made the same offer to Agnes and Eva, but they adamantly deferred to Beth.

CHAPTER 16

Camilla, the next town, was barely noticeable. There were old roadblocks composed of cars parked across the road on both sides of the city. They pushed through. Past the town, the roadbed was in bad condition.

They encountered several washed out sections, one so deep, Jake knew they risked damaging the trailer if they attempted to cross it. The ground on each side was too soggy to risk leaving the roadbed. They filled the washout with roadside debris, rocks, dead tree limbs, broken pavement.

At another point, he had to take Beth's place at the wheel in order to creep past a jackknifed semi blocking most of the road.

They went through more small towns, stopping only for Jake to deliver his message. Beth asked if it was safe letting people know about the existence Haven. He explained his goal would be to get as many survivors to the facility as possible, and by having them gather at a place relatively far away, it would be possible to filter out any bad elements.

At 3:30, that afternoon, they arrived outside the city limits of a sizable town named Moultrie. Jake pulled into an abandoned convenience store located at a long straight section of road, giving clear visibility in both directions. As he dug through his pack for a map, the rest got out to stretch.

There was an area to the right of the store with a combination concrete picnic table and benches with a sturdy steel barbeque grill planted in concrete close by. Agnes and Eva were busy setting out supplies and cooking utensils in preparation for another small meal of MRE's. Beth was at the edge of the roadway keeping guard. Jake went to the far end of the table and spread his map.

“Where are my kids?” he asked Eva who was closest.

“Sound asleep the both of them. We’ll let them rest until it’s time to eat.”

Jake studied the map in silence. Once again, he found himself feeling comfortable and at ease. For the last two and a half years, while traveling from Wisconsin, he had felt very alone. Thinking further, he realized he had been alone and lonely since the death of his wife and boys, no matter that in Wisconsin, and other places, he had been among large groups of people.

Eva took a break and slid onto the bench across from him.

“Are we getting any closer?”

“We’re a little less than half way to Lakeland,” he answered, glancing from the map. A few miles east, past Moultrie, is a state park with campgrounds. I think we’ll overnight there.”

“You seem relaxed and happy,” she said.

“I didn’t realize I was projecting,” Jake replied, smiling.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Just before you came over, I was thinking exactly that. I am comfortable and relaxed.”

“You do remember killing a few people earlier today?”

“To tell the truth Eva, I haven’t thought about them since we drove from that spot,” he replied.

“The deaths of those men won’t haunt you?

“Eva, I don’t feel a thing for them.”

“I was watching through the back view grill when Agnes broke Bakers’ knee and arm. Being a doctor, I knew exactly the damage she did, and how it must have hurt.”

“Eva, I—.”

“When Agnes yanked the microphone off the motorcycle, she also took a pamphlet from his saddlebag. We’ve been reading it.”

Agnes spoke from the other end of the table. “Could you speak just a little lower? I don’t want to hear it while I'm cooking?”

“Of course I will, dear.”

Eva continued in a lower voice. “The first part of the pamphlet deals with the organizational details of his troops. The second part is a cookbook. It details how to render a human into food, including spiced forms of jerky... Jake, you have no idea how sick John Saint is... He has a standing order for the ears of Jews be dried and fashioned into a necklace. When the necklace has a hundred ears, John Saint will place it around his neck and immediately be granted special powers.”

“That is so disgusting, it transcends sick, and leaps right into delusion,” Jake said. “Eva, I realize being a doctor makes things difficult for you in the realities of this world. Your oath still has meaning, but you need to be able to defend yourself. Agnes can teach you. She is one dangerous lady.”

“I guess it’s my mental makeup, but I find it strange how easily you and she can kill or maim those whom you consider evil, yet be so kind to everyone else. I know with Agnes, and possibly with you and Beth too, there is an element of revenge to it.”

Jake thought about her statement before answering.

“I imagine by now Agnes or Beth has told what happened to my family, and yes, that element does exist, but I was killing people like these even before that. I'm getting tired of doing it, but we, as a people, have no other choice except for hiding and hoping they don't catch us at an inopportune time. Eva, at no time, during the collapse or after, was there a shortage of food. Saint is an insane sociopath who uses the eating of human flesh as a means of intimidation. I’m going to speak only for myself. Harming other people doesn’t set easy in my mind. I have to justify it deep within myself. In my mind, I’m killing deadly carnivores. It’s in their nature to harm. The carnivore has no choice, but the people we're killing made a choice, and they took the path of evil. I don't see them as human."

“Comparing Saint to a carnivore does the carnivore an injustice, but I can see one would need some sort of mental barrier. I’ve been trained to heal rather than to harm, and this new world is so foreign to me.”

“If Haven is as Avis said, it may be that you will be in a place where you can remain exactly how you are. Hopefully, Al too. He’s such a kind, greathearted boy. I’m sorry I exposed him to killing the night we shot and burned the first group of Saint's men. I wish now I’d taken Beth.”

Eva reached across the table and squeezed his hand. “After we get to Heaven, it may be time for you to take advantage of your place in his life. Have a father to son talk about how you feel. Your words carry strongly to him, and words said properly have the power to heal. Let’s hope Haven is Heaven,” she said as she stood.

Jake motioned for her to sit again. “How did you end up down here in South Georgia?”

“After spending five years working trauma at a major hospital in Atlanta, I was hired by a medical group there. Strictly management. I loved living in Atlanta, but after the plague ravaged the city, it seemed like the few remaining people turned into savages. In the beginning, I was in the downtown area. Violent ethnic gangs formed. White, African, Asian, Hispanic. I believe their only raison d’être was to hunt and kill each other.

“I survived the long winter by hiding during the day and foraging for canned goods at night. After the long spell of cold weather ended, I moved out to the suburbs north of the city, and joined with a small group who were living commune style. You spoke of carnivores. It was there, while I was out scavenging, I was attacked and mauled by a lion.”

“A lion?” Jake responded, incredulously.

“Yes, can you believe it? It would turn your stomach to see the scars on my legs and buttocks. I almost bled to death. It’s a good thing he wasn’t hungry, he clawed me a few times and then walked away. I guess someone felt sorry for the animals in the zoo and turned them loose. There are exotic animals living and breeding in the forests and suburbs around Atlanta. The monkeys seem to be thriving.”

“I’ll be damned,” Jake said. “What’s this country going to be like in another twenty years?”

“A lot stranger than it is now, that’s for sure. Lucky for me, an old man found me and dragged me into a grocery store, and left me there without saying a word to me. He came back with a roll of thin gauge stainless steel wire, a bottle of vodka, and wire snips.

“He was brutal. Just handled me as if I was an object. He doused the wire and my wounds with vodka, snipped off a section of wire, pushed it though the edges of my lacerations, and gave it a twist to lock it. Thirty eight times, he did that, taking a drink from the bottle between each suture, never saying a word, even though I was screaming with pain the entire time.

“When he finished closing my wounds, the bottle was empty and he simply walked away. I never saw him again. I left Atlanta two months ago, headed to Florida.”

“Jeez,” Jake responded with sympathy. “That had to hurt like hell, but let me ask. Why Florida?”

“No particular reason, maybe for the climate and the ocean. Do you know the city of Atlanta is being…? I’ll say dissolved, for lack of a better word. The downtown area is blanketed in a thick white fog. Over the past three years, I’ve witnessed even the tallest of buildings reduced to rubble, and now the fog is spreading to parts of the suburbs. I found out the hard way if you touch even the slightest portion it stings as if ten wasps stung you simultaneously in the same spot. I would suppose those are the nanobots you speak of.”

“You don’t actually mean reduced to rubble do you?” Jake asked.

“No, not truly rubble, more like haphazardly scattered blocks of material, some large and some small, covered with a strange film. I tried cutting one open, but my knife just slid on it.”

“If you had been able to open those blocks,” Jake continued, “you would have found them to be the material the buildings were made of, separated into their various elements. You’d find blocks of pure aluminum, iron, carbon... you name it. Check further, you’d even find small blocks of gold and silver, and other precious metals, even tiny little blocks of the rare earth elements.”

“What about the gases, the poisonous ones like methane and Freon and ammonia?”

“The people I was working with in Wisconsin say even those are broken down to their base elements.”

“That is almost incomprehensible,” Eva said. “I’d love to hear more about what you learned, but I need to give Agnes a hand with lunch. I’ll put these papers up front in the cab, where you can read them. There’s information about Saint’s organization in them too.”

*

Back on the road, Beth took another turn in the driver’s seat. Jake told her about the conversation with Eva. He spent time reading the papers, quietly relaying bits of information to her as they traveled.

They entered the town of Moultrie. As Jake said, it was much larger than any of the other towns they had encountered. He had Beth drive slowly while he manned the turret as they passed through. At where he judged, to be the center of town, he called for her to stop so he could climb down and deliver his message. Almost as soon as he climbed back into the turret he saw a gray haired man, dressed in faded coveralls, holding a rifle, waving to him from the door of a discount store about a hundred feet away.

“Stop,” he called to Beth as she shifted into gear. “We’ve got someone out there.”

Beth stopped and shut the engine.

“You over there,” Jake shouted. “Do you want to talk?”

“I wouldn’t mind talking a spell if you for sure ain’t goin’ ta kill me.”

“I’m not going to kill you,” Jake shouted again. “Why don’t you come over and I’ll come out to meet you?”

“You mind if I bring my rifle just in case?” he shouted back.

“You can bring it if you like, but there’s going to be someone manning this gun watching you.”

The man shrugged, and propped his rifle against the wall of the store and began walking towards the truck. Jake stepped from the platform and headed for the door, passing Beth as she moved to take his place in the turret. He exited the truck, grabbing the sheath of paper on his way, and waited as the man cautiously approached.

“Did you tell that gal there not ta shoot me, mister?” He asked as he drew near, glancing nervously at Beth manning the machine gun.

“She’s just a precaution. She won’t shoot you unless we find out you’re a bad man. If you are she’ll cut you in half.”

“She don’t look like a mean’un,” he said, glancing up again. “Just what do you consider ta be a bad man?”

“A cannibal, rapist, cold blooded killer. If you’re a good man, you know what a bad man is.”

“I reckon I’m safe enough then.”

“Are you by yourself here?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. What’s this you saying about a gang headed our way?”

“There’s a very large group of insane people not very far from here.” Jake opened the papers to the pages Eva had shown him earlier. “One of my friends took this off a man we ran into a few miles back. These pages will tell you what you need to know about who’s coming your way.”

The old man took the papers and sat unceremoniously on the pavement to read them. Jake decided to sit also.

The man took his time reading, turning the pages one at a time. Jake studied him as he read. He judged him to be in his late sixties. He wasn’t a frail man, but he was thin. He was clean-shaven, and his coveralls freshly washed. There was dignity about him Jake liked. The man finished reading, folded the papers, and passed them back.

“My name’s Connie Stevens. I own a farm just outside of town. There are twelve of us there. I reckon we have us a few of those coons and spicks those papers writes about. How close you say this gang is?”

“The last time we saw the main group was back in Bainbridge, about two months ago. We ran into one of their roadblocks earlier this morning just outside Newton.”

“How’d you manage ta get by them?”

“I killed them. That’s why Saint may be moving out in this direction.”

“That so? Good a way’s as any getting past a roadblock... Mister, these papers changes things. We done started our plantin’, but if that gang of loonies is as close as Newton, I might be feelin’ we should go down the road with ya now as later. You say ya got a refuge ya headed to?”

“That’s only a maybe, but it’s a very strong maybe,” Jake replied. “I have to tell you, there’s not enough room for twelve more in our truck, and the trailer’s full of things we need.”

“We can take care of ourselves in that respect. It’ll take me time ta get back to my people and ta get them ready. Ya’ll planning ta drive all night or be you going ta park somewheres?”

“I’ll tell you what, Connie. Get your people together and join us at first light tomorrow. We’ll be overnighting at a state park just to the east of town.”

“Reed Bingham, I know the place, used ta camp the boys there when I was a Scout Master. We’ll meet’ya at dawn and we ain’t the kind to be a burden. We carry our own weight.”

“I appreciate that, Connie,” Jake replied, rising and offering his hand. “We’ll see you tomorrow morning then.”

“That you will mister… don’t think I caught your name.”

“Markett, Jake Markett.”

“And that dangerous gal there?” he asked, nodding up to the gun turret.

“That’s Beth Markett, my wife.”

“That so? I’m pleased ta meet ya Jake, and I appreciate you not shooting me Missis Markett. I’ll be seeing ya’ll.”

Jake climbed aboard the truck and turned towards the back, “Did you all hear any of that?”

“Bits and pieces,” Agnes answered. “This metal doesn’t let in much sound.”

“That fellow seemed like a nice enough sort. We’re going a short way further to a camping ground to overnight. He and eleven others will be joining us tomorrow morning.”

“That’s a lot of people,” Janie said. “Are any of them kids, maybe another little girl?”

“What’s the matter kiddo, you getting tired of us older folks?” Jake asked.

“No, but you don’t know how to play with me.”

“Will there be any people like us?” Al asked. “I mean like me and Beth and Janie?”

“He mentioned there were,” Jake answered, catching Al’s meaning, “and he said there were some people of Hispanic descent also. He didn’t mention children but that doesn’t mean there won’t be any.”

“How far down the road is this camp ground?” Agnes asked.

“I’d say about ten, twelve miles.”

“Then we need to hustle if we’re going to get there in time to set camp and cook before dark.”

Beth dismounted the turret as Jake moved to the front and took the driver’s seat.

“I’m glad you didn’t kill him for what he said,” she remarked after she settled into the passenger’s seat.

“What are you talking about?” he asked, worried he may have missed something.

“When he said ‘ain’t',” she replied laughing. “I thought sure as hell you were going to kill him.”

“Sometimes your sense of humor is way out there lady.”

“That may be, but I can tell you’re about to laugh too.”

“Am not.”

“Are too.”

“Am not.”

“You two need to shut up and act like adults.” Agnes called from the rear. “There are some little ears back here listening to your every word.”

“Yeah,” Jake said to Beth, “you need to shut up.”

“You shut up.”

“No, you shut up.”

“I mean it you two,” Agnes called out again, “don’t make me come up there and whack your heads.”

Jake reached over and took Beth’s hand in his. “You shut up,” he mouthed silently to her, smiling.

“No, you shut up,” she mouthed back.

They both started laughing, and for a while, every time they glanced at each other they couldn’t suppress the giggles.

The roadway improved dramatically a couple miles outside of Moultrie. A long section of the asphalt had been replaced with concrete, probably not too long before the global catastrophe, and there was hardly a crack or a plant marring the surface.

Jake increased the speed, and soon turned left to follow the signs to the campgrounds. After a couple turns, they crossed some railroad tracks and entered the park.

A sign indicated there was a camp pavilion to the left. A short distance later, he stopped beside a large covered pavilion with open sides and a paved parking area suitable to accommodate the huge truck and trailer. The pavilion was close to a small lake.

There were several cast iron grills near one end. Agnes and Eva began preparations to cook while Janie went scavenging for firewood. Jake, Beth and Al cleared areas for three tents and in short order they had the camp site ready.

“I sure do hope that friend of yours put some real bathrooms in Heaven,” Al said.

“I would think he made that a priority,” Jake had to agree. He walked to where a spigot with a pump handle was barely visible above the overgrowth and pumped the handle vigorously a few times. To his surprise rusty water came spurting out, a few pumps later it was running clear.

“I’ll get our empties,” Al said, “that water smells clean.”

“Good thinking, son. Pump it a few times more to clear the down pipe of standing water. Let the others know I’ll be back where the road splits. I’ll take my dinner there. Tell Agnes to figure out guard shifts for tonight.”

Jake retrieved his rifle from where he’d leaned it, and hiked the quarter mile back down the road. The sun was getting low, and the day’s heat was fading. It promised to be a cool night. When he reached the fork, he found a place to hunker down, gathered a pile of pine straw to pad the area, and settled in with his rifle across his knees.

Shortly before sunset, he saw Janie coming down the road with his dinner plate balanced in one hand and a cup in the other. He called out so she would know where he was. She handed him his plate and cup with relief. She sat beside him and began rubbing her wrist.

“I told them I could bring this to you, but a plate can sure get heavy.”

“It sure can, honey. How old are you now?”

“I’m still nine silly. My birthday’s not until August.”

“I bet you don’t know what day in August.”

“Do too. It’s the ninth.”

“Wow,” Jake said, making a mental note of the date.

She snuggled closer. “It feels good having a daddy, I never had one before.”

“That’s not true, honey. You had a daddy before, a real good one. You’re just too young to remember. From what Beth has said about him, he was a wonderful daddy.”

“You’re my daddy now. I asked Beth should I call you Daddy or Daddy Jake but she said to ask you.”

“Which way do you like best?”

“I didn’t know until this morning, I kept saying it both ways, but I think I like Daddy the best.”

“Then I have to say I would be delighted to have you call me Daddy.”

“You can call me Janie or honey, I like it both ways.”

“Okay Janie or honey.”

“No silly, one or the other. Daddy, what’s Heaven going to be like?”

“That’s hard to say from a point of view for you, but I can tell you some more about it. It’s mostly underground, and that means there won’t be any windows. Another thing is, it’s huge inside, and besides a lot of other big spaces, there are fifty family apartments, two hundred single rooms, and several dormitories, those are big rooms with lots of beds sort of like the place we just left. There are real bathrooms, and a huge kitchen everybody can use.

“I think what will interest you most is, Avis said there’s playground equipment in storage, and board games too.”

“What’s playground equipment?”

“Why honey,” Jake said, setting his plate and cup aside and pulling her into his lap. “Playground equipment is probably the best thing a little kid could have.”

Jake told her about the joys of swings, and slides, and jungle gyms, and what a board game was. When she fell asleep, he fluffed pine straw to pad the ground and, covered her with his jacket.

His dinner and coffee were cold, but that evening, listening to her soft breath as she slept, he felt like he was already in Heaven. Jake hugged Al when he came down to relieve him, and carried his daughter to the tent, placing her between himself and Beth under the spread out sleeping bags.

CHAPTER 17

The next morning dawned crisp with a chill wind. Al was returning to the campsite with an armful of dry firewood. The others, except for Agnes, were at the picnic table preparing breakfast. Jake greeted them a good morning, and made the trek back to the fork. Agnes was alert, and called out to him as he approached.

“I was about to radio you. I heard some vehicles coming this way with the engines revving as though they were in a hurry, and now I don’t hear anything. That was only a moment ago.”

Jake considered her statement. “I don’t know what those folks are traveling in, could be two or three vehicles. It’s strange they stopped. Maybe one of the vehicles broke down. We’ll give it a while and see if they begin moving again.”

They waited in silence, straining to hear any sound from down the road. What they finally heard was the sound of a weapon fired.

“Damn,” Jake exclaimed, “We’ve got trouble. Let me have your radio.”

Jake keyed the radio. “Attention, Emergency!”

“Eva here. Over.”

“Listen closely Eva. I need all of you down here fast. Douse the fires and bring your weapons and ammo with you. I think Connie and his friends are in trouble. Do you copy?”

“I copy Jake, douse the fire. Grab weapons and ammo, and come running. Over.”

“Hurry,” Jake said,

They arrived at full run. Jake and Agnes stepped from concealment to join them.

“What going on?” Beth asked. “Janie said she heard a gunshot.”

“She did,” Jake, replied, “I think our friends from Moultrie are in trouble.”

“Damn,” Eva exclaimed, “can’t we have one peaceful day?”

“Not today it seems,” Jake said. “Let’s make this quick. We are not running. We can’t be dogged every step of the way to Haven. Beth and I are going to take care of the problem.”

“I’m going with you,” Agnes said.

“I’d rather you didn’t, Agnes. If anything happens to us, I want at least one adult with these kids, who knows how to fight.” He motioned for her to follow him. “Come over here with me.”

Jake led her to a point where the others could not hear his whispered words.

“Take them back to the MaxxPro. Break out any weapons you think you can use. If they get past us, fight to the death... You don’t want Saint to have a go at you. I want Janie and Eva armed too. Agnes, if you see you all are going down, you cannot let Saint take any of you alive. It’s on you, you know what to do with your last four bullets and why.”

“Jake, I can’t shoot... You son of a bitch!”

“It’s on you,” he repeated, cutting her off and moving back to the others.

“What do we need with us Jake?” Beth asked.

“Just our rifles with a spare clip, same for our pistols.”

They headed up the slight grade, Jake setting the speed at a fast sprint, Beth easily pacing him.

“How far away are they?” Beth asked as they ran.

“Shot sounded about a half mile. It could be more or less.”

They continued running in silence, saving their breath. They were in excellent condition, and neither of them was breathing hard when they reached the railroad tracks.

Another shot was fired, and Jake increased the pace to a flat out run. As they approached a curve to the left Jake saw what could only be the front of a school bus. He put out his arm to guide Beth and swerved to the left side of the roadway into the brush.

“School bus around the curve,” Jake informed her in a low voice, as he continued to move. “We’ll go deeper into the trees and approach them from this side.”

Jake cursed under his breath at the vines and roots that tried to trip them, slowing their progress. Beth was moving so quietly, he glanced back to be sure she was still with him. They arrived at a point where they could clearly see the upper half of the school bus above the brush.

“Sneak low from here,” he whispered. They moved stealthily towards the road to a point directly across from the bus. In addition to the school bus, there were two pickup trucks and a four-wheeled ATV. One of the pickups was angled in front of the bus. A quick glance told them the passengers taken from the bus were prisoners.

The men and women were lined in a row standing with their backs against the bus. All but two. One, a Hispanic man, was sitting with his back against the front tire, his hands clasped to his bloody belly. Another man, with curly brown hair, was face down on the pavement with a puddle of blood surrounding his head. Three terrified young children huddled together at the rear end of the bus.

There were at least ten armed men standing between, Jake and Beth, and the passengers. One of the men, a tall lanky fellow with red hair, was walking slowly back and forth in front of the captives, not saying anything, He stopped abruptly and grabbed a young white male by the hair and bent him over, placing a pistol against the top of his head.

“Am I going to shoot him next, old man?” he shouted. “Is that what you want? I’ll shoot them one at a time until you tell me where you’re going and where that armored truck is. Is this what you want? Do you want me to shoot him in the head?”

Connie was near them, back pressed against the bus. His shirtfront was spotted with blood from his bleeding nose and lips.

The young male began begging for his life, screaming for Connie to tell them. Tears and snot were dripping from his bent over face. His bladder released and a wet stain began to flow from his crotch down the front of his pants.

"You've got ten seconds old man," the killer shouted.

"Ya gonna kill us all anyways ya bastard. Ya mamma pushed shit out her pussy," Connie shouted back.

The red head shifted the pistol from the young man’s head to point it at Connie. Connie didn’t flinch.

"Pull the trigger ya piece'a shit."

"Not yet, you son of a bitch," the redhead said, placing the barrel back to his victim's temple. “One...two..."

“We can’t shoot from here,” Beth whispered. We’ll hit our friends.”

“Drop the rifle, pistol only, do it quick.”

Beth complied.

“Okay. When I say go, charge in, get close, and start shooting.

“Let’s do it,” she whispered back.

Jake reached to touch her hand and then pointed towards the bus.”

“Go.” He whispered.

The count was at seven when they burst from concealment, crossing the road almost faster than a person could blink. Beth fired first, taking one of the men full in the back and swerved to fire again. Jake’s first shot also took a man in the back. He saw the red haired man, holding the young victim, turn in surprise and shift his aim towards Beth. He went down as he fired, his legs swept from under him by Connie. The scene erupted in gunfire as the men recovered and began to react.

Time stood still as Jake found one target after another. He felt a sting high up on his left thigh, but kept shooting until there was no one left standing that needed shooting. Immediately his eyes went to Beth. She was wild eyed, still searching for targets. A bloodstain was slowly spreading from her calf down her pants leg.

A man, bleeding from a wound, groaned as he tried to sit and aim the pistol he still held. Jake and Beth reacted in the same instant, their rounds adding to the one already in his chest. He groaned again as he fell back. Connie had his captive locked in a chokehold with his legs wrapped around his waist. Jake went to Beth.

“You’re bleeding. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she answered, “you’re bleeding too.”

Jake checked his thigh where he’d felt the sting and saw the blood seeping through the fabric of his jeans.

“We’ve both been shot in the left leg,” he said in amazement. “Does it hurt?”

“I don’t even feel it.”

“Iffen you folks ain’t about ta bleed ta death,” Connie shouted, “Lester over there is. This bastard shot him in the guts. What ya want me ta do with him? I can wring his neck easy enough.”

“No, let’s keep him alive for now. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, the bastard hits like a baby. Ya sure ya don’t want me ta kill him?”

“Not yet, I need to debrief… talk to him first.” Jake replied. He motioned towards the others seemingly paralyzed against the bus. “Why don’t some of you tie him up and make sure those people we shot are dead... And somebody help Lester?” Jake moved close to Beth and pulled her down with him as he sat.

“We’re both bleeding pretty bad,” he told her. “Check your pants to see if you can feel two holes.”

He checked his pants leg while she checked hers. He found two holes.

“One hole,” Beth reported.”

“Damn, the bullet is lodged in your leg. Use your hands and put pressure on it. Do you have a radio?”

“In my jacket,” she replied, reaching for it.

“No, I’ll get it.”

Jake fished the radio from her pocket and keyed it.

“Jake here, do you copy? Over.”

“I copy Jake,” Agnes answered, “We heard the shooting, are you okay?”

“We’re mostly okay, but we’ve got a man belly-shot down here. Beth and I have superficial flesh wounds. We’ll be coming your way in a few minutes.”

“I copy, Jake. Over.”

*

“You need to plug your holes,” Beth said when he finished talking. “You’re bleeding worse than me.”

He located the entry and exit points of his wound, used his hands to apply pressure, and turned his attention to the others. A chubby Hispanic woman was beside Lester, moaning, and speaking soothing words in Spanish to him. He was very pale.

“You and you,” Jake said, using a bloody hand to point at the young man who had been threatened earlier and to a young black male. Let’s get Lester onto one of the pickups. Do either of you know how to drive?”

“I do,” the black male responded.

“Good. As soon as you get Lester loaded, you drive that truck. My wife and I will take the other truck. The rest of you get back in the bus and follow us.”

“What about this piece’a shit?” Connie asked, indicating the man he’d captured by kicking him in the side. He was securely trussed hand and foot with bailing wire and gagged with a filthy rag.

“I think those two fellows can throw him in back of the truck I’ll be driving.” Jake replied. “No need to be gentle either.”

Calling out, “I got that boss,” another of the men from the bus, a very big man with skin as dark as coal, moved from where he was comforting two of the children, and took the prisoner from beside Connie. Lifting the man by his hair and belt, he carried him to the other pickup and tossed him over the side like you would a bale of hay. The man hit the metal bed with a thud.

Jake stood and pulled Beth to her feet, their hands slippery with blood. The fabric of his jeans was soaked to the bottom of his leg. His right boot dripped blood and left a print with every step to the truck.

He climbed into the driver’s seat and led the vehicles back to the camping grounds. He drove with one hand, using the other in an attempt to stanch the steady flow of blood from his leg. When they arrived at the campsite, he stepped from the truck and passed out.

CHAPTER 18

Jake awoke inside a tent lying on a sleeping bag. After a moment of disorganized thought, he remembered passing out and tried to sit. He felt pain in his right thigh and seeing the big white bandage on his leg, realized he was not wearing pants. He could hear people talking outside the tent and called to them. “Hey, somebody bring me some jeans?”

Beth shouted, “I’ll get you some.” A minute later, she slid through the opening and handed him a pair of jeans. “How does your head feel?”

“My head feels fine,” he replied, “I got shot in the leg.”

“When you passed out you slammed your forehead on a rock. You should see the knot.”

Jake reached to touch his forehead. “I don’t feel anything,” he said in confusion.

“Got you,” Beth said, laughing.

“Christ girl, you’re so silly. How does your leg feel?”

"It was throbbing like a toothache but its better now."

"How long was I out?"

“Not long, about an hour. Eva said you lost a lot of blood, and that’s why you passed out when you stood. She told me the bullet nicked an artery. Eva had her hands full with Lester, the man who was shot in the stomach. Agnes put a belt very tight around your leg and stopped the bleeding. When Eva came to work on you, she said your wound was full of those nanobots. I looked, and they are like a white fog. She said, as far as she can tell, you have good blood flow to your leg.” My hole has nanobots too, but Agnes pulled my bullet out with tweezers before they got in there.”

“Jeez darling, we were lucky today,” Jake said. "We managed to save those people and escape with only flesh wounds. I'd hate to be laid up from a shattered bone, or worse.

“I don’t see the lucky part," she replied. "We were fast, and we were cold blooded. We were in charge today, not them. Now Saint has ten less men, and we saved those people.”

“When you put it that way, it makes a lot of sense. You’re turning into a warrior.”

“I told you I was going to get as tough and dangerous as you are. Considering how much trouble you keep getting us into, I reckon it’s a good thing I am.”

“Hey, it’s the trouble finding us,” he responded to her gibe. "We need to get out of this tent. I’ve got a distinct flavor of chocolate in my mouth, and when that happens it makes me want a distinct flavor of you.”

“You smell like Old Spice to me.”

“Do I smell like that now?”

“You sure do, and I like it.”

“I like the way you smell right now too.”

“I’m not wearing perfume,” she said.

“Oh yes you are, girl,” reaching to pull her to him. “Even your sweat is perfume.”

She bumped his leg as she cuddled close. It hurt but he did not care.

Sometime later, they emerged from the tent. Jake felt refreshed, but once again, Beth’s hair, as Agnes would say, looked like she had stuck her head in a blender. She went to the truck to retrieve a brush from her pack.

The only people in camp were Eva and Connie, sitting at a concrete picnic table, and the young blonde male from the bus sitting off alone, close to an old stone fire ring. Jake could not help but notice the way he glowered at him. He walked over to Eva who was laying MREs and canned goods on the concrete slab of the picnic table.

“Where’s everybody?” he asked.

“They’re scattered in all directions. Let’s see, Agnes, Al and Janie are guarding down at the fork. Sam, that’s the young black man in the group, took a bunch back to where the fight was to clean the area. Lester, that’s the man shot in the abdomen, is in a tent along with his wife, Mercedes, and their daughter Julia. Sarah and her husband Ishi are down with the cleanup crew, and their two children, Daniel and Abbey, are asleep in the bus.

“Lester will live as long as sepsis doesn’t set in. The bullet hit his decorative belt buckle. The buckle slowed the bullet, but he had bits and chunks of plastic and metal buried in his fat layer. Thankfully, none of them pierced through into his abdominal cavity, because all I had to work with was Connie’s pocketknife. He keeps that thing as sharp as a scalpel. Lester had one large gash I sutured with a sterilized sewing needle and cotton thread.

“There’s another girl with the cleanup crew, Carol, I think, but like I said, they’re all over the place.”

“I can see you’re good at remembering names. Hey Connie,” Jake said, turning to the older man, “would you mind taking a little walk with me.” Jake turned back to Eva, “It is okay for me to walk?”

“Walk if you want, it’ll help your leg heal faster, besides, the nanobots are in charge of your wound, not me. It’s a good thing they are too. There was nothing I could do about a missing section of artery. Just try not to bump it or over stretch it. Also, so you’ll know, I used the last of the morphine on Lester.”

“Let’s go then,” Connie, said, “longs it ain’t too far. These arthy legs of mine don’t want ta carry me none ta good lately.”

“Just a stroll.”

“A stroll I can handle, I could use a cane though. Most times my knee don’t hurt so bad, but I kind’a twisted it bringing down that loudmouthed asshole this morning.”

“We’ll look for something as we walk,” Jake said, leading the way. “Where is the loudmouthed asshole?”

“He’s still in the back of the truck where Ishi throwed him. The doctor lady wanted ta loosen the wires a bit, but I advised agin it.”

“What’s with the young man back there, why isn’t he helping the others?”

“Nobody wants to get close to him. They plain don’t like him. Hell, I don’t like him. Lazy, snotty little brat.”

“He’s not that little,” Jake observed. “At least he didn’t tell them where we were when he had a gun to his head.”

“Actually he’s twenty four and weighs over two hundred, but he’s little in the mind is what I’m saying. All the time telling us his parents wouldn’t want him, ‘sociating with our kind’, but the good for nothing scab ain’t got any trouble with eating our food.

“He’s that bad, huh?”

“Nothing but trash. He was a jock in high school. Seems like some of the hits he took playing football shudda knocked some sense inta him. The only reason he didn’t rat you out is because he didn’t know where we was headed. Piece of crap peed himself, and he’s still got on the same pants. Sometimes I think about shootin’ him, but I keep hoping he’ll mature inta some sense.”

“You’re a kind hearted man Connie. I would have run him off... I want to thank you for bringing down that fellow this morning, he was about to draw down on my wife.”

“Ta hell with that son, we’re the ones doin’ the thankin’. The whole time I was standing there, I told myself ya had ta heard the shots over at the camp. I told myself ta be ready ta move. I felt something about ya, mister. I knew ya’d come.”

“I’m glad you were ready. The others just stood there.”

“Ain’t none of the others fighters, they’re good folks, but they ain’t fighters.”

Jake stopped and pointed to a dried fallen branch close to the pavement.

“What do you think about this piece?” He picked it up and flexed it before handing it to Connie.

Connie took the offered stick with an L shaped crook at one end and took a few steps with it.

“I think you done found me a cane, a bit heavy, but almost as good as a store boughten one. I could trim it down some, but I’d best leave my knife sharp in case the lady doctor has need agin.”

They turned to the roar of engines approaching from behind. The four-wheeled ATV and a pickup truck sped into the campsite. They stopped to unload several passengers before continuing towards them. The vehicles slowed as they drew near and stopped. The young black male was driving the ATV, the passenger’s seat filled with weapons. The body of the dead passenger from the bus was on the rear seat. The bed of the pickup was piled high with the bodies of Saint’s men.

“We got the place down there cleaned so you can’t tell anything happened,” the young man reported. “We’re going to dump these bodies at the end of the campground.”

“That was good thinking,” Jake said, extending his hand. The young man grasped it in a strong grip.

“We know your name. Mine's Sam, and the fellow driving the pickup is Sheldon. The big ugly black fellow beside him is Ishi.”

“I heard that, boy,” Ishi shouted good-naturedly from the truck, “You better watch that mouth of yours.”

“As far as cleaning down there,” Sam continued, “Your woman sent us. She took charge after you passed out. We’re taking the bodies as far back as we can. We don’t have a shovel, so we’ll just cover James with whatever we can find,” he said, tilting his head towards the back seat.

“Was he a friend of yours?” Jake asked. “Should we have some sort of service?”

“He was an atheist,” Sam replied, “I don’t think he’d want one.”

“What you want us to do with this truck and the four-wheeler?” Sheldon called from the truck.”

“You may as well leave them with the bodies,” Jake said. “Matter of fact, don’t even bother unloading that trash, just let the truck roll into the woods, they can rot where they are. You should unload first,” he told Sam, nodding towards the weapons.

“I hear that,” Sam said. “We’ll see you at the camp.”

He cranked the ATV, spun around, and sped off. The truck continued up the road.

Jake and Connie talked a bit more before returning to the campsite. Beth, much more presentable, was at the table helping Eva. Jake had a short conversation with them before limping over to the remaining pickup truck. As soon as the man saw Jake he began thumping the bed of the truck with the heels of his boots, trying to mouth words past the gag in his mouth. Jake, shook his head, and checked if the keys were in the ignition.

He cranked the truck and drove in the direction Sam and the others had taken. He pulled to a stop where the road made a sharp turn.

The two vehicles had made a mess of the undergrowth when driven off the road. The men were busy covering the body of their friend with rocks and branches.

Jake stepped from the cab, shouted to them not to bother with his truck, and walked further along the curve in the road until he was out of their sight. In an effort to clear his mind, he made a point to pay attention to his surroundings as he moved.

He came to a place where a large tree had fallen close to the road. He sat on the trunk, opening his senses to the forest around him, the sounds, and scents of nature helping him reconnect with the real world.

After a few minutes, he began to think about the ones he loved and about those, he and Beth had rescued. He thought about Lester propped against the side of the bus with blood flowing from his belly. He pictured James lying on the pavement with his head in a pool of blood. He saw the three young children huddled together in terror.

He thought about John Saint, and the atrocities he and his men were committing. When he was sure Sam and the others were finished, he steeled himself to do what he was about to do, and returned to the truck.

He opened the tailgate, reached in, grabbed a handful of hair, and pulled the man to an upright position with his bound legs dangling over the edge. The wire binding his hands dug deeply into his wrists and the wire was looped around his belt, immobilizing his arms. Jake removed the gag from his mouth. As soon as he could speak, the man began whining.

“Mister, you’ve got to get these wires off my hands, that lady said they’d die if they weren’t off. They’re turning black.”

Jake responded by slapping him hard in the face.

“You need to shut your mouth and listen to every word I say,” he said, in a voice devoid of emotion. “You’re going to be dead in a little while, there’s nothing to be done about it. You are a murderer. You shot an unarmed man in the stomach. You shot another human being in the head, and you were about to kill a young man when we rushed you. I want some answers from you. The only choice I’m going to give you is the choice to die easy.”

“Go to hell you son of a bitch. When John Saint—.”

Jake slapped his face even harder, causing the man to fall backwards, his head slamming against the hard metal of the truck. Jake again used his hair to pull him to a sitting position.

“You can forget about John Saint, you murdering bastard. He will be dead soon enough. Right now, you have me. I will repeat what I said before. You can die easy or hard. I want answers to some questions, and by god you’re going to give them to me.”

“I’m not telling you shit, you bastard,” he replied. He hacked a wad of phlegm, and spat into Jake’s face.

Jake responded by jabbing him hard in the eye with two stiff fingers. He felt the eyeball burst. The man screamed, shaking his head violently side to side. Jake stepped away to avoid the flying gore from the ruptured eye and wiped the spit from his face with his sleeve.

“I’ll repeat what I said before. I have no choice, but you do. I have friends and loved ones to protect. You'll tell me what I need to know because every lie will hurt you."

*

It was a long trek back to the camp. Jake was limping and his leg was throbbing when he came within view of the others sitting at the table eating. Sam saw him and ran to assist him the rest of the way in. They stopped by the water spigot. Sam pumped it while Jake rinsed his hands, and then his face. He finally sat with a groan on the concrete bench of the picnic table beside Sheldon.

Beth came over to him. Sheldon smiled, and stood to make room for her to sit beside Jake, taking his plate and cup with him.

“Guess that man won’t be coming back,” she said. “We sent the kids to the bus to eat so they couldn’t hear him cussing and screaming?”

“It was terrible, but it’s over.”

“Did you get anything from him?” Agnes asked.

“I did,” Jake, replied. “For one thing, Saint is pissed about what we did to his roadblock yesterday, not to mention the other people we’ve killed. He’s preparing to move his entire force into this area to hunt us down.”

“When’s he planning ta move out?” Connie asked. “I hope ya got a plan, ‘cause we ain’t got enough men ta put behind guns ta even slow him down.”

“You’re right about that Connie,” Jake agreed.

“What are we going to do?” Agnes asked. “I know we said we’d fight them every inch of the way, but if he comes with three hundred men, we’re not going to last a foot.”

“Let’s not get in a tizzy ‘til we need to,” Connie said. “Ain’t nobody shootin’ at us right now.”

“They may be soon,” Sheldon said, speaking in a high-pitched voice, obviously near to crying. “That horrible man may have called us in. If he did, Saint and his men may be on their way. We should be fleeing.”

Agnes was standing close to where Sheldon was sitting. She moved to put her hand on his shoulder. “Calm down, Sheldon, we’ll be all right. Like Connie said, no one’s shooting at us.”

“What are we going to do, Jake?” Beth asked.

“He told me Saint is moving out tomorrow morning. Another thing is he didn’t call in the encounter with the school bus. He wanted to capture us himself to win points with Saint.”

“Do ya think he was telling the truth?” Connie asked.

“In the end, the truth was his only escape. Saint's man was not defending a lofty ideal, he was merely a thug among thugs,” Jake answered. “Part of my Special Forces training was interrogation of enemy combatants, and we’re taught how to recognize when someone is lying. Even if he did lie, it’s going to take time for Saint to organize such a large group. I doubt he’ll move out with a smaller force, he’s already lost too many men to chance it.

“You’re right about what you said, Agnes," Jake continued, “It’s easy to make bold statements. We said we’d fight them every inch of the way, but that’s not the way it’s going to happen. I’m going to assume the man was telling the truth about not calling in the incident with the bus.

“It’s 8 a.m. In three hours, Beth and I are going to Bainbridge and put a crimp in John Saint’s plans. We’re taking the fight to him. I need to get off my leg and get some sleep before we head out. Beth needs rest too. While we’re sleeping, I need the rest of you to disconnect and empty the trailer, and sort out the weapons we packed in there. There are enough rifles and ammo to arm everyone… Connie, there are boxes of shoulder fired rockets, along with grenade launchers, in the trailer. I want at least ten of the rocket launchers in the MaxxPro, along with several of the grenade launchers with…”

“I know what you’re getting at,” Connie said, interrupting him, “You want me ta outfit ya truck for war. I can handle that. We’ve got good mix of home-made diesel in the bus ta top off yer tank too.”

“Connie and I will get the camp armed and organized,” Agnes asserted. “If Saint does manage to get past you two, we may lose the fight, but he’ll pay for it.”

“I can’t believe this,” Eva spoke from where she was sitting next to Sheldon. “You and Beth have been shot and lost a lot of blood. You two won’t stand a chance against that many people. I agree with Sheldon, we should be on the road right now!”

“We’re not running,” Agnes said, leaving Sheldon’s side to be close to Eva. “Here we can establish some kind of defense. If we’re on the road, and they catch us, we won’t stand a chance.”

“Folks, I’m exhausted,” Jake said, ending the discussion, as he stood. “Agnes, you’ll need to set a guard schedule and see that someone wakes us.”

“I’ll be in soon,” Beth, told him. “I want to talk to Janie and Al.”

She soon joined him in the tent, bringing with her a large container of water and some salt pills, Eva, told her they had to take. She let him know, that for some reason, she was exhausted too, and her leg was itching unbearably.

He drank as much water as he could and swallowed the two pills. Beth made a pillow from clothing rolled in a towel and used it to elevate his injured leg. He knew exactly what she meant about her wound. His leg was itching so bad he wanted to rip the bandage away and dig at it.

“Just so you know, I’m not okay,” Jake said to her as she worked. “I did something … I had to hurt him to get him talking.”

“I know. I saw it in your face while you were walking towards us.” Beth finished padding his leg and moved to lie beside him, propping her head on her hand in order to see his face. “I’m glad I wasn’t there. Just hearing him scream was bad enough.”

“I should have gone further away,” Jake, said, with disgust, “I thought we were far enough away that you wouldn’t hear.”

“As bad as it was, I’m glad we could hear him. In a way, it was good for us to hear one of Saint’s men suffering, even the kids…no, especially the kids. We’ve all been hurt by him and his men. It’s good they know that bad people have to pay for their wrongs. I’m glad we’re going to Bainbridge. We’ve reached a point where we’re not taking anymore. From now on, we’re giving it back. I agree with you. It’s time to put an end to this.”

*

Jake was startled from sleep by shrieks and screams. Beth placed a restraining hand on his chest as he positioned himself to rush from the tent.

“It’s just the children,” she told him, “they’re playing. Sam came by a moment ago. It’s time for us to get moving.”

Jake lay back and listened to the sounds of the children. The calls of, “Run Janie run, look out, you’ll be it, no you didn’t touch her Daniel, you’re still it,” all mixed with shrieks and cries of joy.

“That’s a lovely sound isn’t it?”

“The most beautiful sound in the world,” he agreed. “I see what Janie meant when she said we didn’t know how to play with her.”

“We’re not kids. I can’t remember being one. Were you ever a kid Jake?”

He thought a moment. “Yes I was, but in a very restrained way. My dad was an officer in the Army. Loud noise and boisterous behavior was frowned upon, but I remember having a lot of fun.”

“Let’s build a world where kids can always have fun, where they can always be kids.”

“You want us to build a world? That’s a big hunk to bite off, beautiful. We’ll be lucky if we can build a safe little corner on this one.”

“You’ve got to think bigger than that, mister. Our kids are going to have a world they can play in.”

“Our kids,” Jake said teasing her, “who said anything about kids?”

“Oh, we’re going to have kids buster, four of them, all girls.”

“You’ve got to be kidding. Girls are nothing but trouble. Take you, for example. Nothing but trouble since the day I met you. You honestly want me to have to deal with four more of you. Uh, uh. No way.”

“You’ll have what you get,” Beth said, punching him roughly on his shoulder, “and you’ll like it.”

“I know I’ll like the process of making them, matter of fact I wouldn’t mind practicing making one right now.”

“We could,” Beth, replied leaning close to rub her breasts across his face, “only according to Doctor Eva, we might not be just practicing right now.”

Jake pulled her to him and hugged her tight. “I’m teasing you darling, when the time’s right, we’ll have our children. Four girls if that’s what comes. Now let’s get out of here and pay John Saint a visit.”

Their wounds still itched, but the water and salt Eva prescribed, along with the sleep, had worked wonders. Jake felt revitalized and ready to face life again. The camp was bustling with purposeful activity. He saw Agnes coming from the bus and hurried to her, his injured leg much less painful. Agnes saw them and changed course.

“You look better than you did a few hours ago, Jake.”

“I feel a lot better too, Agnes, but thanks for the compliment. Wait ‘till you see me after I shave. You’ll probably swoon. The water and the salt probably helped.”

“You’ve even got your whacky sense of humor back. I can’t wait to tell Doctor Herman that she’s worked another miracle cure. Actually, Eva is a little jealous. She said if the nanobots are doing the curing, at least she can give them supplies to work with.”

“You’ll be telling the truth. I do feel fine, and my leg doesn’t hurt, but it itches like hell. Beth says hers is itchy too. Now I feel bad about teasing Al when he had his cast on. I had no idea nanobots had his leg itching this badly... What’s going on?” He asked, waving his hand to indicate the hurried activity.

“We’ve been busy. We made Lester a soft place at the back of the bus and rigged restraints to keep him from rolling around in case we need to make a fast get away. He’s feeling better, with no fever. Eva is in a positive mood about his recovery.

“We sorted food and other things from the trailer. Eva made sure you had plenty of MREs, water and other necessities in the MaxxPro. She was a little frightened earlier, but she put it behind her, and got into the effort to get you two ready. Good thing she did too, because she thought of the little, big, things like toilet paper. Connie finished arming and fueling your war wagon. You’re set to go.”

“What happened to that wild bunch of kids I heard earlier?” Jake asked.

“Eva has them in the bus, reading ‘Alice in Wonderland’ to them. Little Julia must have two hundred books with her.”

Jake and Beth ate the food Agnes had ready for them and went to the bus to say a hurried goodbye to Al and Janie. The kids’ faith in their ability was such that all Al asked was, that they be careful, and Janie told them to hurry and kill John Saint so they could go to Heaven.

Sam approached Jake as they were entering the MaxxPro.

“Connie’s got security set up. I talked to him about coming with you, and he says he can spare me.”

“I appreciate your willingness to help, but Beth and I work very tight as a team. What we’re about to do is extremely risky, and I’m leery about adding an unknown element to the pot.”

“I agree with him, Sam. Besides, if something bad does happen, you’ll be needed here.” Beth added. “We’re depending on you and Connie and Agnes mostly to keep these people safe.”

“We’ll do that,” Sam responded, disappointment shading his voice. “Be careful, and get back in one piece.”

CHAPTER 19

They were moving fast. Beth was driving and Jake was riding lookout in the turret, his eyes glued to the road, looking for obstructions or any sign of John Saint’s crew. They had already traveled this road and knew there were only a few bad spots.

Beth was using the tracks of crushed vegetation as a guide, doing her best to keep the wheels of the big truck in line with them. Still, there were sections of broken and rutted pavement that made for a rough ride. Jake struggled not be thrown from the gunner’s platform.

The miles flew by. Beth poured on speed whenever her view of the road was clear, slowing only at the rough spots to ensure she did not kill them both. About ten miles past the city of Moultrie, Jake did lose his footing, and took a hard tumble into the passenger section.

He called for a break and as soon as the vehicle stopped, he went out the side door and waved for her to join him. “I need to stretch,” he told her. “I’m getting beat to death in that little hole.”

“You’ll have your turn bouncing me around. My shoulders are killing me.”

“You did a great job. We need to make as many miles as we can while the sun’s up. I’ve been making and refining a plan while you drove. We want to be in Colquitt before nightfall.”

“Why Colquitt,” Beth asked, confused.

Jake smiled at her. “I know, all the way back to where it began. We’re going to approach his camp from that direction because there’s a good chance, with his mind wrapped around us being to the east towards the I-75, he won’t have any troops out to the west. Besides the fact there’s nothing there of value for him, he’s already been there, and will consider it to be a clear area.”

“I bet you were good in the Army. I’d have never thought of that. You know what I’d like to do if we’ve have time darling?” She stumbled over the term of endearment and a sad look crossed her face.

“What’s wrong, beautiful?” Jake asked.

“Daddy called Mamma, darling, all the time. They never fussed or argued. They just loved each other. Those sons of bitches came and took it from them. I think that’s what hurts the most.”

“I wish we could turn back time, if—.”

“I’m okay Jake,” she said, smiling at his concern. “It happened, and can’t anything be done about it. I’m glad we found love like they did. It’s good to have someone to call darling.” Beth paused to take a breath. “What I was about to say is, I’d like to shoot off one of those rockets so I know how, and maybe one of those grenade guns.”

“This would be a good time, he agreed, “We’re far enough away from any towns.

Connie had uncrated the LAWS, and ten of them were strapped to a passenger bench. Jake removed one and passed it out to Beth. A moment later, he rejoined her, holding two M-79 grenade launchers in one hand, and a box of rounds for them under his other arm. Beth followed him to the front of the transport.

“Lay the LAAWS down. We’ll get you familiar with the grenade launcher first.”

Beth did as he suggested and accepted the fat-barreled weapon he handed her.

“The M-79 is a single shot breech loading weapon,” he said, falling into the vocal cadence of a military instructor. “All that means is... now watch me and do the same with yours. You push this, and the barrel drops down.” He stopped talking to open the box of rounds and removed one, handing it to Beth.

“Once the breech is open, you slide the round in place and close the breech,” he continued, motioning for her to do so as he spoke. “Now the weapon is loaded.”

He took several moments explaining the proper methods of aiming the launcher. With the two of them using the MaxxPro for a shield, he had her target a small tree about six hundred feet away, reminding her to duck down after she fired. The round hit the ground and exploded about ten feet in front of the tree. A cloud of smoke and debris flew from the impact zone.

“Damn it,” Beth exclaimed, “I missed. All I did was knock some bark off it.

“No, that was an excellent shot. With these, you don’t have to hit the target. When the round explodes, it sends out hundreds of little pellets and fragments. Anyone within twenty feet of where it hits will die, and it can cause casualties….wounds a lot further away”

“So, if that tree was a man, he’d be dead?”

“Judging from the bark you blasted off it, yeah, he’d be dead. You ready to fire a rocket now?”

It took a bit longer before she was ready to launch the LAWS. She paid attention as he demonstrated the several steps it took to extend the tube and arm the weapon. He had her target the same tree. She took her time aiming and fired the weapon. When the smoke cleared, a two-foot high stump was jutting from the ground.

“Damn girl, you’re a natural. Not one soldier in ten would have hit that tree the first time he fired a LAWS.”

Beth smiled her appreciation. “I like these weapons. You don’t have to be close to use them. We need to get moving, huh?”

“Let’s eat first,” Jake suggested. “This will be our last chance until we get to Colquitt.”

A few miles past the town of Newton, they came to where the roadblock had been. Jake stopped the transport and Beth joined him in the cab. They stared with disbelief at the bloated corpses still lying where they had died.

“If we needed an example of the trash we’re dealing with, this would be it,” Jake said in disgust.”

“Saint’s letting them rot where they are,” Beth said, matching his tone. “I reckon even his own people don’t mean much to him. Let’s go,” she implored. “You ready for me to drive again?”

The miles flowed as they raced towards their destination, stopping twice more to change positions. It was a toss-up as to which was worse, driving and being under constant stress, or being battered about in the gun turret. They entered the town of Colquitt about two hours before sunset. As Beth had told him, back when he first met the three, fire had claimed most of the stores and buildings, leaving only a few structures near the center of town still standing.

They spent ten wary minutes walking and stretching, working the kinks out while at the same time looking for any signs of people. Beth suggested they should eat again before they went to war, and prepared two of the self-heating MREs. They used the tailgate of an abandoned pickup as a place to eat. As they ate, Jake laid out his plan for the attack.

“We’re about to attack a very large group. The fellow driving the cycle said Saint has over three hundred people in his crew. They’re not all soldiers. Over half of them will be support staff, cooks, laborers, and such. He probably has a large number of women and children in his group, and knowing him, some slaves. Still, I expect he’ll have at least a hundred men at arms.”

“That’s a lot of men,” Beth responded with concern.

“Yes it is. We’ll be out numbered fifty-to-one. All we have going for us is the element of surprise. Our mission isn’t specifically to kill John Saint, although that’s not to say we won’t. The trouble is, even if we kill a lot of people tonight, we won’t know if we get Saint, because we wouldn’t know him if we saw him.”

“Then what are we going to do?” Beth asked.

“We’re going to ride into the Walmart parking lot, and kill as many targets of opportunity as we can, and depend on the armor to protect us. Our main targets will be his vehicles. A group as large as his has to have many transport vehicles to move from place to place. If we destroy his trucks, it will take him a long time to replace them. The vehicles around Bainbridge have been sitting so long it’ll take days, maybe weeks to get them running. It could take a month or longer for him to re-mobilize. That will give us time to get to safety and hopefully enough time for the other people to begin arriving at Haven.”

“So we’re going to ride in and shoot everything we see and ride out. That’s your plan?”

“Not much of a plan, is it?”

“No, I like it. Remember when you said that even with a MaxxPro you’re not a Mad Max. Would this be something he’d do?”

“Yes it would,” Jake, said, smiling, “only tonight it’s going to be the Mad Marketts.”

“When are we leaving?”

“I want to hit them after they’re sound asleep. Maybe around two or three … we’ll head out at midnight.”

They finished eating. As they stood to return to the truck, they heard a voice shout at them, “You over there, what’s your name?”

“FR!” Jake exclaimed, giving the code he had taught her and her siblings for 'fall and roll’. Beth was on the ground and rolling behind an abandoned car almost before the signal left his mouth. Jake rolled straight ahead, under their armored vehicle, springing to his feet to open the side door. In seconds, he was in the turret manning the machine gun.

“Who’s asking?” Jake shouted back in the direction the voice came from.”

“Damn, you two are fast... Ain’t no need to be scared, I could have done shot you if that’s what I intended,” the man shouted. “Are you Markett?”

“I’m Markett.”

“I'm coming out. Don't be shooting at me.” A young man with a rifle stepped from the doorway of a building about a half block away and warily approached. Jake guessed him to be about twenty years old. He stopped fifteen feet away, holding his rifle, not pointed at them, but in such a manner, a slight shift of his hands and it would be.

“You know John Saint’s gunning for you?”

“I’ve heard words to that effect,” Jake replied. “Who are you?”

“Bishop’s my name. Me and a few others decided we’d skip out while Saint’s all fired up to hunt you down. We’re hoping he’ll be too busy with that to let a few people taking off slow him down.”

“You’re deserting him.”

“You got that right. We’ve had a bellyful of him. When we saw this big truck roll into town, we figured it was you, even if it ain’t half as big as James claimed it was.”

“That would be James Baker,” Jake supplied, “How’s he doing?”

“Not good. Saint killed him for being a traitor. Had a morning formation to explain you wouldn’t have left him alive otherwise. They carried him out in a chair, and his man Ross shot him in the head in front of us. James wasn’t perfect, but killing him like that was plain lowdown. I think the real reason Saint had him killed was he was going ta die anyways. James was in pain, and he kept everybody awake screaming at night. Infection set in, and his leg swelled big as a tree stump.”

“I can see you have some grievances against Saint. Why don’t you call you friends over and we’ll talk a bit? Jake suggested.

“I will, if you don’t mind me checking inside your truck first, just in case there’s somebody else with you.”

“I'll come out and you can take a look. Just lean in and look... Beth, shoot him if he tries to go all the way in.”

“Hell, I don't want to look that bad. If you tell me there ain't nobody else in there I'll take your word for it.”

“There is no one else with us,” Jake told him.

“I can call the folks I'm with over to here if you’re scared, but we’d be more comfortable where they are,” Bishop stated. “We holed up in the library waiting till dark.”

“Where are you headed to?” Beth asked.

Bishop hesitated for a moment as if trying to decide whether to answer her. Instead, he addressed a question to Jake.

“Who’s this girl you got with you, Markett?”

Jake recognized the unspoken racial undertones of the question and framed his answer carefully.

“I know you just recently left Saints group. I would hope you left because you disagreed with his fundamental beliefs and criminality, and not only because you didn’t like his rules. If you didn’t leave because of his inhumanity to other people, and I include racism with that, then I suggest you rejoin your people and get the hell out of my face. To answer your question, that girl is a beautiful woman, and sir, that beautiful woman is my wife.”

Bishop flinched at the vehement tone of Jake’s reply.

“Whoa, there hoss, don’t blow a gasket.” He turned to face Beth. “I’m sorry about not answering your question. We thought to head over to Mobile, down on the Gulf. We’d rather go east towards the coast, but that’s the direction Saint’s headed in the morning.

“Do you want me to call my folks over?” he asked, shifting his attention back to Jake. “If we go over there, you'll have to leave your guns by the door. We'll do the same.”

Jake replied, somewhat mollified by the apology. “Like you say, we’ll be more comfortable there. At least we’ll have a place to sit down.”

Two men in their mid-thirties, along with four women and five children, were grouped together just inside the doorway. They moved back to allow them to enter. The men kept their rifles aimed at Jake.

“You all can rest easy, ain’t nobody fixin’ to kill anybody,” Bishop said in response to Jake's pointed look. “I told them we'd all put our rifles and guns by the door. Lamar, you and Rob can help me move a couple tables beside each other so’s we can all sit together.” There was a moment of shuffling as they arranged tables and the adults moved chairs. The children sat at another table looking at books.

“Mom, I put my foot in it again,” Bishop said, addressing a time worn middle-aged woman. “It didn’t take me five minutes to insult Markett’s wife.”

“I guess it was wasted time with you this morning. I told you to watch that mouth of yours. Sometimes I wish you were still young enough to be whipped.”

“It’s okay Missus…?”

“Bishop,” she supplied.

“Missus Bishop,” Jake continued. “Your son didn’t mean any harm and he apologized as soon as he realized he needed to.”

“Maybe it wasn’t wasted time after all. He’s a good boy, but he’s been around the wrong sort of people for the last three years.” She paused. “So you’re the famous, Jake Markett, and this pretty black lady is your wife,” she said, chuckling. “John Saint would blow a gasket if he knew his worst enemy had a black woman for a wife. Almost makes me want to go back and tell him just to see his face.”

“That would be something to see,” Beth agreed, “but since you’ve already gotten away from him, I don’t think I’d go back. My name is Beth.”

“Oh, don’t you worry about that, Beth. Wild horses couldn’t drag me back there. I just pray we don’t run into the likes of his kind ever again.”

Jake broke in to make his position clear. “Missus Bishop, Billy, I have to tell you people, I kill cannibals whenever and however I can. We can have a talk and I hope to get some information from you. I’ll give you some rations from the truck in exchange, and we can go our separate ways from here and I promise not to kill all of you.”

“Just hold your horses there, Markett,” Billy said, "we ain’t fucking cannibals. All we ever were is workers.”

“What do you mean workers?” Jake asked.

“Means you didn’t eat human flesh and join the ranks of the Saints,” another of the men answered. “Not much higher up than the slaves. No liquor rights, no whore rights, nothing.”

“So not all of Saint’s men are cannibals. We thought they were,” Beth, said.

“All his soldiers are, and there are some others that eat the meat because they like it, and like to cozy up to Saint,” Missus Bishop supplied, “but most of the women, and quite a few of the men, back in the camp, refused to eat it. All of us are in that group.”

“That’s good to know.” Jake, replied.

Billy said, “It saves you from having to kill us. So far, all you’ve killed is people eaters. Saint don’t let none of us workers leave the camp. I’m wondering though, just how were planning you on killing us, seeing as how you left your pistols and rifles by the door?”

“Ever since we sat at this table, Beth and I have had our ankle pistols in our laps. Now we know you’re not cannibals we’ll put them back. The fellow you have hiding behind the checkout counter may as well join us too. That thin plywood won't stop a bullet.”

“Damn,” Billy said, “Come on out Will, he's right about that plywood. Put your rifle over by the door with the rest.”

A stout, short, older man came from behind the counter, put his rifle beside the door, and dragged a chair to the tables.

“How did you know I was back there?”

“I could hear your heart beating and I heard you breathing.”

“Damn,” Billy exclaimed again, as Jake and Beth briefly showed their pistols before lifting their legs to replace them in their holsters.

“What are you two doing here in Colquitt?” Will, asked.

“We had a little trouble up the road, and one of his men told us Saint was moving towards the east tomorrow. We figure to put a kink in his plans.”

“One of his men just up and told you,” Missus Bishop said, smiling. “Saint sent out a scouting crew early this morning. There was a bunch of them left in a couple trucks and a four wheeler, is that the trouble you ran into?”

“That’s the bunch,” Jake agreed.

Missus Bishop exclaimed joyfully. “You’re here, so I guess you took care of that problem. Tell me that redheaded son of a bitch won’t be coming back.”

“He won’t be coming back,” Beth replied. “None of them will. They’re dead.”

“Where’s the rest of your crew?” Will asked, pulling up another chair and sitting at the end of one table.

“Will, there isn’t any other crew, just me and Beth.”

“Just the two of you… shit…You do know Saint’s got an army there in Bainbridge?”

“Yes we do, and that makes me glad we met you. If you could tell us all you know about his camp, it would be a big help making our plans. We’re going to hit him late tonight while they’re sleeping.”

“He’ll have guards posted,” Billy Bishop stated.

“I expect that,” Jake replied. “Tell me everything else you know.”

CHAPTER 20

The telling took almost an hour. Because of Saint’s anger about the killing and burning of his men, and his growing frustration over not being able to capture the ones responsible, he had turned his base at the Walmart into a semi-permanent installation, erecting huge military tents to house his people.

Jake asked many questions about the position of Saint’s elements. Finally, Missus Bishop found a pencil and sheet of copy paper, and made a drawing of the parking lot.

“So, Saint’s main cadre, his officers, stay in these three tents lined in a row. This other bunch of tents is for his married soldiers and their children, and the eight big tents behind them are where the rest of his men sleep?”

“Except for the twenty or so men Saint keeps with him inside the Walmart as body guards,” Billy said.

“Right,” Jake continued. “The four tents angled off from the family tents are for the single women and the male workers, none of them cannibals?

“That’s the layout.”

“Good. Now here, kind of isolated from the main camp, are the two eighteen-wheel container trucks he uses as prisons to lock his slaves away at night. One houses about twenty men, and the other, maybe twenty five women.”

“Saint calls the woman’s truck his whore house on wheels,” Billy said, interrupting. “The trucks stink because he don’t let them keep them none too clean. Every Wednesday afternoon he selects the girls to service his officers, and has them stripped naked and hosed down so they don’t smell so bad.”

“Yeah, Wednesday is his party and gambling night,” Lamar said. “Saint likes things on a regular schedule.”

“You two need to hush your mouths about that and stop interrupting Mister Markett,” Missus Bennett said primly. “He’s trying to make plans, and he doesn’t need you two trash talking.”

Jake nodded his thanks to her. “You say he has road blocks composed of old cars at every approach to his camp. He has a few guards patrolling the camp at night. Saint and his bodyguards sleep inside the Walmart. Is this the complete picture?

“That’s it,” Will said ...“No. Wait. Behind the Walmart he’s got the bio-diesel rigs and his ethanol plant set up... puts them away from the camp because of the smell. But like we told you, he’s got a lot of men.”

“You’re right about that, but I have to tell you, Saint may think he’s king of the world, but his military training must not have taken. His position is wide open to a surprise attack. Beth and I can roll in and do a lot of destruction in a very short period. I’ve been doing a bit of thinking while we’ve been going over this. Let me ask you, how did you manage to get here to Colquitt?”

“In a bus,” Billy answered, “Will’s one of Saints’ mechanics. He told the motor pool officer he had to take it out for a test drive. The rest of us snuck out early and he picked us up past the roadblock.”

“Will was a mechanic for Saint, now he’s free, same as the rest of you. I have a problem, and it’s a big one. As I said, Beth and I are going to hit him hard tonight, and let me tell you, the plan I have in mind is going to disorient them. The thing is, Beth would be mad at me if we leave without freeing the prisoners. That’s where you three men come into the picture.”

“Say what?” Missus Bishop exclaimed. “You two may be dumb enough to go blasting your way into that camp, but you ain’t getting my Billy killed for no bunch of…No matter, it’s not going to happen. We’re out of there and none of us is going back.”

“Why didn’t you finish your sentence Missus Bishop?” Beth asked angrily. “Maybe I can finish it for you. Your boy’s, not getting killed for a bunch of niggers and spicks, is what you meant to say. I was beginning to like you, but maybe it’s a shame you’re too old to be getting a whipping to teach you some decency. Jake, let’s leave this trash and get some sleep before we head out.”

“Not so fast,” Billy said. “I reckon I might be taking a hand in this if you got a plan that makes sense.” He waved his mom to silence. “I’m a grown man, Mom, and I made up my mind I’m going to help them.”

“I reckon me and Lamar might join in too,” Will said. I want to be away so bad I can taste it, but I hate Saint more than I got common sense. He nodded towards another man. Rob can stay with the women and kids till we get back. When we first met Saint….”

“You shut up, William!” a woman sitting near him cried out. “Don’t you be telling him about that, and you ain’t going nowhere. We still got two young’uns to worry about.”

“I know we do,” Will replied angrily, “but we talked about why we were leaving, and boy did we get uppity about how much better we are than they are. We ain’t been away even a day, and we’ve proved just the opposite. There’s two decent people sitting here at this table with us and all we’ve done is insult them. I say, shame on us, and shame on you, Lula Adams. Saint’s bastards raped our Maggie to death, and in another year, you know he was going to add little Ginny there to his whores.”

He looked towards the where the children had stopped reading and were looking at him. “You kids keep on reading, and don't pay attention to grown up talk. Ain't nothing bad going to happen to you Ginny, we're away from that now.” He turned back to his wife. “If I can do something to help these folks and get back at Saint, I’m doing it. I should have already figured out a way to kill that bastard, and if it weren't for worrying about you three, I would have.”

“Lamar, you’re keeping quiet,” Jake said, speaking to the man sitting beside Will, in an attempt to defuse some of the anger in the room.

“Ain’t got nothing ta say. I do whatever Will says ta do. He’s my friend.”

“What do you want from us, Jake?” Billy asked.

“The container trucks he uses for the slaves, where do they keep the keys for them?”

Will answered for Billy, “Saint got tired of people losing keys. The keys are always in the ignition of every truck.”

“Good, that makes things easier. What I want you three to do is follow us into the camp. While Beth and I are working them over, I want you to hijack those two trucks and head back here to Colquitt. Saint’s men are going to be too busy staying alive to pay you any attention.”

“In and out, for us. I like that. What time we heading out?” Will asked.

“I figure around midnight. We’ll try to arrive around two in the morning. When we get to the roadblock, I’m going to use our big truck to smash through. We’re not going to be doing any shooting until we hit the camp. We may not kill all the guards at the roadblock, so keep your heads down.”

“He doesn’t keep guards at the road blocks,” Will said. “He figures the cars blocking it are enough.

“Jeez,” Jake replied with bewilderment, “his overconfidence is astounding.”

Will barked a laugh. “He ain’t run into crazies like you two. Hell, he ain’t fought a real battle in the three years I been with him. Saint used to have regular formations and drills, but he got tired of hearing the noise, ‘cause of his drunken, drugged hangovers. For the last two years, none of his men have done any training.

“If we’re leaving that late, it probably wouldn’t hurt us none ta get a little shuteye too.” He nodded towards the man who hadn't participated in the discussion. Rob over there don't talk because he ain't got a tongue, but he knows how to shoot. Maybe you could arm him with something better than that single shot rifle of his. Him and the women can stay awake and listen for trucks just in case Saint does decide to worry about a few deserters. It might be a good idea to hide that tank of yours behind a building while you’re sleeping.”

*

They left for Bainbridge a little past midnight. Before they did, Jake prepared the remaining LAWS rocket launchers to be ready to use and emptied the grenade rounds into a cloth satchel Missus Benson supplied. His last chore was to hang several of the ammo canisters for the machine gun to the wall of the turret using wire he found inside a burned-out hardware store.

Beth carried two cases of MREs over to the library. While she was there, Missus Bishop asked for a private word with her.

“Beth, I’m sorry about my attitude earlier. I was wrong. I guess I been around trash so long I’ve just about become like them. My son and the others gave me hell after you two left. I think you’re going to find, ain’t none of us perfect, but we’re not bad folks.”

“I know you’re not,” Beth replied, “I want to tell you I’m sorry for what I called you earlier.”

“No, you were right. I was wearing those shoes, and calling me trash just about fit the bill. Just promise you’ll get my boy back to me. He’s all I got in this world.”

The sky was clear, and the nearly full moon made the headlights of the vehicles almost redundant. There was no need to rush, and Jake kept the speed slow. As they rode, he explained the details of his plan to Beth.

“I didn’t have a true plan until we met that bunch, now I do. Beth, you said this morning we’re not killers. Deep in my soul I feel that’s true, but the fact of the matter is we’re going to be killing a lot of people tonight, and the way we’re going to do it is the stuff nightmares are made of.”

Beth interrupted the flow of his words. “According to everything you have told me, Saint and his men have been hurting people for years. Look at what they have done to me and Al, Agnes and Eva. We’ve got people back at the camp. Janie and Al are back there. The other people we care about, Connie and his people, their lives depending on us. We have to stop Saint from coming down the road tomorrow. Darling, whatever we have to do to protect them is okay with me. Just tell me what to do.”

“I wanted you to know so you have time to prepare your mind. You saw the picture of how the tents are set in the parking lot. I’ll do the driving. What I plan is to enter the parking lot at high speed. Now that I know who is sleeping in which tents, I’ve altered the plan to do even more damage to Saint’s gang. This isn't going to be a simple destroy the equipment attack. I’m going to run over the tents that house his officers, and crush them while they’re sleeping. Then I’m going to do the same to the tents that house his regular army. It won't be pretty.”

“What about the women and children in there with them Jake,” Beth asked with distress.

“I’m not going to bother with the married soldiers tents. You’ll be in the turret. If any men come out of those tents, you’ll have to take them out. Do your best not to shoot into the family tents or the womens’ tents.”

“I’m glad you told me what we’re going to do,” Beth said. “You’re right. I needed to know you were going to run over them with the truck.”

“It’s a cowardly, lowdown way to go about it,” Jake replied. “Some of those who are going to die may be just like Billy and the others. I’m sure more of his people would leave if they saw an opportunity for a better life, but according to Missus Bishop, the ones I’ll be running over have embraced cannibalism to some extent. I wouldn’t do this if we weren’t so badly outnumbered. The scariest part is going to happen when I stop.

“Our goal is to take out as many of Saint’s vehicles as we can. I’m going to exit and use the LAWS until they’re expended, and then switch over to the grenade launcher. Your job is to cover me, kill anyone shooting at me, and any other target of opportunity. If you have no human targets, shoot at the tires of any vehicle you can. After that we’ll roll around behind the Walmart and take out his mobile refineries”

“They’re bound to hear us coming,” Beth said. “There will be some of them shooting at us when we get there.”

“You’ll have to take ‘em out. All I’ll be doing for the first minute is driving.”

“My stomach feels funny and my heart’s beating fast as hell,” she said. “I think I’m a little scared.”

“That’s called getting the butterflies, and I’ve got ‘um too.”

Jake saw a road sign that indicated Bainbridge was five miles ahead. He increased his speed to shorten the time of their arrival, hoping to give Saint’s men as little warning as possible.

The roadblock, just before the entry to the Walmart parking lot, was nothing but an unmanned set of two cars arranged end-to-end across the road. He slowed to almost a stop, pushed his way through the blocking cars and then floored the pedal, gaining speed as he entered the parking lot.

As Beth had surmised, some of Saint’s men were awake and alert, and they immediately began firing at the MaxxPro. Jake was only peripherally aware of the red ribbons of light from the tracer rounds pouring from the turret above him as Beth worked the machine gun.

He swerved in line with the first row of large tents, and in an instant was plowing through them. The canvas concealed the men he was running over, but the steady bumping he felt from the wheels told him he was crushing the bunks and whoever was on them.

As soon as he rolled over the last tent in the row, he swerved again and passed around the end of the family tents to gain access to the targeted tents behind them. Again, he felt the thumps of bunks crushed and bodies destroyed.

The entire time, mere seconds stretched by slow motion adrenaline intensity, Beth was pouring out steady bursts of fire with the machine gun. Jake barreled around the parking lot, running over the same tents again. He saw movement under the collapsed fabric of some of them, and did his best to run over those points. He finally chose a spot in an open area of the parking lot to stop. He exited through the side door, unceremoniously shoving the nine remaining LAWS out onto the pavement as he went.

A man was racing towards him, firing his rifle as he ran. Bullets spanged the metal near Jake, causing him to duck. The man fell as a line of tracers from the turret found him. Jake stood, using the truck as a shield. He shouldered a rocket tube, stepped from the shelter of their armored vehicle, and targeted a large canvas-backed troop carrier. When the rocket hit, the vehicle almost disappeared in a blazing white ball of fire. Jake discarded the spent tube, reached for another, and stepped out to acquire a new target. Again, bullets spanged near him, but he paid them no attention, leaving it to Beth to keep him alive as he launched the rest of the missiles.

The parking lot was now a mess of flaming vehicles. The air was full of the screams of the mortally wounded, and the shouts of men giving orders. As Jake discarded the last spent rocket tube, he dove back into the MaxxPro, and came out with a grenade launcher and the bag full of grenades.

Even though Beth was hard at work with the machine gun, he was still coming under fire. Methodically, he fired grenade after grenade at the vehicles. Finally, he could see no targets that were not either blazing or else twisted piles of metal.

As he was scrambling back into the vehicle, he heard a final bullet hit the metal of the doorframe. He did not feel the ricocheting round that entered his skull at an oblique angle through his right eye. The bullet blasted a huge cavity as it exited his left temple, carrying with it shards of skull along with a large portion of his forebrain. He made no sound as he fell forward onto the metal floor.

CHAPTER 21

The murmur of muted voices pulled Jake slowly to awareness. He lay with his eyes closed, savoring the luxuriant feel of the soft mattress and the silky smooth sheet covering him, the soft pillow... The cozy feeling evaporated as onrushing memories turned his pleasure into confusion.

“What the hell,” he said, opening his eyes and attempting to sit. He fell back with a groan, barely noticing a badly startled Eva jumping away from the side of the bed. He did notice when his bed was surrounded by Beth, Janie, Al, and Agnes all asking questions. “How do you feel, do you know my name? What’s the last thing you remember? Are you okay, are you in pain?” He heard Eva telling everyone to hush and get out of her way.

“How do you feel?” she asked.

“I feel fine except for being weak. Obviously I was wounded at Saint's camp, but where in the hell am I?”

“We’re in Moultrie at the Holiday Inn. Do you remember getting shot?”

“I was shot?”

“Yes, you were shot,” Eva replied. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

Jake thought for a second. “I guess that would be getting back into the MaxxPro, although I don’t remember actually getting into it.”

“What’s my name?”

“You’re Eva, and that’s Janie standing next to you and there’s Al and Beth and Agnes. Now tell me what's going on and why everyone’s crying.” Jake paused for a moment. “And why am I so tired and hungry?”

“Because you didn’t eat for four days and you were just about dead,” Janie said, her tears turning to laughter, “Now you’re not. You got your eye back, and you’re just like new, only better.”

“My Eye?”

“Jake,” Eva said, responding to his confused expression, “Agnes is going to set an MRE warming while we tell you a very strange story.”

*

Jake was beside the transport firing grenades from his launcher. He had already fired all his rockets and the parking lot was ablaze with burning vehicles.

Beth was concentrating her machine gun fire towards the entrance to the Walmart. Several men were using the low concrete wall supporting the shattered front glass as a shield. They would pop up, fire a few rounds in Jake’s direction, and then duck down before she had time to target them. That did not work every time and her vigilance was taking a toll on their numbers. The only trouble was they were not the only targets she had to worry about.

The longer the MaxxPro sat there, the more time individuals and small groups had to overcome their initial shock and confusion. She was taking fire from several directions, and slugs were hitting the bulletproof glass and armor surrounding her, leaving pockmarks in the tough material. Several rounds had actually entered the turret through the firing aperture of the machine gun. One of them clipped a tuft of hair from the top of her head.

Her feet were in constant motion as she swung to keep those targets at bay, but only for a moment. She had to keep diverting back to the entrance. The men in the Walmart had a direct line of fire to where Jake stood, only partially shielded by the MaxxPro.

Time seemed to stand still. Because of her constant movement, it was as if she were experiencing the battle in segments. Swivel here, fire at a man running towards her from the tents. Swivel again, fire at a group of men using the small patch of trees at the corner of the parking lot for cover.

Spin back to the Walmart and try to pick off heads as they rose to fire at Jake. Twist this way and see two of the guys disembarking from the bus that followed them. They raced towards the slave trucks. Fire at two of Saint’s men running towards them. Back to the Walmart and manage to hit another head as it popped up. Change empty ammo canister for new one.

Back to the bus in time to see one of the men attempting to rescue the slaves get shot as he climbed into the cab of the truck. Kill the man who shot him. More targets coming from the tents, sweep a steady stream of fire until they are down.

The parking lot is in flames, a fitful wind whipped the acrid clouds of smoke in ever changing directions. She could feel the heat radiating from the burning trucks and jeeps. Blast the Walmart again. See the bus and slave trucks leaving the parking lot, one behind the other.

Target the Walmart. She realizes Jake is no longer firing grenades.

Risk a moment to peer into the passenger section. Jake is lying half in the vehicle, a pool of blood surrounding his head. Clamber down and pull him in, dive for the driver’s seat, not bothering to close the side door.

Drop the still running vehicle into gear and floorboard the pedal. Turn in a wide circle to follow the other vehicles. Two men were not able to dodge out of her way quickly enough. They were ground to tangled bone and meat as the big tires of the heavy vehicle ran over them.

Race towards Colquitt, blasting the horn to urge the trucks in front of her to go faster. Afraid to stop for fear some of Saint’s men will find a functional vehicle and come after them. Afraid to stop because, deep in her heart, she felt Jake was dead. As long as she did not stop, she could pretend she had not seen the big deep hole in the side of his head. Just watch the road and drive.

Pull in behind the other vehicles parked in a line near the library. Rush to Jake’s side, screaming for help. Oh God, the bleeding has stopped. He is breathing. He is still alive. Scream again for help. Will came rushing up, followed by a group of people.

“Get in the seat and drive Will, don’t stop for nothing!” she commanded. "The rest of you follow as soon as you can. Campground on the other side of Moultrie. Get behind the wheel and drive, damn you.”

*

“You were still alive when they barreled into the campground,” Eva told him. “I don’t know how. The damage that bullet did, along with the amount of blood you’d lost, you should have been dead.”

“How long ago was this?” Jake asked, reaching instinctively to touch the side of his head.

“Leave your head alone, there’s nothing for you the feel. Just listen to the rest of this bizarre tale,” Eva said. “To twist an old phrase, you ain’t heard nothin’ yet.

“Beth was frantic, but I didn’t know what to do,” she continued. “The first aid kit in your pack couldn’t approach dealing with the extent of damage you presented. Connie suggested we move here to Moultrie where we would have access to surgical supplies from the hospital. I agreed, fully expecting you to die before we got here.

The truth is, even with a fully functional trauma facility there was not anything I could do, short of keeping you alive with machines. I estimated a full tenth of your brain exited the opening the bullet made in your skull and no telling how much more was destroyed by the concussion. At most, even if we could keep you alive, you’d be in a vegetative state.”

Again, his hand moved to feel his temple.

“You’re touching the right spot, but I told you, there’s nothing to feel. It was pitch black inside the hospital, but we did manage to gather much of what I thought I would need. Will told us the backup generators there were too complicated for him to understand. Connie remembered that the inn here had emergency generators. Will and some others managed to get them running. ”

Agnes came to the bedside carrying an MRE and a glass of water on a bed tray. Eva and Beth helped him struggle to a sitting position. Beth pulled a chair close to his side and sat quietly staring at him.

Jake gulped water and handed the empty glass to Agnes as she reached for it. “Keep talking while I eat,” Jake said around a mouth full of beef stew. “If you’ve got any more of, you may as well set one warming,” he added. “How long ago did this happen?” he asked again.

“You’ve been in this room for four days,” Eva said.

“It must have happened again,” Jake said with amazement. “I don’t know why, but I know it did.”

“You know what happened?” Eva asked.

“It had to be the nanobots. They fixed my head.”

“Jake, they did more than heal you this time,” Beth said. “They changed you. The nanobot cloud started forming around your head almost as soon as we brought you into this room. It only took a couple of hours till they were so thick we couldn’t see your face. I was scared crazy, and tried to make them go away but they wouldn’t budge.

“Me and Al tried moving the bed, but they stayed with your head. After a few more hours, they covered your whole body. All we could do was leave you alone. There wasn’t anything Eva could do either.

“We’ve been keeping watch on you twenty four hours a day. Janie came running out of your room about an hour ago yelling the nanobots were going away. We’ve been waiting here for you to wake. ”

“What did you mean they changed me?”

Eva rummaged through a leather bag and removed a small round mirror mounted with a swivel to a short metal handle.

“This isn’t much of a mirror, but it should give you a general idea as to why Beth can’t take her eyes off you.

Jake took the proffered mirror and examined at his face. “What the hell!” He exclaimed. The reflected face was familiar.

“I estimate your biological age to be somewhere between twenty five and thirty years. I’ll repeat what you just said. What the hell?”

“I guess the nanobots like me,” Jake said, smiling, moving the small mirror around to see different areas of his face. “I don’t know what’s going on any more than you do.”

“I’m infected too. I told you about the scars from the lion attack. Agnes told me they’re practically gone.”

“I doubt there’s a cure,” Jake said, reluctantly passing the mirror back to Eva. “I think I need to avoid mirrors and take the change in small doses. I’m totally weirded out by this.”

“If you think you’re weirded out, wait until the people you rescued from Saint see you.”

“Why’s that?” Jake asked.

Beth tore her eyes from his face and stood. “Because you’re beautiful, that’s why. Let me finish telling you about the things you missed while the nanobots were healing you.”

“Beautiful?”

“Yes, you’re beautiful, the most beautiful man in the world, and now you’re young too, not much older than me. I love what the nanobots did to you.”

Beth continued speaking. “I thought you were dead,” she said, struggling to keep her emotions in check. “The entire time it took to drive from Bainbridge to Colquitt, I thought you were dead.

“When I saw you weren’t, the only thought I had was to get you to Eva. I started screaming for help, and people came. People I didn’t know. Slaves from the container trucks. I saw them, but didn’t see them. I wanted someone to drive so I could hold a towel against your head, and try to keep you alive.”

“That had to be horrible,” Jake said. “I don’t know how I would have handled it if it were you instead of me.”

“Horrible doesn’t come near. Nightmare doesn’t come near. There’s no word to describe the feelings I had.” Beth began crying, sat back into the chair and hid her face in the covers. She reached for his hand to press against her cheek. “I thought you were dead,” she repeated, her voice muffled by the sheet.

Jake used his free hand to stroke her hair. Al dragged a chair over to be beside his sister, and put his arm across her shoulders.

Agnes placed yet another warm MRE on his tray. She continued the tale where Beth left off.

“There’s a lot more to tell you. You sent three men to rescue the slaves. One of them, Lamar, was shot, and killed. We buried him three days ago. A slave, a young black man named Silas, took his place driving one of the big eighteen-wheeled container trucks they used to house the slaves.”

“You should see how they treated the slaves, Daddy,” Janie said. “Almost every one of them has scars from getting whipped.”

“So, except for me getting shot, and poor Lamar getting killed, the plan worked?”

“More than worked Jake, I’ll tell you about that in a minute,” Agnes said. “I want to tell you more about the slaves. In Saints camp, it became common knowledge that someone was killing many of his men. When that man I busted up...”

“James Baker,” Jake provided.

“James Baker. Anyway, before Saint had him shot, he told people about Jake Markett’s threat to John Saint, and about the woman that broke him up, and about the black girl driving an assault vehicle. He must have seen Beth in the side mirror. Anyway, the slaves heard about this through the grapevine, and about the men, you killed at the roadblock.

“A Latino female got to preaching you were going to come to Saint’s camp and free the slaves. They call her Aunt Maria. Aunt Maria was so positive in her belief she just about convinced the other slaves you were going to be their savior. Sure enough,” Agnes said, laughing, “you were.”

“Oh Lord,” Jake said.

“Silas, the guy that drove the other truck in place of Lamar, was one of the people who came running when Beth started screaming for help. He saw the extent of your injuries and told the other slaves you were as good as dead. Aunt Maria wouldn’t have any of that, and started telling everyone that a miracle was going to happen and you were going to be good as new.

“That’s what Beth was referring to when she said the slaves were going to be weirded out. They’re going to think you’re the Messiah.”

“They’re in for a rude awakening when they find out I’m just as human, and just as fallible as any other man.”

“But are you, Jake?” Eva asked. “I have to say I’m stunned by what’s taking place here. Would you even know if you were the embodiment of the second coming?”

“Yes, I’d know,” Jake, replied with conviction. "What I do know is what’s happening to me and to my family has something to do with the alien invaders, but for the life of me, I don’t know why.”

“Be that as it may, there’s not going to be much evidence to dispel their belief. As soon as they see you, that’s it.”

“Oh Lord,” Jake said, repeating himself.

“There’s more to tell you,” Agnes said. “Connie armed a bunch of the former slaves, and he’s been maintaining a roadblock to the west of us, He also has guards posted around the hotel.

“Yesterday, a ragtag group of over forty people, men, women and children, refugees from Saint’s camp, approached the roadblock and asked for mercy. The slaves vouched for them, except for one, saying they weren’t bad people, so Connie let them join us.

“The one they didn’t vouch for got belligerent when Connie told him to leave. He threatened Connie with a pistol. Sam put a bullet into his heart before he even got his arm up.”

“Things have been happening while I was out. It seems like it’s under control though.”

“As best it can be. Do you want to know what kind of damage you and Beth did to Saint?”

“You know I do.”

“According to the refugee’s report, over thirty men were crushed to death when you ran over the tents, many more than that were badly injured, some of those will likely die. They left the dead and the injured behind.

“Between Beth on the machine gun, and you blowing away with your rockets and grenades, Saint lost at least another forty men, and many others were severely wounded. Saint himself lost the thumb of his right hand from Beth shooting at the Walmart.”

“Was there any collateral damage?” Jake asked in a serious tone, “Were any children hurt?”

“According to them, no, the only people dead are Saints soldiers.”

“Thank God,” Jake responded with relief.”

“I wish I’d killed that bastard,” Beth said, raising her head from the covers. “All I got was his thumb. At least he doesn’t have an army anymore. They said John Saint left the next morning with ten of his men without telling anyone he was leaving.”

“So he’s still out there somewhere?” Jake said. “We accomplished our goal in disrupting any plans he had of mounting a massive move. He has to be demoralized by our attack, and my bet is he took off for fear we might return and finish him. He’s laying low, but he’s not going to disappear. When a man like him suffers a humiliating set back, all it does is make him want revenge. Sooner or later, he’ll form another group. I wish we were in a position to finish him off, but with the people we’ve gained, I know we have to be running out of supplies, if we haven’t already.”

“You’re right,” Agnes agreed. “Thanks to the food we loaded into the trailer, we’re still okay, but another day will practically exhaust our supply.”

“Now that Daddy’s well, we can just go to Heaven,” Janie said, “He says there’s enough food there to feed hundreds of people for years.”

“That is our best option,” Jake agreed.

“It’s too late in the afternoon to leave now. Also, we need to wait for Connie. The refugees said the mobile fuel factories were still intact, so he took a group back to Bainbridge to get them.” Agnes stated, “Besides, as weak as you’re acting, it wouldn’t hurt you to rest. I say we leave in the morning.”

“Speaking of being weak,” Jake said, “I’m feeling better, but I’m still hungry. Do we have anything besides beef stew? … I think I need a gallon of drinking water too.

“I’ll make you one,” Beth said, giving, his hand a squeeze before releasing it and standing, “To tell the truth, I’d like some time alone with my husband.”

“We can take a hint,” Agnes said. “But what you mean is, you’d like some time to get reacquainted with your brand new husband.”

“That too,” Beth responded, gazing at Jake adoringly as the others filed out of the room. “Especially that.”

Beth set another MRE warming and returned to the chair beside the bed, once again reaching for his hand.

“I knew I loved you Jake, but I never felt how deep love could be until I saw you lying in a puddle of blood. I thought you were dead, and when we got here, Eva told me you might as well be dead. Your eyes would open every once in a while, and when they did, I could tell you weren’t there anymore. It was horrible. When the nanobots started getting on you, I thought they were going to take you apart like you said they did the buildings.”

“But they didn’t,” Jake responded, “and now I’m back, and everything’s okay,”

“No, it’s not,” Beth, responded, “My mind feels like it’s… I don’t know the right word, but my thoughts are confused. I love what I see, but I’m asking myself if it can really be you after having so much of your brain…” She gasped and began crying again.

“Beth, darling, I want you to listen. Ever since Eva told me how serious my injury was, my mind has been working overtime, trying to find blank spots in my memory. I can’t find any. I think the Nanos searched through what was left of my brain and found everything.”

“How could they?” Beth asked, “So much was gone.”

“There is a theory that the brain stores everything, every thought, every sight, every memory, in many different places. I can remember everything. I’m still the same me.”

“Are you sure?”

“Not totally the same, Eva’s mirror dispelled that.”

“You’re so beautiful,” Beth stated again. “Is this how you looked when you were younger?”

“I think so, except now I’m a lot healthier and thinner than I ever was. You know what. Those meals make me feel like I’ve been reborn. I want to brush my teeth and wash, and then I need some quality time with my wife.”

“If you're ready to play, you're able to warm your own meal,” Beth said, punching his shoulder as she stood. “Don’t you ever put me through another four days like this again. I’ll going to fetch a pail of water for your bath, and when I get back you better be ready to prove to me I’m your woman.”

“Try not to go tumbling down,” Jake quipped, unable to suppress a chuckle.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Jake replied, smiling, “just being silly. By the way, a while ago you said me and Al. It should be Al and I.”

“Damn, you are you.”

Like their wedding day, their lovemaking began slow, once again getting to know each other. His renewed youth, and Beth’s emotional ride of the past few days combined to make the beginning a spiritual experience.

In the end, this changed desire so deep the external world disappeared in a frenzy of passion. They fell asleep in each other’s arms.

CHAPTER 22

They were awake and dressed. Jake was eating yet another MRE when they heard a gentle knock on the door to their room. Beth opened it to admit Agnes.

“We barely heard you knock,” Jake said. “What’s up?”

“I wasn’t sure if you’d be sleeping or not. I figured if you heard a light knock, you’d be awake. We’re leaving early tomorrow, and Silas wanted a minute with you if you’re up to it. Aunt Maria would like a word too.”

“I can handle that,” Jake said, “but one at a time, if it’s okay with them.”

“I’m sure they’ll be fine with that,” Agnes agreed. She noted the condition of Beth’s hair and smiled. “I can see you’re feeling better. I’ll delay them a few minutes so Beth can freshen up.”

“Oh,” Beth said, reaching instinctively to touch her hair. “I don’t know what I’d do without you,” she said, moving towards the bathroom.

Agnes lingered a moment. “I still can’t get over the change. You know what I think. The nanobots were slowly de-aging you anyway, but they simply took the opportunity to speed things up while they repaired your head.”

“More than likely,” Jake agreed. “I wonder if there are others…individuals or groups, the nanos are affecting?”

“I guess there could be, but I see no evidence any of Connie’s group or from Saint’s camp are showing signs they are infected. I’ll be out in the hall with Maria and Silas. Let us know when you’re ready.”

*

Silas was a handsome man. Jake guessed him to be in his mid-thirties. He was slim and tall, with skin the color of aged mahogany. There was ample seating left over from so many people keeping vigil over Jake’s body while the nanobots did their miracle. Jake motioned for him to take a seat facing the two of them.

“You’re the fellow who drove the other truck after Lamar was shot,” Jake said. “I’m glad you made it out of that hell.”

Silas did not respond. He sat staring at Jake, disbelief written on his face.

“He’s changed, hasn’t he?” Beth said. “He’s a lot better than the last time you saw him.”

Silas finally found his tongue. “Better, is an understatement, he’s been reborn. What the hell's going on here?”

“There’s an explanation, but it’s far from a simple one,” Jake responded. “It’s tied in with the same situation that caused the death.”

“You mean the nanobots. Your kids told me about that. How sure are you?”

“One hundred percent,” Jake said. “I’ve seen them through some of the best imaging devices when I was part of a group studying them at the University of Wisconsin.”

“I’ll be damned… were they ours or someone else's?”

“Neither,” Jake replied, they’re alien to our planet.”

“Do you agree with what he’s saying?” he asked, glancing at Beth.

“How could I doubt it? I spent four days by his bedside watching while they remade him.”

“I’ll be damned,” Silas said again. “I taught high school chemistry and physics, so I know a little about the subject. There has to be some very advanced science behind those things. From my reading on the internet, we were nowhere near creating anything like this. Kind of lends credence to them being extraterrestrial.”

“Or extra dimensional,” Jake added. “We just don’t know. There’s a lot of brain power going to be joining us in Haven to work on finding out where they came from.”

“Haven? Your kids told me about that too, only they call it Heaven... I have to say, the people are feeling a bit confused by everything that’s happened, and the confusion is only going to deepen when they learn you’ve not only been resurrected, but you also managed to shed about twenty years in the process. Aunt Maria already has us half believing you’re the second coming of Christ. I mean, come on, the place we’re going to is called Heaven.”

“The official name of the facility is Haven, but listen, I’m just human,” Jake said, responding to his statements. “It may be that the nanobots are aware of some things I haven’t voiced yet, and they could be, for lack of a better explanation, trying to help me achieve certain goals. It may also happen, when I do voice the goals I hope to achieve, my words will make me seem even more messianic, but I know, and the people who know me, know, I am only a man.”

“I’ll have to take you at your word even though the evidence seems to support Aunt Maria’s position.” Silas paused for a moment, his countenance gripped and twisted by deep emotions.

“Aunt Maria swore you were going to rescue us and you did. You have no idea what it was like for us there in that camp. We were worked like mules and beaten like dogs. Our women were raped and gang raped. Our children were killed out of hand and turned into meat. When one of us died, they turned the body into meat and that is what we had to eat before Saint would allow us anything else. We had to eat…” His voice broke and he seemed to collapse into himself, his body wracked by deep sobs.

Beth left her chair and moved to kneel in front of him, pulling his hands from his face so he could see her.

“You had no control over what was done to you, or the things you were forced to do, but you’re alive and that’s what matters to me and Jake. You are people and we had to come get you away from that son of a bitch. What happened was Saint’s fault.”

Silas fought to regain his composure, clamping his hands to his face as if to physically stem the flow of his tears. He shuddered and drew a deep breath.

“You’re right, of course,” he said, dropping his hands from his face, the tears diminished, but still slowly trickling down his cheeks. “It just hurts so much. You have no idea the hope Aunt Maria gave us, swearing you would come. Even though we thought she was crazy, there was still that hope.

“When you came roaring into camp firing the machine gun, we in the men’s truck could hear her screaming, “He’s here. Jake Markett has come for us. Be ready. Be ready to go.” “My heart was racing so fast I thought it was going to explode.”

Jake stood and moved to Silas, reaching out to take his hand. He motioned for Beth to move aside as he slowly pulled Silas to his feet. He enveloped him in his arms, patting his back as he spoke.

“We’ve all been hurt, and had to do things we don’t like to think about. The pain will fade, and the memories will dim. But we’re strong. You’re strong. You are with us and together we're stronger.”

*

Aunt Maria’s visit was different. She was short in statute but long in strength. She appeared to be in her sixties, grey hair with distinctive Hispanic features. She was nearly as skinny as Beth was when Jake first met her. She came bustling into the room and took the chair Silas vacated when he left. She skipped the introduction part of the conversation and began talking animatedly. Her voice was devoid of any accent.

“I’m sure Silas has told you all about the crazy old lady who tried to convince them you were a savior coming to our rescue. Just so you know. I know you are not the embodiment of the second coming, and I damn sure didn’t think you were coming to rescue us. I made that up so they would have a modicum of hope. John was getting heavy handed with his beatings and short rations, and more than a few of them were only a half-step from suicide.”

“It’s a relief to know you don’t believe I’m the messiah,” Jake said. “I know it must have been terrible there, for so many to think about killing themselves.”

“Terrible doesn’t even come close to describing conditions in that place, but Lord, the more people you killed, and them not being able to find you, the more it drove John crazy. The more frustrated he got, the rougher he was on everyone, especially his slaves.”

“It’s too bad we didn’t kill him,” Beth interjected. “I hate to think of him still out there, maybe building another gang, and doing the same things again.”

“That’s something I want to speak to you about. Silas and a few others, even some from your group, want you to arm them so they can hunt him down. I would counsel against letting them. They don’t have any training, and they’re more likely to get killed themselves, as they are of killing John.”

“Justice for John Saint will have to wait,” Jake responded. “His time will come, but our duty is to get as many people safely to Haven as we can. The people with us represent our genetic heritage. There are so few humans left. We can’t afford to continue losing the good ones to trash like Saint. I’ll let Silas know that Saint will have to wait.”

“Thank you. Silas is a good man, and we do not need him dead. I like the sound of your phrase, ‘our genetic heritage’. You’re not planning on any separation are you? You have yourself a black wife and two adopted black children. You risked your life rescuing what the whites in general consider to be lower races.

“The people who were with you from before seem to think you’re the best thing on two feet. I think I am going to like going to Heaven, and I think I am going to like you, Mister Jake Markett. You are not the second coming of Christ, but you are the closest thing we have. I'll have to tell them I made a mistake, and convince them you are just a man. The one thing you don’t need is them to be seeking perfection in your every action or word.”

“I’d appreciate that,” Jake agreed, “but the name of the place we’re going is Haven, Heaven is only a nickname.”

“You’ll have to work on that, we all call it Heaven.

“I notice you call Saint by his first name. Were you around him a lot?” Beth asked.

“Every day,” Aunt Maria replied. “I was his personal servant. Maria, fetch me my tobacco, Maria my feet are sore, would you mind rubbing them, Maria cook me some of your special biscuits. Yes Sir, John. Right now, John. Let me do that for you, John. I did my job well, and sometimes I could get concessions for the other slaves.

“It was a good position for knowing what was going on, too. You should have heard the way he cursed you. It got worse and worse for him, especially after the two of you taunted him on Puckett’s radio. He was obsessed with capturing you and the different ways he was going to torture Jake.”

Aunt Maria paused in thought and then started laughing.

“What?” Beth asked, puzzled.

Aunt Maria regained her composure, but a smile lingered. “I was just remembering one of the ways he was going to get revenge was to make Jake watch you being tortured. He was going to start with cutting off your fingers, beginning with your thumbs. What is funny, it was so bright from everything burning, he had to see it was you machine-gunning his men to pieces. I could see you clearly, when I looked through the air slot on the trailer, so I know John had to see you too. You flipped it around and shot off one of his thumbs. Ain't life is a bitch sometimes?”

“It sure is,” Beth responded, unable to suppress a smile at the thought, “but you need to be careful about saying ain’t. Jake usually kills people who say that word.”

“Huh?”

“It’s an inside joke,” Jake responded to her puzzled expression. “Beth gets silly some times.”

“You’ll have to fill me in later. Right now, I am going out to do messiah containment. Before I leave, I want to say, even though I know you two are not holy, you sure are beautiful, and so are Allen and Janie. Bless you for having the heart to come for us. Bless you.”

A few minutes after Aunt Maria left there was another tapping at the door, Beth opened it to admit Eva and led her to the chair.

“I’m here as a Doctor,” Eva began. “Most of the former slaves are in horrible physical condition. They have multiple lacerations from being whipped and beaten. Some are crippled from broken bones not set properly. They are all suffering malnutrition. A few are so vitamin deficient, they’re actually showing symptoms of dementia.”

Jake rubbed his hand across his face. “Avis told me he provided and stocked a rather extensive treatment facility in Heav…er, Haven. We will make it a point to locate it as soon as we get there... Jesus. I wonder how many people Saint has killed over the years. It has to be in the hundreds.

“Eva, I appreciate, as a Doctor, the challenge these people present seems overwhelming, but believe me, if the facility is intact and functional, every able bodied member of our group will do everything we can to help mend them. I have to tell you though. I am very tired. I need more sleep.”

“I understand,” she replied. “Did you finally get full?”

Jake smiled at her. “As a matter of fact, I think I’ll have one more meal before I lay down. Getting reborn sure makes a person hungry. Could you have someone wake us about six or seven tomorrow morning? The sooner we get to Heaven, the sooner we can begin treating the victims.”

Neither of them mentioned he said Heaven.

CHAPTER 23

The following morning, Jake and Beth exited the lobby of the Holiday Inn. They found the parking lot full of people hurrying to and from the five vehicles parked in the front receiving area. Parked on the roadway were two more tractor-trailers that looked like rolling chemical factories. Jake spotted Agnes and Connie standing off to the side, and took Beth’s arm to guide her in their direction. Agnes saw them approaching and said something to Connie. Connie turned towards them, his expression turning to astonishment.

“Damnation! Seeing is believing, but I ain’t believing what I’m seeing,” he said as he reached out his hand towards Jake. “I think I might want ta get shot in the head iffen it’ll take twenty years off me. You sure are sprightly for a man that’s had half his brains blowed out. You’re looking mighty pretty too Miss Beth, how ya liking your man now?”

“Same as before, I like him with all my heart,” Beth answered, giving Connie a hug. “I guess we’re packing,” she said looking around to take in the bustling activity of people with purpose.

“You better believe it,” Agnes said emphatically. “I want to know if Heaven exists, and I want to know today.”

“I see you brought up Saint’s fuel refineries,” Jake said, addressing Connie.

“Yep and the technicians to run them.”

“Do you have the time? Jake asked. “I left my watch in the room.”

“It’s close to seven.” Connie answered, glancing at his wrist.

Jake did some mental calculations, “If we are able, and that’s a big if, to drive nonstop, there’s a chance we could be at Haven by five or six this afternoon. I noticed there’s a conference room adjacent to the lobby in the hotel. Before we leave, I’d like to say a few words to everyone as a group.”

Agnes spoke excitedly, “Then get your things from your room while we finish the last bit of packing, and let’s get going. Connie can pass the word about the meeting.” She paused and frowned, “Don’t expect Butch to help with anything,” nodding to where Butch sat on low concrete wall near the entrance to the inn. “I hate to say it again, but he’s a useless piece of shit. Yesterday we had to scrub the two container trucks out three times to get rid of the stink. The slaves were not provided anything to poop or pee in. It’s a good thing the trailers had metal floors or they’d still be stinking. He refused to help. Said he wasn’t cleaning any nigger shit.”

“Agnes,” Jake said, pretending to be shocked.

“It’s the truth, you wait and you’ll see what I mean. He’s a nasty piece of work.”

“Yep, it don’t take long ta find that out,” Connie agreed.

“I‘ll have a word with him,” Jake said.

Butch pretended not to notice as Jake approached him.

“I’m not going to waste many words on you, boy, and if you are wise you’ll keep your mouth shut and hear every word I say. If I have one more complaint about you not doing your share of work, or hear of one more instance of racism from you, you will not travel another mile with us.”

Butch flushed red. “You can’t tell—.”

“Don’t speak, boy, or I’ll run you out of camp right now. There are lines you should not cross, and you have already crossed them. Consider yourself warned.”

Butch gave Jake a sullen look and turned his back to him.

Jake and Beth made short work of packing their belongings. Janie spent the entire time they were organizing the MaxxPro pleading with them to, ‘please’, let her ride in the bus with the other children, a request they adamantly refused. When she realized they were serious, she ran off crying. As they were finishing she came running back with a young Hispanic girl in tow.

“Julia’s mom, Mercedes, says it’s okay for her to ride with us, if it’s okay with you.”

“I don’t know about that,” Jake said, winking at Beth, you might want to play and make noise and stuff.”

“We won’t play, I promise,” Janie said, “and we’ll be so quiet you won’t even hear us.”

“Janie honey, your daddy’s messing with you,” Beth said. “You can play and make all the noise you want. Why don’t you two go tell her mom it’s okay for Julia to ride with us?”

“Maybe I shouldn’t tease her like that,” Jake said, watching them run full tilt back to the bus.

“Don’t ever stop,” Beth said emphatically. “Just keep being the same person she wanted for a daddy.”

A short time later, Connie and Sam began herding everyone into the Holiday Inn. Jake sent Beth ahead with Al, explaining he needed a few minutes alone to organize his thoughts. When he entered the room, he went directly to a podium on a low platform and stood there silent until the movement and ongoing conversations of the group slowed and finally ceased as people noticed him and took their seats. There were over a hundred people gathered in front of him.

Jake, waited for absolute quiet in the room, and let the silence linger, allowing a level of expectancy to grow as they waited for him to speak. He smiled and began to talk softly, just loud enough for everyone to hear.

“My name is Jake Markett. Today we are finally going to a place properly called Haven. My daughter got us into the habit of calling it Heaven. I do not know if this facility is still intact. If it is, compared to what we have gone through, the nickname is appropriate. There is a possibility that we will arrive there and find it not viable. That will not matter, because here in this room are some of the best humanity has to offer.

“As I look around, I see many I know, and I see people I’ve yet to meet. Everyone in this room is a survivor. In all your faces, I see the loss and pain you have endured, but I also see the reason for your survival. I see hope. We have stories we could share, and I’m sure we will share them, but what makes us the best of the best is, we lived through the horrors of the past six years, and from this day forth, it will be us who forge a new beginning. If the Haven is not viable, we will make it viable. Despite the disasters that have happened, the world’s resources are still available to us.”

A shout from a woman at the back of the room interrupted him.

“I ain’t being a slave for nobody again.”

Jake did not miss a beat.

“No, you won’t be. Each person in this room represents a portion of the genetic heritage of the human race, and you are extremely valuable and important. One of the things I want to address directly concerns that. I am going to use the terms used before the plague. If there is anyone in the room who thinks they have a right to discriminate against another person because of their race, gender, or sexual orientation, you can leave now. Our genetic heritage and the community we’re going to establish will have no need for your input.”

Several people glanced to where Butch was sitting. Butch squirmed uncomfortably in his chair. His face flushed with anger, but he remained seated.

Aunt Maria stood and waved for Jake’s attention.

“I want to ask, what is the purpose of this? I would like to know why you even care. Do you picture yourself as some kind of God who is going to save what is left of mankind? I know I did my best to make the other slaves believe you were a saint…please pardon the use of that word, I meant savior, and you did save us, but you damn sure are not holy. A holy man would not run over people sleeping in their tents and he would not have his wife using a machine gun to cut people in half. You’re as human as any of us and that’s why I’m asking.”

Jake smiled at her questions. “Thank you, Aunt Maria. You are correct saying I am not a saint, but I was honor bound as a fellow human to rescue you and the others. It is also my nature. As far as the purpose of going to Haven, it may be that we are the new beginning of humankind. It is my hope we can stay together not only for self-protection, but to also to form a more humane, and fair society than what existed before the death.

“Whether the facility is intact or not, we have a lot of hard work ahead of us, and we will have to draw upon the skills each of you had before the death, and the skills you have had to develop to stay alive. It is time for us to leave, but as we travel, I want each of you to know how important you are, and to think about how you can help make a place worthy of us. Let’s make a place where a child can play, where a kid can be a kid.”

Jake looked out into the crowd, searching for a face.

“You there, the woman who says she’s never going to be a slave again. What’s your name?”

“Name’s A.J.” she called back hesitantly and then stronger, “A.J. Jackson.”

“Folks,” Jake said, raising his voice a bit louder, “Are we going to let anyone use A.J. as a slave ever again?”

There was a scattered chorus of no and hell no from a few people. Jake moved from behind the podium to stand in front of it.

“I guess most of you aren’t sure if we are going to let A.J. be a slave. Let us try that again and this is what I want to hear. He drew in a deep breath and shouted loud and strong, “NEVER AGAIN!” startling the people gathered in front of him. He drew another breath and shouted again, letting pent up anger loose with his voice, “NEVER AGAIN!”

Jake paused for a moment and looked at Silas standing in the front row beside Sam.

“Silas, are we going to let anyone enslave A.J. again?”

“Hell no,” he said, caught by surprise at being singled out. “Hell no,” he shouted, gathering his wits. “NEVER AGAIN!”

“Sam,” Jake said, looking at him.

“NEVER AGAIN,” Sam shouted with emotion, “NEVER AGAIN!”

Jake spoke again immediately.

“That’s what I want to hear. I want it shouted at the top of your lungs. I’ll ask you again, are we going to let anyone enslave A.J.?”

This time the walls of the conference room shook with the power of the response, many of them rising to their feet to add force to their voices.

“NEVER AGAIN!”

“I ask you this,” Jake, shouted into the reverberations of their passion. “Are we going to let our women be raped and our children killed?”

‘NEVER AGAIN!” The mantra shouted, growing in strength.

“That’s right,” Jake shouted. “Never again.” He raised his hands in front, elbows bent and fists clinched. “We are a strong people. We are a free people and we are going to stay free.” He turned and moved back behind the podium and again surveyed the sea of faces in front of him.

“I see some embarrassed faces out there,” he said in a calmer tone. “Never be embarrassed to speak your anger about injustice. We are about to leave here and go to … Maria, what do my children call the place we’re going?”

“We are going to Heaven,” was her strong reply.

“Then we will call it Heaven. I appreciate you listening to me and I wish we had more time so I could fully explain the things I hope we accomplish. We are running short of food and other supplies. We need to get loaded up and moving if we are going to get to Heaven before nightfall.”

***

They were rolling by nine, the big MaxxPro leading the way, breaking trail for the more cumbersome buses. The four eighteen wheel trucks followed the buses. The center of the roadway was in fair condition and they were making good time. Jake was driving with Beth at his side. Al was riding the turret, keeping guard and calling out any major potholes or washouts.

True to Jake’s prediction, the rear of the truck was overflowing with the excitement of the two new best friends. Agnes was teaching Janie and Julia, a singsong hand-clapping game, and every time they made a mistake, they would get even louder. The noise level was just about what Jake had anticipated.

He leaned towards Beth so she could hear him. “If we were on a good road and I didn’t have to pay so much attention, I’d be holding your hand all the way.”

“If we were on a good road sir, I’m sure you would be holding more than that,” she replied, reaching discretely to her shirt to jiggle one of her breasts.”

“Watch it lady, we’ve got kids in here.”

“I can’t believe it,” Beth exclaimed in delight. “You’re blushing.”

“You are a bad evil woman, Beth Markett, and sooner or later you’re going to get the spanking you deserve.”

Beth leaned closer to him to whisper in his ear. “Will you pull down my pants to spank me?”

He responded by turning even redder.

“I’m not talking to you anymore,” he said.

“Will too.”

“Will not.”

“Every time you say will not, you’re talking to me.”

“Then I won’t play anymore.”

“Will too.”

Jake did not respond.

“Will too.” Beth repeated.

When he still did not respond she punched him in the arm hard enough to hurt. “You better talk to me.”

“Will not, will not, will not,” he repeated rapidly before pulling her close enough to swiftly kiss her lips. “Now let that hold you, I’m doing my best to get us to Haven.”

An hour later, they crossed the bridge over Interstate 75. Jake pulled to a stop at a convenience store close to the off ramp. He suggested everyone take time to stretch and relieve themselves. He stood guard while the ones who needed to, went to do their business. When he saw Sam coming from behind the building he called him over and asked him to stand guard. Sam complied and a very thankful Jake hurried around back.

When he returned he saw Connie and Agnes having an animated conversation, and walked over to join them.

“Jake,” Agnes said as he approached, “I was telling Connie his people should be armed when they get off the bus, not just him and Sam, and it wouldn’t hurt to arm more of the former slaves.”

“And I was just telling her right back that none of them excepting Sam knows a thing about how ta handle a gun. They’d be more of a danger ta us than whoever we might be shooting at.”

“You know, he might have a point Agnes. When we arrive at Haven, we’ll have time to teach them.

“We need to do something. Those are the most defenseless bunch I’ve ever known.”

“I ain’t denying that one bit, that’s why I packed em up to come with you,” Connie said. “They can learn, just don’t want them learning around me in the middle of a fight.”

“Connie armed more than a few of the new people.” Jake reminded her.

“I worry too much, I guess,” Agnes agreed. “How we doing on time Jake?”

“Even with this stop, we’re ahead of where I thought we’d be. This would be a good time to get everyone fed.”

“Let’s rush and stay ahead of schedule. We need to be off this road today. This meal will practically exhaust our supplies.”

A loud commotion near the buses interrupted their conversation and captured everyone’s attention. Jake saw Butch puffed with anger, confronted by a just as angry Janie.

“I said you need to apologize to Daniel for calling him names and you need to stop pinching us. You know you tripped me on purpose,” she said loudly, moving to block his way as he tried to go around her.”

Jake moved quickly to be closer.

Butch saw his approach, and turned to address him.

“You’d better get your little bitch out of my face before I move her myself.”

Al looked toward Jake and started to move towards the two. Jake shook his head no.

“It looks like you crossed another line you shouldn't have, Butch.” Jake said. “You need to man up, and apologize to her and the other children, and then make it a point to never let this happen again."

“I’m not afraid of you.”

“Not me boy, she’s the one that’s in your face. You are in over your head. If I were you, I would say I’m sorry and walk away from this. For that matter, once you start walking you can keep walking. You’re not riding another mile with us.”

“Fuck you, and fuck your whole family you nigger loving bastard, and fuck all you staring at me. I hate having to be around all you trash.” He moved to push Janie out of his way.

Without warning, Jake’s visual perception changed, and Butch seemed to be moving in slow motion. Janie moved quickly to the side and delivered a slap to his face and took a step back and delivered a slap to the opposite side of his face with her other hand. The sound Jake heard was loud but greatly distorted. Just as suddenly, his vision reverted to normal. Butch was standing, stunned. Two red handprints were already forming on his cheeks. It took a moment for him to regain his wits and when he did his cheeks flushed even redder with anger.

“I told you to call your piece of shit off me,” he said, addressing Jake, "I’m not going to let her keep hitting me without doing something.”

“You need to apologize to me and the other kids and stop hurting us,” Janie said again. “We never did anything to you.”

Connie, who was standing near Beth, spoke up. “I hope you don’t apologize. It’s time somebody whupped your sorry ass, and it’s fitting it should be that little slip of a girl. Size and age don’t make you a man, boy.”

“You need to shut up, old man, or I’ll bust your face in when I’m done here.”

Connie began to move towards him, but Beth, put a restraining hand on his shoulder.

“Butch, say sorry and walk away,” Jake repeated.

Butch ignored him and gave Janie another warning.

“I’m telling you one more time to get out of my way or I’ll move you.”

Janie stood her ground and repeated her demand he apologize. “Not until you tell Daniel you're sorry for calling him a half breed piece of shit. And promise to stop hurting us.”

Again, Butch moved to shove her. This time Jake focused on not letting his perception change. Butch moved fast, but Janie moved much quicker and repeated the exact two slaps to his face, the sound of both impacts extremely loud in the quiet that had fallen among the people gathered watching. It seemed everyone was holding their breath at the drama unfolding. Butch looked confused. His confusion turned to rage and he struck with a fast jab at Janie’s face.

Janie sidestepped, and Jake barely saw her arm move as her bent fingers struck the wrist of the hand he threw at her. Just as rapidly, her other arm drove her knuckles deep into his ribs just under his armpit. She quickly stepped back from him several feet. He screamed in pain and rage.

“You god damned bitch. I’ll kill you!” Butch charged her mindlessly, with his arms stretched out to grab her. Again, she side stepped, and this time delivered a roundhouse kick to his back as he went by, causing him to lose his balance and go crashing head first onto the rough cracked asphalt of the parking area.

He slowly regained his feet, his nose scraped raw, and a stream of blood flowing from a cut on his forehead. He looked desperately towards Jake.

"Butch, I told you, you’re in over your head. Let Agnes fix your cuts before you get the hell away from our camp. Janie, that's enough.”

Janie gave her father a grateful look. She turned from Butch, glad to quit a situation that had escalated out of control. She went towards Julia who was standing with a small group of children near the bus door.

Butch looked at Jake with hate-filled eyes. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he shouted as he bent to lift a large stone and hoisted it over his head. He charged Janie, intending to bash her with it.

"Watch out Janie," Julia shrieked as the other children scattered.

Janie turned to see Butch rushing towards her. She did not wait. She closed the gap between them, drove her little hard fist directly into his solar plexus, and quickly spun out of his way.

Butch did not slow down. Blinded by the painful blow, he ran full speed into the side of the bus. The impact of his body and face hitting the metal made a nauseating sound. He bounced off and fell flat on his back and his head made another nauseating sound when it hit the pavement. The heavy stone had hit a window stanchion and fell, smashing his face as his head bounced up.

Everyone one reacted with stunned silence. Beth went to Janie and whispered something. They left the area together and entered the MaxxPro. People suddenly seemed to come back to life.

“Oh my God,” Eva gasped.

“Is he dead?” Julia asked.

“Mercedes, Sarah, gather up the children and get them on the buses,” Agnes shouted. She moved to where Butch lay prone on his back. The only part of his body moving was his feet, which were twitching feebly. She looked up from where she was kneeling and spoke to Eva.

“He’s alive, but he’s a total wreck. Patient shows obvious blunt force trauma to his face, compression injuries to his chest, possible broken ribs, looks like a broken wrist. Blunt force trauma to the back of his skull with a deep laceration, probable concussion. Possible ruptured spleen from the blow to the solar plexus.”

“Sam, Silas, let’s get him into a bus.” Eva commanded.

“No, Eva,” Agnes said, giving her a hard, telling look. “He’s bleeding internally and he’s going to die. He brought this on himself. Sam and Silas can just take him out of sight.”

The two men lifted Butch, looking towards Jake for direction, neither bothering to hide their disgust with having to touch him.

“Dumb ass boy should have apologized to that little mite of a girl,” Connie said. “Did you see the son of a bitch try to hit her with that big rock? Putting him on the bus seems a waste. Where ya want them ta toss him Jake?”

“He’s not dead yet,” Eva said.

“I think he is,” Sam said, obviously in a strain holding Butch’s upper end. “He feels like dead weight to me.”

Agnes pressed her fingertips to Butches neck. After a moment, she looked towards Jake. “He’s dead.”

“You fellows may as well throw him in the weeds, ain’t none of us wantin’ ta bury his sorry ass,” Connie said, still shaking with anger.

Sam and Silas looked at Jake. “Somebody needs to make a decision, this sack of shit isn’t getting any lighter,” Silas said.

Jake nodded towards the high growth of weeds at the edge of the parking area. “Connie’s right. Let’s take him far enough he can’t be seen while we eat.” He went to give them a hand.

“We can handle this,” Sam told him. “Connie should have run this bastard off long before now. Damn fool should have quit while he had a chance. I guess he thought he was bigger than Janie, but she stood head and shoulders over him. You need to go see after your little girl.”

“He isn't getting any lighter,” Silas, reminded them,” shifting his grip on the legs he was holding. “Tell Janie she did us a favor. I came near to killing him myself yesterday when he told Agnes he wasn't cleaning up after a bunch of niggers. He was trouble waiting to happen.”

Jake watched them move into the tall weeks bordering the paved parking area.

CHAPTER 24

They continued on highway 37. Al was riding beside Jake in the passenger’s seat. Beth was in the rear compartment with Agnes and Eva, comforting Janie, who was still distraught about the incident with Butch.

Not far from Interstate 75, they passed through the town of Adel. True to form, Jake stopped to give his message on the loudspeaker. The roadway continued to be in relatively good condition, and around three that afternoon they entered the outskirts of Lakeland.

“Okay everybody, we’re getting close,” Jake called out, “Another two hours should see us there.”

They drove through the town, not stopping for Jake's announcement due to his reluctance to announce their presence so close to their destination. Near the center of town, he turned right, onto a highway which proved to be in even better condition than 37. About eight miles south of Lakeland he turned left onto a secondary road. This road was in poorer condition, but still negotiable. They continued another ten miles before Jake pulled to a stop. He climbed from the transport and waved for Connie to join him. Connie exited the bus and came limping towards him, leaning heavily on his makeshift cane. Will Bennett, Silas and Sam left their vehicles and joined them.

“I hope you’re about ta tell us we’re almost there,” Connie said. That bus ain’t automatic, and working the clutch is about wearing my left knee right off.”

“None of the others know how to drive?” Jake asked incredulously.

“Got Sam driving the other bus, but this old bus of mine is finicky, and I ain’t positive any of them can drive a stick good enough for me to trust ‘em not ta wreck us. Besides, seeing as we’re this close, I’m inclined ta finish her up.”

“At least I can tell you we’re almost there, but the road is a tricky from here. The fellow who built Heaven ran out of time towards the end. All he laid in for a road at this point is packed-earth and gravel, covered over with steel sheets like those the military uses to make temporary runways for planes. It’s only about sixteen feet wide, and you for sure don’t want to ride off the edge, it’s swampy on both sides.”

“I see the path you’re talking about,” Silas said, pointing to an opening in the trees to the left of the road. “You keep your beast in the center, and we’ll ride your tracks. It should be all right.”

“I think so too, but you all watch the road close, just in case the truck ahead of you caves in a section.” Jake said. “Beth’s going to ride the turret, and scout the road ahead for me. We’ve got about four miles left.”

“Let’s get going then,” Connie said. “This old knee's gonna stiffen soon.”

Jake and Beth watched Connie follow the other drivers, leaning heavily on his cane.

“I think if it wasn’t for him, his people would be dead already,” she stated.

“I’d have to agree with you,” he replied. “I think he may be one of those men your daddy calls a man among men.”

“I think he’s true blue too.”

They drove slowly, the metal of the road mostly not visible under a layer of composted leaves and forest debris. Low growing bushes and grasses obscured it even more, but the lack of any sizable tree growth defined the edges. Jake kept the truck as nearly to the center as he was able to judge. They were within sight of the upper half of a tall concrete building showing above the treetops when Beth spotted a problem.

“Stop, Jake,” she shouted, “There’s a sagging place in the road.”

He stopped the truck and climbed out. What he found was a washout that left the metal, bridging a gap, hanging with no support. The washout was clear across, about six feet wide and three feet deep. Off to each side the ground was wet and soggy. Agnes joined him at the gap.

“That’s a mess isn’t it?”

“You got that right. We can’t drive over it and we can’t drive around it. We’ll have to do some kind of temporary repair.”

“What’s that building?” she asked, pointing to the concrete structure.”

“That, my dear Agnes, is Heaven.”

“That’s it?” she asked, confused. “I mean it’s big, but nowhere near big enough to hold everything you said would be waiting for us?”

“Kind of a sad place isn’t it.”

“Sad! The place is downright depressing!”

“Would you feel better if you knew the building you see is just the door to Heaven, because that’s what it is?”

“If that’s a door, then I’d have to say, that is one very, very huge door.

“That’s the door, big as life, waiting for us to open it.”

“Why don’t we walk the rest of the way?”

“It’s over a mile away, and we still don’t know what we’re going to find there. I’m not inclined to leave our vehicles behind, nor am I inclined to split the group to guard them.”

Agnes squatted to examine the washout. “I’m getting everybody to help. No little rut in the ground is going to keep me from getting to Heaven!”

It was hard going. They had no tools to work with. Jake organized four groups. One group fanned out to each side of the road and brought anything they could find that was loose back to the roadway.

Another group carried the material to the washout and passed it down to the packers. The packers pushed the material into the hollow under the steel plates, compacting the scavenged debris as tight as they could.

The last group was posted as guards, both behind, and in front of the convoy. It broke Jake’s heart watching the former slaves work. They were so skinny it hurt to see them move, and, as Eva had pointed out, many of them were maimed, and half-crippled. One, a diminutive Asian woman carrying a large stone, limped towards him as he returned for a load to carry to the packers. He tried to relieve her of the burden, but she hugged the stone closer to her chest, shook her head dismissively, and continued past him.

The pickings were few, but slowly the gap filled with mostly rotted tree limbs mixed with a few large rocks. After two hours of hard sweaty work, Jake declared they had done the best they could.

To lighten the weight of the vehicles, he had everyone wait on the other side of the washout while he, Connie, and the other drivers attempted to drive over the makeshift repair.

“Connie, this truck weighs almost fifteen tons. That patch is going to push down. I don’t know how much. If you think you won’t make it, just stop and honk your horn.”

Jake climbed into the transport, and slowly eased the monster onto the repaired area. He felt it sink with the weight, compressing their patch. He continued forward, and as he passed over the patch, it sank even further to a point the all-wheel drive of the MaxxPro had trouble pulling it and the trailer up and over the far side. Connie immediately honked his horn.

The sun was getting low in the sky. They spent another hour rushing to find even more material to pack on top of the pushed down metal.

Finally, just after the sun actually set, the two buses, and the large trucks crunched their way across the patch with no problems. Everyone climbed aboard the vehicles, and they completed the short drive to the building.

Soon they were all standing in the dark on a wide concrete apron in front of a windowless and featureless gray building lit by the headlights of their vehicles. It was at least sixty feet tall and hundred fifty feet wide. The rear of the building continued into a low wide hill.

The building itself had several signs at eye level with radiation and hazardous material warnings. There was no obvious door or opening of any kind.

“Shit,” a man said loudly, almost shouting. “We worked our asses off to come to this shitty building. There were better places back at the freeway.”

Jake gave him a hard look, and turned his attention to Janie who was fighting to hold back tears. People were huddled together in their original groups. They were soaking wet, and covered with black mud and debris from their labors. Like Janie, more than a few of them were on the verge of crying. Everyone was staring at him.

“That might be true,” he said in a loud theatrical voice. “Yes, it might be true if this were any place but Heaven. This is one hell of an ugly building, but just as beauty can hide ugly, ugly can hide beauty. When the doors open, the true majesty of Heaven will be revealed. To get into Heaven you have to have the key. Will Janie Simpson Markett please approach the key master?”

Janie jumped up and down with excitement, and left the other children to run to him. Jake reached into his pocket and removed a cloth pouch that held a small odd shaped metal bar about eight inches long with two spring-loaded protrusions that sprang into position as he slid it out. “This is the key to Heaven,” he said holding it high for everyone to see. To his astonishment, there was a collective gasp, and several people dropped to their knees.

“It looks like a cross,” Beth whispered to him.

Jake tilted his head, and sure enough, he was holding a cross aloft. He lowered his arm with a sheepish look on his face.

“People, please, this is not a cross. Please stand and accept my apology. As I said, this is only a key, and the shape is purely incidental to its purpose.”

“You need to be a mite more careful, Markett,” Silas shouted to him, half angrily, and half-laughing. “You’re beginning to come across as weird.”

“Again, no symbolism was meant.”

Jake bent to whisper to Janie. “Don’t worry about what the man said. This is the key, and Heaven is exactly what I said it will be.” He held out the key. Her fingers trembled as she took it.

“Honey, there are five signs attached to the wall. Just below the middle sign is a hole. Push the key in as far as it will go and twist it either way. Wait until I announce you."

“From this day forward let it be remembered and passed throughout history that Janie Simpson Markett unlocked the Door to Heaven. You can proceed, Janie.”

“Does that mean go?”

“Absolutely, honey.”

Janie ran to the building. Without hesitation, she inserted the key into the hole below the center sign and gave it a twist.

“It turned, Daddy,” she cried out, “I heard something click.”

“The door to Heaven is unlocked, you may return to my side.”

As Janie ran back to join them, Jake leaned to whisper to Al, standing next to him.

“Son, when I say proceed, I want you feel along the top of the sign where Janie was, with both hands. You will find two holes you can fit a finger into. Push hard with your fingers, and the sign will hinge down. Attached to the back of the sign is a handle. Pull it, and the door will open.

Again, Jake spoke in a theatrical voice.

“From this day forward, let it be remembered and passed throughout history, that Allen Simpson Markett opened the Door to Heaven. You may proceed, Allen.

Al strode proudly to the wall, and placed his hands as Jake instructed. The sign hinged down. Holding the handle, he slowly backed up. Once he got it in motion, a large concrete rectangle section of the wall, about twenty feet tall by twelve feet wide that looked exactly like the other formed sections of the building, began to smoothly move with him. He continued backing up until the door to Heaven stopped moving, about a quarter open. He tugged a few times but it would not move further.

“It’s stuck,” he called to Jake.”

“Never mind, son,” he called back. “The door is open. Allen, you may return to my side.”

Al returned to his side. Everyone stood gazing into the partially opened door. It was like peering into a pitch-dark cave.

“I think someone should see if there’s a light switch,” Jake said. “Connie, as co-Captain of our convoy, would you like to do the honors.”

Connie glanced at Jake in surprise. Jake smiled at him and nodded to the doorway.

“I reckon I wouldn’t mind that honor sir, as long as history remembers that Connie Eugene Stevens was the one that turned on the lights in Heaven,” he answered, using the slang term. He stood tall and allowed his makeshift cane to fall to the ground. Ignoring the pain in his knee, he marched deliberately to the open door. An automatic switch activated as he passed through the entrance, light blazed from the inside.

Janie could not resist any longer. She ran to the door of Heaven, and froze in the opening. “Oh Daddy, it is bigger than it looks.” She shouted with joy. “It’s so much bigger, and I see children way far away!” The other kids ran to join her and they began jumping with excitement.

Beth took Jake’s hand in hers, and began walking towards the door. “I can’t believe the lights work,” she said.

“I guess someone must have paid the bill,” he quipped. “I wonder who’s in there... Everyone with weapons, on your guard!” He squeezed Beth’s hand and they entered the opening to join the others already inside.

They were at one end of a broad boulevard that was actually a road through the center of Heaven. There were wide openings in the concrete walls on each side, walls that formed a long dark tunnel.

Standing in another pool of light a least a quarter mile away. was a small group of men, women and children, all facing their direction, most likely as astonished to see Jake and his people, as he was to see them.

A feeling of relief washed through him. Relief that Heaven existed. Relief that his friends had made it there alive. Relief that he no longer had to roam the earth, alone and lonely. Relief that he had kept one of the promises made to a man so long ago. He squeezed Beth’s hand, and strode down the road. He had other promises to keep, but first he needed to know who the heck those people are.

A new road is ahead of him but for now, this is THE END

Do not miss the exciting sequel,

THE FOUNDATIONS OF HEAVEN

Don’t forget that this is a double book download. Annie Higgins is waiting to entertain you.

A bit of self-promotion. If you enjoyed Hard Roads, please leave a review.

Another two books you may want to read.

If you enjoy post apocalyptic novels, please read ‘Disaster’. A story about prepping gone horribly wrong.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BF2Z5QG

Or

‘Gran De Daddy prelude to apocalypse’

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BYGFRDY

While waiting for the sequel to Hard Roads please enjoy reading Annie Higgins below.

Annie Higgins

A post apocalyptic tale

Fast paced action. A real page-turner. Annie will warm your heart. Annie will break your heart. Adult situations, violence, language.

It is the year 2028. The survivors of the plague and the limited nuclear exchange of 2017 are few and scattered. This is the story of a group of these survivors who embark on a cross-country journey from Spokane Washington to a civilized refuge named Haven in the state of Georgia. Their caravan is attacked, the men and boys are killed and the women and horses are taken. The task of rescuing the women falls on the shoulders of thirteen-year-old Annie Higgins. Annie is determined to reclaim her mother from the highwaymen no matter what the odds. Annie is an amazing young girl. Her careful planning, her words of wisdom and her acts of heroism will have you cheering for her.

Adult situations, violence, language.

This novel is based in the same set of circumstances introduced in my novel, 'Hard Roads' that led to the downfall of society into anarchy. Annie is a stand-alone novel, complete within its pages.

Annie Higgins

By Terry McDonald

Copyright 2012 Terry McDonald

All rights reserved, domestic and international

CHAPTER ONE

My Diary by Annie Higgins

April 12, 2028

My name is Annie Marie Higgins. I am 13 years old. Missus Jenkins gave her students a blank spiral bound notebook yesterday and told us we should keep a diary of our trip to practice our penmanship and grammar because we can’t have regular classes like she thought we would. We’re always too tired. She was our teacher back in Spokane, and told us she would be until we get to Georgia. This is day eighteen since we left the city. We are on our way to Haven. Haven is the only civilized place left since the plague killed most of the people in the world. They have electricity and schools and hospitals. I didn’t write last night because I was too tired from helping push the wagon through a washed-out place on an uphill stretch of the road. Nothing special happened yesterday anyway, Grandpa says boring days are the best days, but I’m tired of being bored. Maybe Heaven will be like everyone says and the days will be filled with newness and excitement. The real name is Haven, but most people call it Heaven and some of the people we talk to on the radio in Haven do too. Anyways, who’d want to go to Haven when you can go to Heaven?

I can’t write much tonight. Mom is in a hurry to get us fed and to bed. We’re late stopping for the night. Boss Henry pushed the wagon train hard today. He was determined to reach the Walmart here in Butte.

Our wagons are made from Ford Ranger truck beds with a hinged steel pipe welded in front to harness the horses to. Each family built their own covers with plywood from the Home Depot there in Spokane. They had to get their plans past Grandpa first so they wouldn’t be too heavy.

The regular tires are old and rotten. Grandpa makes wood wheels for them. He fits the wood to the steel rims and binds them with a wide steel hoop. Boss Henry says he wouldn’t be surprised if Grandpa’s wheels last all the way to Georgia. When I told Grandpa, he laughed and told me we’d be lucky if we made two hundred miles on them. Grandpa’s smart. One of the wagons is for his tools and spare parts. Today we arrived in Butte, Montana. Butte is way more than two hundred miles from Spokane and none of the wheels broke.

Grandpa said Butte has the right name because it sure is a butt ugly place. Butt is not the way the name is pronounced, but he says it like you would say butt. It sure is ugly. On the way into the city, the ground is torn and dug out. Grandpa says it’s from mining for copper. We’ve been travelling on Interstate 90, and ever since we left Spokane, it’s like we’re going uphill. Grandpa says we’re crossing the continental divide and after we do, we’ll be where there are forests. It would be nice to see forests again. Grandpa says I won’t think it’s nice, when we have to chop our way through the trees and bushes growing on the road. When we get to Billings we’re going to get on highway twenty-five and go south, and the weather will get warmer and warmer. I sure hope it does. It’s cold here in Butte. Grandpa says Georgia will be hot by the time we get there. He claims it can get hot enough, candles melt in the shade and the sun can burn the skin right off the top of your head. I asked him, if it’s so hot, why are we going? He told me it’s better than freezing to death during the winter in Spokane. Grandpa doesn’t always make sense. Nobody froze to death since the nuclear winter ended. We had plenty of wood to stay inside by the fire on the coldest days.

I can’t write more now. I need to feed and bed the horses. Mom says we’re having moose meat and spiced fried greens for supper. She makes the best fried greens in the whole caravan.

*

Lori Higgins saw Annie climbing over the tailgate of the wagon. The first thing she noticed was her daughter wasn’t wearing a coat. The second thing she noticed was the lack of a hat.

“Annie Higgins, get back in there and get your hat and be in a hurry, there’s work to be done before dark. Put on a coat, it’s cold and I don’t have the energy or time to be nursing you.”

Annie flipped back over the tailgate. Lori turned to speak to an old man coming towards her with a load of firewood in his arms. “I swear, Dad, she gets more scatterbrained as the days go by.”

“Yep,” he agreed.

Lori frowned at her father-in-law. “It’s your fault and all you can say is ‘yep’?”

“Yep,” he replied, smiling. He set the wood down and stretched. “She’s full of energy and wants something exciting to happen. She’s like my boy Roy, yearning for adventure.”

“All adventure brought, ‘your boy Roy’, was dead, and I ended up with two young’uns to raise by myself. Why can’t she be more like Will?”

Dave Higgins glanced from where he was arranging kindling for the supper fire.

“Roy did like to adventure a bit, but it wasn’t adventure killed him, it was a pack of wild dogs killed him while he was hunting meat for our table.”

“I still don’t see why she can’t be more like her brother?”

“Because she’s not. She and her brother are two different people... Where is he?”

“Boss Henry has him on guard detail.”

Anger crossed Dave Higgins face as he stood, backing away from the flames beginning to lick through the pile of kindling. He turned to gaze at the other wagons circled in the parking lot of the Walmart store.

“There’re over thirty men and boys he can call on. Will’s been assigned his share of duty and more. I’m going to talk to Henry.”

“Don’t be stirring trouble Dad.”

“It’s not stirring trouble to ask for fairness.”

“I know, but there’s something ...,” she broke off to speak to Annie as she climbed from the wagon. “Your Grandpa’s already unhitched the team. Get them fed and watered, we still got supper to cook before dark.”

“You were saying?” Dave prompted.

“Would you get the table for me?”

Dave went to the wagon and lifted the plastic folding-table from the hooks holding it to the plywood side.

“You were saying?” He prompted again as he unfolded it and set it near where she sat on a plastic bucket with an aluminum pan in her lap, trimming the coarse wild greens she’d gathered as they traveled.

“I agree with you. The work assignments aren’t fair, but there’s something else bothering me concerning Henry. I was on laundry detail yesterday. I went to his wagon to get his clothes, and when I turned around, he was right behind me.... Dad, he had the meanest face and he told me to keep away from his damn wagon. I told him I was getting his clothes to wash and he said next time to tell him and he’d get them himself.”

“Odd,” Dave, agreed, “but I guess he has a right.”

“He does, but while I was getting his clothes, I saw what he has in his wagon. He has barely any staples in there. No potatoes or corn meal. He has a few jars of preserved food and nothing else.

“If he plans to eat off the rest of us, I’m saying right now, he’s not eating any of ours.”

“Something else too. I was watching him while he made his rounds of the wagons earlier, and he was acting antsy. He wasn’t paying attention like he usually does and he kept looking up and down the road like he was expecting someone.”

“Who?”

“How would I know? I don’t even know he was. It’s only a feeling.”

Dave Higgins gave a thoughtful reply. “He was adamant we reach the Walmart tonight. I was sort of wondering why we pushed the horses. We passed by a couple places would have done fine to make our circle. He is pretty tight lipped. Maybe Haven’s flying in food for him. I reckon they could parachute it. Tomorrow I’ll tell him to make the duty shifts fair. We’ll wait and see how he plans on eating. I’ve some other things to hash out with him too. He took over our radio from the minute he walked into Spokane. I can understand not wanting to let our plans on the open air, but he won’t allow anyone but himself anywhere near it. Another thing galling me is him not letting us know where Haven is located in Georgia.”

Lori stood and placed the pan of greens on the table. “He says it’s to keep anyone from leaking the exact place, so if there’s trouble, we couldn’t be tortured into revealing it, but there’s something ... I don’t trust him. Still though, they sent him from Georgia to guide us, he must know what he needs to do to eat on the way back.” She shrugged and continued in a weary tone.

“Grab the pot of dried moose soaking on the seat of the wagon and feed the fire some bigger pieces. I’m ready to get this meal cooked and go to bed. Pushing the wagon uphill half the day wore me out. What’s keeping Annie? I swear she’s on my last nerve.”

Annie could hear her mother and grandpa talking. She hurried with the horses. She knew why her mother was angry. After they arrived at the Walmart, she and Will had snuck off to explore even though they knew they should get right to their chores. They were only gone a few minutes, but their mother had been in a foul mood from waking with a sore hip.

Annie reflected on how similar this Super Walmart was to the one in Spokane. Same store front, the scattered bones of plague victims, especially the larger clusters of bones in front and inside of the entrance. Rusted and weathered cars, mostly close to the store, parked in orderly rows except for some parked haphazardly near the entrances. Those had probably belonged to looters. She knew if she examined the bones, she would find many had been shattered or pierced by bullets. Her Grandpa told her the plague days were a horrible panic-filled time.

Most of the dying happened in the first few days, then tapered off and stopped entirely after two months. Back in Spokane, they had lived outside the city on their farms. They used the city as a source of supplies only. Annie knew it was because of the bones. The farm society in Spokane had started with only five families and had grown as people wandered in from other parts of the state and established homesteads. Grandpa told her there wasn’t any reason to live in the cities and even if they did, it wouldn’t be right to not handle the bones reverently and bury them proper, but it was too large a task for people working by hand and with beasts of burden, struggling to bring in crops and cutting enough firewood to last the winter.

After the horses finished eating their ration of grain, she hobbled their legs and led them to graze with the horses from the other wagons on a narrow unpaved strip of ground between the parking lot and the road. Martha Benson was leading two milk cows to the same area. The wind was blowing from the camp towards the strip and Annie could smell food cooking. She was hungry, but knew even when the meal was ready, she could not eat until she carried Will his supper.

*

Annie awoke with hands roughly pulling her to a sitting position.

“Wake up Annie, wake up,” her mother whispered coarsely in her ear.

“I am, Mom, what’s…”

“Hush child. A gang’s taken over. Your brother’s been shot. Grab this bag and open—.”

They were interrupted by a disturbance at the rear of the trailer.

“What are you doing at your wagon? You heard Jacobs’ orders.”

“Is that what Henry’s calling himself now?” Annie heard Grandpa say.

“Shut your mouth old man. Who else is in the wagon? Get out of my way.”

There were sounds of a scuffle. Annie’s mother thrust the handle of a canvas bag into her hand.

“Out the front girl,” pushing her to get her moving.”

Annie unlatched the front hatch, slid through, onto the padded seat and stepped down, standing on the welded tongue. She dropped the bag to the ground to free her hands and reached to help her mother. Her mother’s head and shoulders appeared only to be yanked back in.

“Where the hell you going woman?” a stranger’s voice shouted.

“Run Annie! Run!” Her mother cried out.

Annie stepped from the tongue, grabbed the handle of the bag and did what her mother told her to do. She ran like wild dogs were chasing her, straight across the moonlit parking lot of the Walmart towards a patch of trees she could see among some nearby buildings. A gun shot rang out, the bullet narrowly missed her. A spray of asphalt flew from where it hit the pavement a scant three feet in front of her. Adrenaline gave wings to her bare feet.

There were two more people running across the parking lot outside the ring of wagons. They were going in a different direction than her and were too far away to see who they were. Several more shots rang out and those two fell to the pavement. Seeing them shot spurred her feet to move even faster. She dodged around the end of a building and continued running to the trees. She could hear men shouting for her to stop as they gave chase.

The trees were sparse and offered no place to hide, but did conceal her from her pursuers. She turned left between two buildings then turned right between two more. One of the buildings had an open door. Not knowing what else to do she ran through the opening. It was dark inside, but there was enough light to see a counter beside the entrance. She went behind it and huddled close to the wooden frame. It was cold inside the building and the sweat from running chilled her body as it cooled. She did her best to stop breathing so loud. Her heart was pounding in her chest. She could hear the men shouting to each other. They were near. A few seconds later, they were close enough to hear what they were saying.

“Hold up John, I need to catch my breath, I ain’t built for this.”

“Breathe Chas. We ain’t goin to catch her. She’s half way to Colorado by now. Let’s find the others and kill some time out here. Don’t want Jacobs thinking we quit too quick.”

“I reckon we could search some of these buildings.”

“Nah, we’d be wasting time. You saw how the kid was running. She wasn’t stopping for nothing. Come on, you caught your breath long enough. It’s cold out here and I’m ready for some real food from the wagons.”

“Plenty of women folk there to cook it.”

“Plenty of women for other things too. Let’s get back before all we get is sloppy seconds.”

Annie stayed where she was until she was sure the men had moved away from the building she was hiding in. She was cold. Eventually, her teeth were chattering and she knew she had to do something. She opened the bag and removed the things her mother had hurriedly packed. She pulled a bulky sweater over her nightgown and wiggled into some jeans, letting the nightgown hang like a dress. The only other items in the bag were her walking boots with the socks she’d worn stuffed inside. As she sat, putting them on, her mind was whirling with thoughts.

She was stunned by what had happened. Evil men had invaded their camp. She knew what the man meant by sloppy seconds. She was thirteen years old and she had girl friends that were older. She didn’t know what else to do but stay where she was and hide. After a while, she figured enough time had passed and she ventured from behind the counter. Despite the sweater, she was still cold. If she had been a child of a different time, she would have known by the fixtures she was in a nail salon. What she did know was happiness when she found a cabinet full of musty cotton towels. She carried them behind the counter. She made a pad with some, and some she stuffed inside her sweater. They were too small to use as covers, but she wrapped several around her neck and head and lay down on her pad. Within moments, her thoughts slowed and she fell asleep.

She didn’t hear the gunshots killing the men, boys and babies of the caravan. She was spared listening to the women screaming as they were raped. She slept the sleep of an innocent while wickedness ruled the night.

*

Shivering woke her. It was cold inside the building. Sunlight flooded through the windows of the salon. Annie sat, towels falling from her head, confused by her surroundings. Memories of the night returned. Panic overwhelmed her, making her heart beat faster. Fear for her family brought her to her feet. More towels fell from her as she stood. She left her hiding place and cautiously crept to a window to peek outside, plucking the remaining padding from under her sweater as she moved. All she could see were the fronts of other stores across the wide walkway.

She listened for the sounds of anyone nearby before venturing through the door. She moved slow and quiet, retracing the path she had run the night before. Her mother had disapproved of her grandfather including her on hunting trips, saying she was already enough of a tomboy as it was. Those times paid off now. She moved forward as though stalking an animal, moving from concealment to concealment, pausing long enough to be sure no one was in sight. When she reached the edge of the group of trees, she could see the place where they had circled the wagons.

The circle was broken with gaps showing several wagons were gone. Hers was still there. She gasped and turned away, not wanting to register the sight of the bodies lying scattered among the remains of the caravan. A long moment passed before she steeled herself to look again. Nothing was moving in the campsite. The horses were missing and she knew whatever happened during the night was over and the evil men were gone. Annie walked slowly towards the camp, heartbreak and despair growing stronger with each faltering step.

She knew, by the red jacket, the body lying behind her wagon was Grandpa. She ran the last few yards to their wagon, seeing, but not seeing her grandpa or the bodies inside the circle of wagons. She leaned over the tailgate of their wagon in the desperate hope her mother would be in there, alive and ready to take charge, to tell her what to do. The wagon was empty. She clung to the tailgate, not wanting to turn around. She cried, gasping for breath, trying to come to grips with wickedness stronger than she was.

Her sobbing diminished and she began to see things inside the wagon. The shelving on the walls, once filled with jars of preserved and pickled food, all of them padded to keep them from banging around and breaking. The shelves were empty now. She remembered the many days helping her mother with canning, the days they spent together, cutting okra and shelling peas. The many tasks they had done to prepare for the trip to Haven.

She saw her brother Will’s work boots near a walking stick he was carving to look like a snake. Her mom’s knitting basket, overturned, with its contents scattered on the floor of the trailer. There, at the end of his sleeping pad, Grandpas’ pipe and tobacco pouch. Her heartache turned to anger, and courage strengthened her heart. She turned from the trailer and gazed down at her grandfather.

She didn’t need to see the bloody dent in his forehead to know he was dead. His lifeless eyes staring unblinking at the sky told her.

She couldn’t bear to see him. She moved away and walked to the middle of the circle of wagons. A mental numbness, born from seeing the unthinkable, was setting in. She walked among the bodies of the dead men, boys and babies. She saw Mister Davidson, the tanner, lying on his belly, half his head missing. One arm was stretched towards Laurie, his three-year-old daughter. The babies and toddlers were dead, strewn around the inner circle of wagons, tossed haphazardly on the ground like bloody discarded broken dolls. Keith, the horse trainer, was lying on his side, his coat black with dried blood. Counting the babies there were at least thirty bodies in sight. She couldn’t look any more. She knew them all. They had been one large extended family back in Spokane. She left the dead and went to find her brother.

As she passed between two wagons, she found the body of the only woman. It was Ellen Ellers, one of her best friends, face down in the sand. Ellen was fourteen, a year older than her. They’d spent the last year telling each other their daydreams of how things would be in Heaven. Ellen mostly imagined the boys she would meet there. Now she was on her way to a different heaven and she would arrive naked, raped to death, her anus a bloody open wound.

She found her brother a hundred feet from the wagons. Will was shot in the chest and face. His rifle was gone. She sat beside his body. The times they’d gone fishing and hunting, memories piling on top of one another. She remembered vividly the first time he let her use the 410-gauge shotgun while hunting pheasants in the harvested wheat field. How patient he’d been, teaching her to lead the flying bird, to squeeze the trigger slowly as she tracked it, rather than jerking it. Will was sixteen and her hero. He always stepped forward to lend a hand on any chore needing doing. He loved to build things. When they arrived in Heaven, he was going to school to be an architect. Tears fell from her chin to her lap. Out of the futile ground of heartbreak, rage grew. A point came where the rage turned to resolve. She reached out and touched her brother's hand.

“I love you Will. After I bury you and Grandpa, I’m going to get our mother back from those men. I’ll kill the men who took her.

*

She entered the Walmart and searched until she found a flatbed four-wheeled cart.

In the end, she decided to bury Ellen Ellers too. It took a while to move the bodies. One at a time, she pushed the cart to the patch of trees. She went to the Ellers’ wagon for something to dress Ellen in. Ellen’s body was stiff. Annie had a hard time moving Ellen’s arms and legs to put the panties and nightgown on.

Using a pick and shovel from their wagon she dug a shallow hole in the soft soil, making it wide enough to lay them side by side. She was crying uncontrollably as she rolled them into their final place on earth. She positioned Ellen beside Will, because she knew Ellen carried a crush on him. Reverently, she put Grandpa’s pipe and pouch into his jacket pocket. Will's unfinished walking stick she laid beside him, wrapping his fingers around it to comfort him on his journey. As she filled the hole, her crying stopped. With each tossed spade of dirt, the resolve she’d experienced beside Will solidified into determination. When the dirt was back and the mound of excess soil carefully shaped, she bowed her head.

“You’re going to a different kind of heaven now. I hope it’s as nice as the one in Georgia. If someone’s in charge there, you make sure Grandpa has his pipe and tobacco. He sure likes a draw come evening after a day’s hard work. If there’s any building needed, be sure to let Will in on it, and if there are some handsome boys there, Ellen sure will be happy. You’re dressed now Ellen, you won’t be embarrassed when you get there.

It was past midday as she walked from the grave and the sun was already lowering in the west. She searched through a few wagons before concluding the highwaymen had taken the pistols and rifles. Using an oil lamp from a wagon, she entered the Walmart. There were few signs of massive looting. There really weren’t many people left alive from the plague which killed nearly all the humans on earth.

Using a shopping cart, she took her time gathering the things she would need. A warm coat, heavy jeans, a sleeping bag, lightweight camping tent and compact cooking items. She gathered other things and arranged them in a backpack. The last thing she hunted for was a rifle.

She found what she wanted behind the counter of the sporting section. The rifles were inside a locked metal cabinet, but a sledgehammer and pry bar from the tool department opened it. The only real rifle, among the pellet rifles and pistols, was a Ruger twenty-two caliber, still in its box. She took it, and not knowing which of the scopes would fit she took one of each along with two boxes of 22 long-rifle rounds.

Annie transported her newly acquired belongings to the front of the store where it was brighter. The sun was close to setting and she was hungry. She went back to the wagons to see what, if anything, was left she could eat. She went first to their wagon. The table was still close to the burned out fire, the pot with the boiled moose meat was on the ground. She bent to place it back on the table, a simple housekeeping chore to give meaning to the emptiness inside her. She felt weight shift the pot. There was meat left in it. She ate with her fingers, not tasting it, but not stopping until the tiniest morsel was gone. Hunger satisfied, she returned to the Walmart. She carried a thin bunk-bed mattress to the front and cobbled a cubbyhole behind the service counter using shopping carts and blankets from the bedding department. She arranged her bed with sheets and thick comforters. The stress and labors of the day lay heavy on her. She fell into a dreamless sleep.

*

She awoke confused and disoriented in the darkness of the makeshift cave. Memories of the day before flooded her mind. She crawled between two blanket-covered carts into a blaze of bright sunlight streaming through the front entrance. This Walmart had a grocery section she hadn’t investigated the day before. Even though the sunlight was bright at the entrance, the further recesses of the store were dark and forbidding. She lit her lamp before venturing forth. She knew, from exploring stores in the Spokane area, the vegetables would be dried-out rot. The meat section would display, dry, maggot-eaten blobs of what once were hamburger and steaks and chicken. She went directly to the shelving holding supposedly non-perishable items. Grandpa told her, anything spoiled sooner or later. The items on these shelves had been here since 2017, over eleven years. Some stores reserve a special section for irradiated foods. Grandpa told her it was because a lot of folks before the plague didn’t trust food preserved with radiation. By the time, she was old enough to remember, most of the irradiated food around Spokane had already been eaten. Her grandpa said the war overseas during the plague years caused a winter to be three years long and people couldn’t grow anything.

This Walmart did have a section for irradiated foods. Some were in cans and some were in plastic pouches. Varmints had been at the pouches. She loaded a cart with canned food. The darkness back there was spooky.

She needed a can opener. She had the choice of going deep into the Walmart again or taking one from their wagon. She chose the frightfulness of the Walmart over seeing the dead again.

After eating a meal of cold Beenies and Weenies, and a can of pear halves in sweet syrup, she went to the front entrance and carefully exited in case anyone had come back during the night. She saw no one.

Back inside, she sat in the entrance beside the backpack. The rifle was unboxed first. It was sealed inside a plastic wrap and was in perfect condition. She read the instruction manual. There was a listing of scopes which would fit it. One of the ones listed was a Simmons which she had. The instructions told her the rifle should be cleaned before first use. She lit her lamp and made another trip back to the sporting section for a cleaning kit. She also brought back a few paper targets. As she followed the directions for cleaning, she thought of the times Grandpa had sat in the living room by the fire doing this very thing. He told her a rifle, like any piece of mechanical equipment, was only as dependable as the care you gave it. She made sure to clean it and then attached the scope.

The scope instructions suggested zeroing the rifle at thirty-five yards for general all-around use. She figured she was going to be doing some general all-around killing. She made a makeshift shooting range with a grocery cart and some spring clips from the service counter to hold the targets in place. With a ruler from behind the service counter, she began to measure, marking the floor with a pencil. She made six marks before realizing she needed only count the square tiles. Using the counter to steady her aim she fired three rounds at her target, taking care to breathe out and squeeze the trigger rather than snap at it. The three rounds were grouped close together in the right hand corner of the target, nowhere near the bull’s-eye. She made an adjustment according to the instruction manual. The next three rounds were much closer. After another adjustment, all three rounds were within a quarter inch of dead center.

She knew Will would have laughed at her for believing she could use such a light rifle, but she remembered Grandpa talking to Mister Roberts, the man who ran the corn mill for the community. Both of them had been in the wars before the dying and Mister Roberts had been in the special something ...  she couldn’t remember what, but he said the twenty-two was used by snipers. She didn’t know why he thought it best, but sniping was what she was going to be doing. There was one other thing Mister Roberts spoke of. She remembered Will kept his 410-gauge shotgun under his mattress. She told herself not to see the dead people when she went to get it and his cleaning kit. She did see them. It was like her eyes were drawn to them.

Mister Roberts told Grandpa he kept a sawed off 410 in a side holster for close-in fighting. She wasn’t planning on any close in fighting, but it wouldn’t hurt to be prepared.

She was growing accustomed to going into the depths of the Walmart and it wasn’t half as spooky. She found a hacksaw hanging on a rack and searched until she found a round file. It was near the chainsaws. She had often worked with Grandpa in his shop and knew you had to remove burrs when you cut metal.

Not sure how far back to cut the barrel, she left ten inches. She cut off most of the stock to just behind the trigger guard. She loaded it with birdshot and stood twenty feet from the target. She fired from the hip. It didn’t balance right holding it with one hand so she gripped the top with her other hand. The barrel tried to jump when she pulled the trigger. If she had held it one-handed, it could have hurt her wrist. Fire shot from the barrel and it was loud. The target was shredded.

It was close to midday. She decided to figure out which way the wagons had gone when they left. It didn’t take long to decide they went west, back the way they had come on Interstate 90. She followed their trail on the neglected sand-covered highway for an hour before turning around to retrace her route. The wagons had left the town limits and continued on. She returned to the Walmart to eat and arrange her gear. She figured, if she left tomorrow, she’d catch up to them in three or four days unless they arrived where they were going before then. The horses couldn’t cover many miles in a day pulling the wagons and the hills would slow them down. When she found them, she’d shoot them and get her mother back.

CHAPTER 2

Another dawn, only this time when Annie awakens, she knows where she is and what she has to do. She returned to the irradiated food section, going through the plastic packages, checking for any the varmints hadn’t gotten to. It was a wasted effort. The animals had been thorough.

On a whim, she decided to try the sporting goods section again. She went along the aisles, moving her lamp up and down to the check the shelving. She hit pay dirt. One short section of shelving had irradiated dehydrated meals. These were packaged in foil-lined plastic. Something had discouraged the varmints from opening them. Possibly the metal and plastic packaging didn’t leak odors like the others. There was also a rack of similarly packaged eight-ounce pouches of beef jerky.

When she returned to the front, she had over thirty dehydrated meals which might be in a safe condition. She sat in the entrance where she had better lighting and examined each package to be sure there were no punctures she had missed in the darkness by the shelves. She found several damaged pouches. Still, when she finished, she had twenty-one of the lightweight food packages she could carry with her. Most of the beef jerky packages were punctured, but eleven were in perfect condition.

It took an hour to get her things packed and ready to go. She took more ammo and a sling for the rifle from sporting goods, along with a compact fishing outfit. She gathered three plastic canteens while she was back there and filled them from the plastic jugs on the shelves. Most of them had burst from freezing over the years.

When it came to packing, she discovered she couldn’t fit all of her supplies into the pack. It was back into the store for Velcro straps and a utility belt from the scouting area. The highwaymen had taken all the visible weapons, but she returned to the trailer and dug through their belongings on the chance they hadn’t taken time for a thorough search. Her grandfather’s spare thirty-two caliber pistol with its extra clip and a box of ammo were still in box the holding his clothing. While she was searching for the pistol, she came across Will’s sheathed hunting knife and attached it to her belt.

She ate a meal from cans. No canned goods went into her pack. They were too heavy to carry. When she shrugged into the shoulder straps of the pack, it was midmorning and she was growing impatient to be on her way. The pack was heavier than she thought it would be, but she figured she’d get used to it after awhile.

Annie walked through the center of the caravan one last time, stopping once more to visit her dead friends. They had been all the people she knew in the world. Already their bodies were beginning to swell.

“I’m leaving now and I probably won’t be coming back. I’m sorry for not burying you, especially the babies.” Tears began to flow as she spoke and she wiped them impatiently with her sleeve.

“I can’t take the time. I’m chasing after those outlaws who took my mother and the other women. I don’t know what they plan to do with them, but I need to catch up with them before they hurt her. I may have to do some bad things to those men.

“My grandpa said some folks just need killing. I reckon the ones who killed you are those kind of folk. I did bury your daughter, Mister Ellers. I couldn’t leave her naked and hurt the way she was.

She made the short trek to Interstate 90 and turned west, following the wagon tracks. She stopped once to change the placement of the strapped on sleeping bag from the bottom of her pack to the top to prevent it from slapping her on the fanny each time she took a step.

After several miles, the tracks veered onto the entrance ramp for the Interstate Highway-15. She continued on 90 to the bridge overlooking 15. The wagon tracks led south, disappearing in the distance. She gazed at the barren emptiness she would be traveling through. Tears tried to flow again, but she fought them, knowing they were tears of self-pity.

Her mind leaned heavily on her grandfather’s’ influence. She knew if he could speak, he would say, “A job to do won’t do itself.” She had a job to do and no matter how fearsome it was, she had to do it. She didn’t have any other choice. She didn’t know the way to Georgia, and even if she did, Georgia is a large state and she didn’t know how to find Haven. Mister Henry was sent to guide them, but Jacobs probably killed Mister Henry and pretended to be him to steal the women and horses and food from the caravan.

“I’d best do what Grandpa said and get on down the road,” she stated out loud. “The job won’t get done standing here.” She shrugged her shoulders in an attempt to settle the straps of her pack in a more comfortable position and used the gully beside the bridge to access the roadway below.

*

She set a steady pace, but not one to tire her too soon. Though slightly built, her legs and body were strong. Helping the horses with the wagon on the steep hills and slopes the past weeks had conditioned her muscles for duration. When she came to hills, she continued her pace, knowing she was moving faster than the horses pulling the wagons. Grandpa told her there would normally be snow here in the high country, but this year had to be setting a record for heat. It was chilly, but not cold. A wind came in the afternoon. It was blowing from the north, against her back and helped her on her way.

As she walked, she continued shrugging her pack. The straps were digging unmercifully into her thin shoulders. She finally had to stop and tear strips of cloth from a shirt to add padding to the straps. The padding worked and she continued her mile-eating pace. She didn’t stop to eat. Occasionally she would chew on jerky as she walked. Even though she wasn’t thirsty, she made herself drink. Grandpa told her it was easy to get dehydrated in the high country because the air was dry.

The landscape she was passing through was sandy and barren. The trees, some large pines, but mostly stunted cedars, were few and far between, as were road junctions. The passing of the wagons had disturbed the sand covering much of the road and she knew it would be no problem telling if they left the roadway.

Not mindful of the wind now chilling with the coming of night, she plodded along, slightly hunched over to relieve her back from the strain of the heavy pack. Her eyes were on the tracks the wagon wheels had made and her mind was envisioning terrible things happening to her mother.

The sun dipped to the horizon and still she walked, numb to the weight of the pack. A thin slither of moon rose as the sun disappeared and still she walked. Long after sunset, she stumbled and fell, barely catching herself with her hands. Her legs had had enough.

She stood in the middle of the freeway, more asleep than awake. Her senses returned and she realized she had to rest. There was an overpass on the road a few hundred feet ahead. She willed her legs to carry her to the top of the off ramp, hoping to find a service station as Grandpa called places with gasoline pumps.

There was nothing there. Where the bridge began was a narrow concrete gully. It would have to do. She was too tired to set the lightweight tent she carried. She rolled out her sleeping bag on the concrete. The wind was strengthening and the temperature was dropping.

She was shivering as she went through the contents of her pack. She pulled on her bulky sweater, rummaged until she found her ski mask and crawled into the sleeping bag, pulling the top edges closed, leaving only a tiny opening to breathe through and fell instantly asleep.

*

Dawn broke with horizon-to-horizon clouds. The wind was stronger and the chill of the night deepened rather than dissipate with the coming of day. Annie struggled from her sleeping bag to stand shivering in the biting cold; working her arms and shoulders to loosen the stiffness caused by the weight of the pack.

She surveyed the sky and spoke to the morning she’d awoken to. “It’s going to snow for sure, and I don’t have an umbrella. I knew I was forgetting something.” Her attempt at humor fell flat in her mind. She rolled her sleeping bag and strapped it to her pack. She kept the sweater and ski mask on and dug through the pack for her cotton gloves.

Begrudging the time it took, she lit a fire of twigs, using one of the paraffin coated matches from a small metal box she’d found in the camping section back at the Walmart. As soon as the water was warm, she poured in a package of dehydrated spaghetti. She ate fast, worrying how much time she was losing.

She wiped her pan clean with sand before putting it away and hoisted the pack onto her shoulders. Her muscles complained but she told them to shut up. Once again, she stood at the top of an overpass and stared at the desolate expanse she had to travel.

“I’m coming to get my mother, you son of a bitches,” she shouted, experiencing a twinge of guilt for cursing. “Tomorrow or the next day or maybe the day after, I’m going to catch up with you and I’m going to kill you.”

She was right. The snow began slowly drifting down shortly after noon. The wind increased, thankfully still from behind her, because with the coming of the snow, the air turned moist and bitterly cold. She found herself wishing for a hat, despite the ski mask completely covering her head and neck.

The snow wasn’t coming heavy, but it was falling steady. Within minutes it was a half inch deep and showing no sign of stopping. As she walked, she would often speak her thoughts out loud, simply to hear a voice. She was lonely and terrified and constantly had to refortify her spirit with the reason for her journey. It was a battle within to ward off the despair and self-pity seeking to overwhelm her. Occasionally, to reinforce her resolve, she would shout, “I’m still coming, Mom. I’m still walking, Mom.”

By late afternoon, the snow was four inches deep and showed no sign of stopping. The accumulated snow slowed her pace and chilled her feet. She came to another overpass and left the freeway, hoping against hope she would find some sort of shelter there. The snow was coming down heavier and it was hard to see far.

At the top of the ramp, she turned desperately in both directions, hoping to see any sort of structure. Her mind shouted with joy at the barely visible building some distance on the other side of the bridge. She hurried to it, knowing the relief it would give her from the biting wind.

The place was one of those buildings Grandpa had called, ‘a service station’. It wasn’t fancy like most found near freeways. This one was made of wood with only two of the pump things in front of it. The door was unlocked and she felt warmer as soon as she went in. She searched the place while it was still light enough to see. There was a kerosene lamp on the counter but it was bone dry. She knew there had to be kerosene somewhere. She found three round cans of it on a shelf inside a cabinet behind the counter. She filled the lamp from a half-empty can and used a precious match to light it. There was another lamp on the shelf with the kerosene. She filled it too, but used a piece of paper lit from the other lamp to light it.

There was a locked door at the back of the store. It took several kicks to splinter the jamb. The area behind the door was where the owners lived. The first place she came to was the kitchen and dining room.

There was a table with a bible open on it. Around the table, in the chairs and on the floor were the bones of the people who lived there. The skulls told her there were two adults and two children. The bones didn’t bother her. Nearly every time she and Will went into a vacant house, they found bones.

The death was fast. People would get tired, go to sleep and die. Grandpa said people who showed symptoms died in only a few hours. Spokane once had over two hundred thousand citizens, but after the death, there were only a couple hundred left. Many of the plague survivors died during the long winter caused by an atomic war overseas. Some more died in the fighting when a gang of anarchists tried to take over and make people work for them. There weren’t many people left in the whole world. Annie knew there were more people in the old days, because there sure were a lot of empty houses... except for the bones.

She was glad these people died in the kitchen and not in the beds because she was going to sleep on one. The master bedroom was missing part of the roof. The floor and furnishings were moldy and rotten, but the other two bedrooms were okay. She took the blankets and sheets from one and spread them over those covering the other bed.

She brought both of the lamps into the bedroom with her. On a bedside table, she positioned two bricks they used for doorstops, standing them on end to hold the camp pot. She removed the globe from one of the lamps and placed the base between them as a stove. It smoked a lot, but it warmed the water for the food quick. She ate another pack of spaghetti and, still hungry, warmed a package of beef stew.

She checked through the window before rolling out her sleeping bag under the mound of covers. It was snowing more than before and the snow was deepening. She became too warm under the covers and woke to take off the bulky sweater.

CHAPTER 3

She awoke still too warm and was sweaty when she crawled from under the covers. It was cold in the room and the sweat began freezing on her skin. She hurried to pull on her sweater and ski mask. She heated water and had boiled beef jerky. The hot broth warmed her.

Outside of the house, it was white, the sky with clouds and the land covered with snow. The falling snow was only flurries, but she thought ‘it snowed like the dickens during the night’. The snow was as high as her knees.

This was a problem. She couldn’t walk in deep snow with just boots. She went to the bedroom and sat on the bed to think. She recalled another of her grandfather’s sayings, “When life deals you a bad hand you shouldn’t think of it as a handicap, but as an opportunity to prove yourself. There’s a silver lining under every cloud.” She sat trying to figure out what the silver lining was in this snow. Everything Grandpa ever told her was true, but dang if she could find it.

She began searching the store and living quarters for items she might find useful. The only thing she found in the store was a tray of disposable lighters. There were at least thirty of them in a display box on the counter. Two of them held gas. This was exciting because, nowadays, you could go through hundreds without finding even one with gas still in it.

She searched the two smaller bedrooms and didn’t discover anything useful. She decided to search the master bedroom, being careful not to fall through the rotted floor. There was a lot of stuff in the closet besides clothing. She found a shotgun wrapped in oily cloth, and a long plastic box she knew from experience held a rifle. There was a box of photographs on the shelf above the clothes rod. She took the rifle case and the pictures back to the bedroom.

The first thing she did was sit on the bed and go through the pictures. She and Will often went through the pages of photo albums when they were in dead peoples homes. They would make comments concerning what was portrayed until they felt they knew the people and would say words to make the dead feel better. They knew it was silly, but they hoped their spirits could hear them. This was a family of redheads and they were smiling and happy in the pictures. The mother and father had pleasant round faces. The girl appeared to be her age and the boy perhaps two years younger. She hoped they loved each other like she and Will did. Near the bottom of the box, one of the pictures made her pulse race.

The picture showed the father in front of the store holding up the head of a dead elk in the back of a pickup truck. Standing against the wall of the store, beneath the window, were two sets of snowshoes along with a high-powered rifle with a scope. Knowing how silly it was, she hurried to the front door and opened it enough to peer around the edge to see if the snowshoes were still there. Of course they weren’t. The picture was taken a long time ago and they would be put away somewhere. She searched the store and the master bedroom again without result and decided to see if they leaned them on the back wall of the building.

The windows were dirty and she couldn’t see through them. She tried opening the back door, but it opened outwards and the snow was drifted too deep against it. The windows were swollen tight in their jambs. Rather than using the front door and wading around the large building through the snow, she used a chair to break the glass from the frame of the window in the master bedroom and crawled out. The snowshoes weren’t leaning against the back wall either. There was a storage shed twenty feet from the store. She crossed through knee-deep snow. Luckily, it wasn’t locked and opened inwards. Inside she found, not two, but three pairs of snowshoes. Two pairs were the regular long kind and one pair, called bear paws, was round. She carried the three sets to the bedroom where she’d slept.

The first thing she did was take off her boots. Snow had found its way inside the tops and down around her socks. She put on dry socks and hung the damp ones close to the lamp base to dry. After wiping the boots dry with a towel from the hall bath she put them back on. Grandpa said a traveling person should take care of their feet and not let them get too cold or stay wet for too long.

It took a while to adjust the ties on one of the long pairs of skis to fit her boots. Both of the long pairs had fittings for adult feet. She strapped them as tightly as possible and went out the front door to try them. One promptly slipped off. She went back inside, tore strips from a bed sheet and wrapped them around the ties to make them fatter. This time the fit was tighter and they stayed on her feet no matter how rough she was with them. The bear paws were easier to walk with but were sized for a small child.

The next thing was to examine the rifle. It was the same one in the picture and the scope was still mounted. She opened the breach to look down the barrel. There was something in the barrel blocking the light. She used the cleaning rod from the kit supplied in the case and pushed out a wad of spider web. She cleaned the rifle before putting it back in the case.

Things were different now. She sat on the bed and contemplated her silver lining. The wagons would be immobilized by the snow, the flat steel rings Grandpa put around the wooden parts would slip and slide and the horses would have a too hard a chore plowing a path with a heavy load. If the killers had taken the repair wagon, they could have put on the cleat things her grandpa made for them. She figured, with her snowshoes, they outlaws with their hostages were two days ahead of her. There was a chance the wagons were stuck out there in the middle of the freeway. It was possible they made it off the roadway, but not likely, considering how far it was between overpasses and exits. She knew the high-powered rifle could shoot a lot further than the twenty-two. She could find a place with cover and kill the men one at a time. If they tried coming for her, the snow would slow them down, making it easy to shoot them. She went to the door to see how late it was. There was daylight left, but it was snowing again. Not as hard as yesterday, but steadily coming down. She decided to wait to see how the weather was in the morning.

She went to the master bedroom closet to find rounds for the rifle. There weren’t any there. After searching frantically through the bedroom and the store, she found three boxes of the bullets in the same cabinet behind the counter on the same shelf with the kerosene. The clip on the rifle held twenty rounds. Test firing the rifle was chancy because of the noise, but she had to make sure she could hit what she was aiming at. The broken window in the master bedroom faced north. Since the wagons were south of her, she figured if she shot from inside the house towards the north, the walls would block most of the sound. There was a plastic sign on a metal stand in the building out back. She put on her snowshoes and took the sign a long ways from the end of the building. The sign was hand lettered, ‘TRUCK FOR SALE’. The O in the middle would be the bulls-eye. The scope brought the target close. After firing three rounds, she was hitting dead center, but low. It took some studying to adjust the scope but the next three rounds were inside the circle of the O. Those shots were easy. She moved the sign even further away. The next three rounds weren’t in the circle but they were grouped in a tight pattern and she could simply adjust her aim. To ensure there would be no problem with close shots, she moved the sign in to a hundred feet. All three rounds were near dead center in the O. It was a good rifle. She knew, if it could kill a moose, it could kill a man even better.

She returned to the bedroom, trying to remember what Mister Roberts, the military man, had taught them during the sporadic classes he would conduct. She remembered him saying, “Once you decide to kill someone, don’t let anything they say change your mind.” He also said, “In a fight, there is no such thing as fairness, an ambush is a lot safer than a showdown.” She remembered him saying, when hiding, to take advantage of any natural camouflage available. There wasn’t much in the way of natural camouflage for snow. If this snow stayed around long enough, she would need white clothing.

What ever she wore would have to be thick, it was cold outside in the wind. She remembered seeing a large sewing basket in the kitchen pantry. It took hours, and the work had to be finished by lamp light, but the reward was a full suit of white, made by first sewing fitted sections she cut from a blanket to a pair of jeans and the same to a sweater found hanging in a closet. These were covered again with fitted sections of white bed sheet. When she tried them on, they were bulky but fit well. Simple, sack-like coverings with drawstrings were adequate for her boots. The most tedious task was making the white gloves to fit over her brown ones. The hat was a challenge, but when it was done, she mentally declared it a masterpiece. It was thick, had flaps to cover her ears and the brim came down to just over her eyes. It had another flap to cover her nose and mouth with a hole to breathe through. The last thing to make was a cover for the pack. By the time the sewing was finished, it was late and she was exhausted.

*

It had snowed during the night and the sky was overcast the next morning, promising more snow. When she opened the front door, the snow was over three feet deep. She closed the door to block the blast of frigid air pouring in. The sun was barely raised, and now, packed and ready, there was nothing holding her back. She wanted to be on the road. The wagon train was stalled because of the snow and there was a chance she could close the distance.

She warmed a meal and ate, then cleaned the pot and used it to melt enough snow to refill her empty canteens.

It was a chore bending in the bulky white suit to put on her boots and snowshoes and an even greater chore struggling into the straps of the backpack. The pack was heavier now with the rifle case strapped to it. She loosened the sling on the twenty-two so it would ride her shoulder and made sure she could reach the pistol in the pouch she’d sewn on the front of her top. Before leaving, she did a mental inventory and a physical check to make sure she wasn’t forgetting anything.

Even with the snowshoes, it was hard to walk on the fresh snow. They would sink in six inches and had to be lifted out with each step. By noon, her legs and ankles were aching and threatening to cramp. Now she was worried her mom and the other women and girls would be suffering. Even though she was comfortable in her homemade blanket suit, she knew how cold they must be. As she walked, her mind tried to picture their circumstances. She pushed those thoughts away because her imagination conjured terrible pictures. She imagined them frozen inside the wagons. The worst thoughts centered on what the men would be doing to them.

By late afternoon, she was done in. Her calves were cramping and the weight and stiffness of the suit along with the load of the pack sapped her energy. She decided to stop at the next building she came to and rest. There was nothing in sight. She was near the top of a long sloping climb and hoped to see something when she topped the rise.

She did see something. One of the wagons was sitting in the middle of the freeway a half mile ahead. There were no horses hitched to it. She stopped and observed it for a few minutes before deciding it was abandoned. The snow was piled high on the plywood top and the snow was smooth around the wagon. It had been abandoned before the snow came.

It didn’t take long to figure out why it was there. One of Grandpas’ wheels had finally come apart. She knew, by the blue paint, the wagon belonged to the Benson family.

Missus Benson was inside the wagon, naked from the waist down. She was sitting with her back against the back wall of the wagon. Her head hung down in front of her. She wasn’t bloody, and Annie couldn’t tell why she was dead, but she wasn’t going inside, a dead person with their skin on them was a lot scarier than seeing bones in an old house. At least her two teenaged daughters weren’t in there with her. Sue Ann and Martha were still alive.

She shrugged off her pack, placed it on the open tailgate and after fifteen minutes of stretching her legs and stiff shoulders, she moved on, determined, no matter how much it hurt, she was going to put more miles behind her. Even though Missus Benson was dead, she took the abandoned wagon to be a sign she was closer to finding her mother. She chewed jerky rather than taking time to stop and cook.

As the sun was lowering, she saw a huge fancy barn-like structure on the opposite side of the freeway. There was a gate secured with wire to allow access through the fence strung alongside the roadway. It took a lot of effort to open it against the weight of the snow enough to pass through. The building was not locked. The inside was a large meeting hall with rows of pews in front of a stage. There were pamphlets on a table by the entrance. On one wall was a wide stone fireplace with split firewood stacked in a long metal rick beside it. She went to the stage to lower her pack. After shedding her bulky suit along with the hat and gloves, she leaned against the podium to stretch her legs and shoulders. It felt like heaven to be able to move her limbs freely.

The place was in great condition considering how long it had sat neglected. The roof and the windows were intact and there was barely any dust on the furnishings. She scanned one of the pamphlets. It was a short story which related how doing good deeds is its own reward. From the writing at the end, she learned she was in a church of the Latter Day Saints.

She went through a door beside the stage and found herself in a hallway allowing access to several classrooms with school desks arranged in rows in front of the teacher’s desk. At the end of the hall was a dining area large enough to seat fifty with a large adjoining kitchen. She went to the gas range and turned on a surface burner. To her delight, she heard a slight hiss and smelled the propane gas. It wasn’t the first time she’d found a place with functional gas appliances, but it was a rarity. Whenever she or Will did find propane during their roaming, they would always run to tell Grandpa. He would collect the tank and use the gas in his workshop to heat metal to make things. She tried the water at the sink but nothing came out.

She went outside with two large pots and filled them with snow to melt for water. It was warmer inside the building, but not by much. She deposited the pots in the kitchen and went to the meeting hall for her backpack. There were windows in each room including the kitchen and it was bright inside. She knew it would be dark soon and there had to be lamps somewhere in the building. There was a door off the kitchen which opened to a stairwell leading to a huge underground room as spacious as the meeting hall. There were shelves and shelves of dry goods sealed in plastic containers. Other shelves held canned foods. She couldn’t believe her luck when she discovered the supplies useable. They were irradiated and much of it was freeze-dried or dehydrated. There were even huge sealed containers of rice and flour and cornmeal.

The entire rear wall of the basement was a steel shelf unit with hundreds of five-gallon jugs of water. It was warmer in the basement and none of them had burst from being frozen. She removed one of the heavy bottles and rolled it near the bottom of the stairs. “Those Latter Day Saints were sure ready for some hard times, Grandpa,” she said out loud, “There’s enough food in here to eat for years. I keep on finding silver linings.”

She found the kerosene lamps in a huge storage room attached to the building outside the rear exit. There was no other place to search. She used a ladle from the kitchen to shovel the snow to enable her to open it. As in the pantry, they had stocked large quantities of supplies. There were at least fifty, five-gallon containers of kerosene. Wood shelving held new kerosene lamps and kerosene heaters. Besides these, there was a metal shelving unit with thirty-pound tanks of propane. She checked and they were full. Other shelves held propane lamps, grills and heaters. It took several trips to bring in the things she wanted.

She used one of the classrooms as her bedroom and left a propane heater warming the room while she prepared her supper. She slept warm and cozy with a belly full of fried ham and vegetables.

CHAPTER 4

Annie greeted the new day with excitement. Today could be the day she found her mother. After a quick breakfast, she dressed in her white camouflage suit, shrugged into the straps of her pack and returned to the freeway.

The sky was overcast but it felt warmer and it didn’t seem as though snow was imminent. With almost four feet of snow cover, Annie knew the wagons were immobilized and was hoping to have them in sight by evening or the next morning. She was toughening to the weight of the pack and a crust had formed on the snow making it much easier walking with the snowshoes.

She was on the road nearly an hour when she came to an exit for the town of Dillon. Some of the town was visible to the left of the freeway as were several large signs on towers. One of them was for a McDonalds. She knew, if she were closer, the sign would proudly proclaim “Billions and Billions Sold.”

It brought forth a memory of a time when Will and she, had stood at the counter at one of the McDonalds in Spokane. They stood studying the menu board and pretended to order food from imaginary employees. When they were finished with their order, they would act like they changed their minds and order again. For some reason they found it to be hilarious and couldn’t stop laughing. The memory brought Will to the forefront of her mind. She could see his face clearly.

She began crying. After awhile she realized she was screaming her anguish out loud and fought her way back from the hurt. She thought of what Grandpa would say. Nothing came to mind, but she imagined he might say. “If something makes you sad you should do something to change the feeling.” Finding her mother wouldn’t take away all the sadness, but it would go a long way towards making her feel better. She didn’t leave the freeway. The town of Dillon had no pull on her. What she wanted was down the road.

At midday, she rounded a slight curve. The road ahead stretched flat and straight for as far as she could see. At the limit of her vision was a dark dot in the road with a faint thin streamer of smoke rising from it. Her heart gave a lurch. It had to be the wagons. She stopped and stared, wishing she had thought to get some binoculars from the Walmart back in Butte. Even through the riflescope, the wagons were too far away to make out details.

Near the stalled wagons, on the left-hand side of the freeway,was a patch of trees. She couldn’t tell how close they were to the wagons, but they were the only cover to shield her approach.

Annie crossed the roadway and walked the barbed wire fence line until she found a gap to cross over. She was much closer to the wagons and was worried she would be spotted before she could get behind cover. She remembered Mister Roberts saying in one of his classes, it was easier to see a fast moving object than a slow one. Taking his words to heart, she removed the dark colored rifle from her shoulder and carried it concealed by her side. She moved slowly, not letting her arms swing and lifting her snowshoes only high enough to make the next step. It took a long time and it was hard because her entire being wanted to move faster, but finally the trees were between her and the wagons. She guessed the distance to be close to six hundred feet.

Once inside the trees she shrugged off her backpack and crept as close to the edge of the patch of trees as she dared and peered through the scope. There were seven men in view scattered around the campsite. They had rifles slung from their shoulders. There were twice as many women grouped around the fire. The men and women had blankets wrapped around them for warmth. Their heads were wrapped with cloth as well. The view through the scope was limited. She cautiously shifted the rifle from person to person. It was impossible to tell if one of the women was her mother.

A large cast iron pot hung from a metal tripod over the fire. Close to the fire was a pile of wood. She could tell, by the fresh cut stumps jutting from the snow near her, the wood had come from this patch of trees. There was a tromped down path in the snow between her position and the wagons and the snow along this edge of the trees was packed with footprints.

The four wagons were lined end-to-end twenty feet apart. The horses were at the front of the line of wagons, huddled together for warmth. Their front legs were hobbled with a short rope tied between them. She could see where they’d pawed the snow for food. All they found was concrete. The men were too stupid to put them where they could get at the ground.

Near the edge of the camp was the bloody carcass of a horse. Horsemeat was cooking in the pot.

Annie faintly heard a woman screaming. It wasn’t coming from any of the women by the fire. It had to be coming from one of the wagons. The distance between the trees and the campsite was just within the limit of her shooting distance with the high caliber rifle. Annie backed away from the edge and pondered the situation. Other than this patch of trees, there was no place of concealment, but the tree trunks were too skinny to offer much protection. Once again, she called on the wisdom of her elders for guidance.

Grandpa had told her, when you need to do something complicated, take your time to do it right, break it down into steps to know what you had to do to get the job done. According to Mister Roberts, when it comes to shooting another human, sometimes a person gets buck fever when it’s time to pull the trigger, only worse than shooting a deer or moose. Annie knew she wasn’t going to have such a problem. She had to restrain herself not to rush to her rifle and start shooting the men.

She listened to Grandpa’s advice and figured the first thing she needed to know was how many men there were. There were twenty women and three teenaged girls before the men came killing. Ellen and Missus Benson were dead. There should be twenty-one women counting Sue Ann and Martha.

Annie went back to the edge, and slowly built a low wall of snow between two trees growing close together, to hide behind. When the wall was high enough, she crawled for her pack. She used the rifle case for a seat. She checked the rifle and her pistol to be sure the safeties weren’t on, and settled in to watch the camp. It wasn’t as cold as yesterday and she was too warm inside her thick white suit. Through the scope, Annie counted eight men with weapons and thirteen women.

She tried to memorize colors of the blankets the men had wrapped around them so she could tell if a new one showed himself. There was at least one more man, because someone had to be in the wagon making the woman scream. Mercifully, she wasn’t screaming anymore.

A few minutes later, a man did come out the back of a wagon. He said something to the other men and Annie could hear them roaring with laughter. There was a lot of movement in the camp as they prepared to eat what was cooking in the pot. More women came from the wagons and one more man. She’d counted nine men. She continued watching until they finished eating.

No one carried a plate with food to any of the wagons and she figured all the people were outside. It took several attempts to count the women because they kept moving around but finally Annie was satisfied there were twenty-one.

The sky was darker, the clouds lower and heavier. The snow, when it began, was swollen fluffy flakes. After a few minutes, the wind strengthened and the snow turned to sleet. It felt like the temperature dropped to bone chilling. The men started shouting orders, and soon they were inside the wagons.

Annie was beginning to get cold, but the snow she had piled between the two trees gave her an idea. If she built a high wall, she could hide behind it. She knew the snow wouldn’t protect her from bullets, but if built high enough and long enough, she would be able to move from place to place and they wouldn’t know where she was until she shot at them again.

The clouds were dark and the sleet was coming down so hard. Annie could barely see the wagons. She knew it would be impossible for anyone to see her in the white outfit she was wearing. The edge of the patch of trees facing the camp was close to a hundred feet wide. She removed her snowshoes and used one of them to dig with, tossing the snow along the edge of the trees facing the camp. It was easy work because it had not warmed enough for any melting to happen and the snow was light and fluffy under the thin crust.

Annie made sure to dig all the way to the sand. She was beginning to get too hot in the suit but knew better than to take it off in the freezing wind. She also knew not to get soaking wet inside her clothes. She made herself slow down.

It didn’t take long to dig a five-foot wide section clear to the ground to make the wall chest high. She used the snowshoe to pack and flatten her side of the wall. The sleet kept blowing and Annie kept working. The sun dipped behind the mountaintops. The bright moon lit the snow-covered landscape and she kept at it. At seventy feet, she decided it was long enough. She took time to soak a dehydrated meal and ate it cold.

Building the wall gave her another idea. She backed away a few feet from the center of her wall and began digging out a wide circle, piling the snow as a windbreak, making a place sized for her tent. She had to relieve herself before going to sleep. The thick pants of her suit made it hard to squat and she felt like she was going to fall backwards. Wiping was even harder.

It was scary to sleep close to the evil men, but she was worn out from walking and digging. The last thought Annie had before falling asleep was she should dig a trench in the sand deeper than the wall.

*

Annie awoke being crushed and smothered. She tried to sit but couldn’t. It took her a moment to realize the tent had collapsed under the weight of new snow. She struggled to her knees and managed to stand, pulling the floor of the tent with her. The rifle tangled with her legs and almost tripped her. Standing had shaken off the burden of snow and she felt the fabric of the tent to find the zipper. When out, she sat on the collapsed tent and pulled on her boots before fishing for the rifle and pistol. The sun was beginning to peek over the hills to the east. The sleet from the evening had changed to snow during the night and added close to another foot to what was already there. The sky was still overcast but the snow has stopped.

She had to pee again before doing anything else. After struggling back into her snowsuit, she took a peek over the wall. No one was out of the wagons yet. She remembered her idea to dig into the sand for a place to hide if she were shot at. Before undertaking further preparations, she cleared the fresh snow from behind the wall to prevent slipping and sliding. It took less than an hour. While working, she found a long stick. It gave her the idea to poke some holes through the base of the wall to shoot through. She had flattened and packed the snow on her side and the wall was only three feet thick at the bottom. She made twenty holes along the base and then began digging a trench.

The sand was soft and loosened easily with a knife, allowing it to be scooped out by hand. She soon had a trench deep enough to lie in and her body would be below the edge. She decided to dig two more. As she was finishing the last one, talking and shouting could be heard from the camp. Five of the men were out, along with eight of the women. The men were ordering them to start the fire and get to cooking.

Annie knew it was close to killing time. She checked the path behind the wall once more to make sure there was nothing to trip her. She put the extra clip for her pistol inside the belly pouch. She wished there had been an extra magazine for the big game rifle, knowing it would take her more than a minute to reload. She stood the twenty-two against a tree and attached the sawn off shotgun to her side with a piece of rope tied around her belly. Annie figured if she had to use it, she could pivot it and fire from her side. Before going to the wall, she set extra ammo on top of the backpack.

She peeked over the wall once more. There were still only five men out. She sat in the cleared path to prepare herself for what she was doing and why it had to be done.

Grandpa was dead. Will was dead. Her mother had probably been raped. Ellen was lying in a grave with Grandpa and Will. Missus Benson was half-naked, dead in a wagon.

The men who did the killing and raping were on the other side of the snow wall. They had her mother and she couldn’t get her back until they were dead.

Grandpa would say, “It’s time for us to get to work.” She felt he walked with her as she stood with rifle in hand and went to the wall. There were six men out now. She packed the snow tighter on top of the wall to use as a platform to steady her aim, figuring this batch of shooting would catch them by surprise. She decided the best thing would be to start with the man nearest a wagon and work it from there.

She removed the thick glove from her trigger hand and settled her elbows on her platform. Through the scope, the one nearest a wagon was too close to a woman to shoot. After a couple seconds, she moved away. Annie aimed for where his belly button would be and squeezed the trigger. Blood splattered the ground behind him and the bullet knocked him off his feet. Everyone at the camp froze in place and turned to where the sound came from. Annie aimed at the same spot on another man with the same result. The third man she shot at turned to run as she pulled the trigger. The bullet hit him in the side, but he went down anyway. She searched for a new target, but they were running for the wagons, even the women. Annie had to aim fast to shoot another man, hitting him in the thigh. He went down, but still managed to get behind a wagon before she could shoot him again. There were no more targets. She ducked and moved thirty feet to the left of her firing position.

The men were making a lot of noise. One of them was screaming with pain but the other one was cussing the person who had shot him. Annie was peeking through a hole when a burst of gunfire from the camp nearly made her pee herself. Little puffs of snow came out of the wall on both sides of her and the puffs continued to pass through in a line going away. She twisted her body from the hole and rolled into the nearest trench. Whoever was firing had their rifle set for automatic.

The automatic fire stopped, probably because his clip was empty, but other rifles were firing toward her. She risked a peek above the edge of the trench and saw sprays of snow puffing away from the wall each time a bullet passed through.

The strangest thing happened. While Annie was lying there, she heard a young girls’ voice say, “There’s somebody running at you.” Startled, she swiveled her head, eyes flitting from place to place. She didn’t see anybody and thought she had spoken out loud.

Her heart was pounding, a runaway horse in her chest. She knew she needed to leave the trench to see if anyone was coming towards her stand, but the thought terrified her. She was scared. She took deep breaths to slow her breathing and crawled from the trench to the nearest hole, trying not to notice the little jets of flying snow. There was a man running towards her and he was only a few yards away.

Annie slid back to slide the barrel of the rifle into the hole. Before she could aim, he moved out of sight. She knew he was going to come over the wall close to her. She let go of the rifle and barely had time to sit and grip the sawed-off shotgun before he exploded through. He was running so fast he went past without seeing her. He stopped ten feet away and turned, searching for whoever was shooting at them. Annie pulled the trigger on the shotgun and the birdshot blasted a wide pattern in his chest. The blast didn’t knock him down, his thick coat slowed the pellets, but it sure must of hurt because he dropped his rifle and jumped straight up in the air and came down screaming, “God fucking damn. God fucking damn.”

He was turning in circles, clawing at his chest with his hands. Annie fished for her pistol with hands made clumsy with thick terror. She shot him three more times, twice in the back and once more in the chest. As soon as he fell, she rolled back into the trench. It was quiet for a minute.

One of the men shouted, “Hey Mack, you alive?”

“Hell no he ain’t alive,” someone shouted an answer to him, “that wasn’t his rifle you heard.”

The renewed firing from the wagons was more intense and they continued shooting for a long time. One bullet came through the wall low and it kicked dirt over the edge of the trench. A man was still screaming for somebody to help him. Finally, the firing slowed and stopped.

Now she could hear the wounded man begging somebody named John to come help him. Another man shouted towards her.

“Why in the hell are you shooting at us mister?”

She didn’t answer him. She left the trench and crawled along the wall close to another trench before peeking through a hole. She didn’t see anyone out. They were hiding behind the four wagons. The wounded man called again for John to help him.

Another voice shouted out, “That’s my brother out there, you son of a bitch.”

The wounded man was the one shot in the side. There was a short trail of blood from where he’d tried to crawl towards the wagons. While Annie watched, he managed to use his legs to push himself another foot closer.

“What do you want mister?” the first voice shouted again.

“He wants our women,” someone else shouted back to him, answering the question for Annie.

“Is that what you want mister? We’ll give you some fucking women,” the first voice shouted again.

Annie was watching the wounded man push himself closer to the wagon he was headed for. She knew better than to answer the man. There was no way she could shout and make her voice sound like anything other than a girl.

A few minutes passed without anyone shouting. The wounded man called for John again.

“Did we get him?” Someone called out.

“How the hell would I know?” another man shouted back.

As before, Annie slid back from the hole to shoot through it. She took her time with the shot, breathing out slowly as she squeezed the trigger. The wounded man’s head, jerked, and blood exploded in a wide spray onto the snow behind it.

With a blood-curdling scream, a man came from behind a wagon running towards the stand of trees. Annie took her time shooting him too. He was so mad, he ran straight at her without dodging. The bullet hit him in the chest and he went facedown in the snow.

“You son of a bitch,” a man shouted, and the automatic started shooting again. Annie scurried towards her trench and as she rolled into it, she felt something hit her right leg like it was chopped by an axe. Pain ripped through her and her bladder released. She choked off a scream, clamping her jaws tight.

Blood was coming through the thick cloth above the knee of her suit. The men were still firing with no indication they were going to cease. Annie needed stop the bleeding, but the trench was too shallow and narrow to allow her to sit without the risk of being struck by a bullet. She used her knife to cut open the pants leg. It was hard, because the layers of cloth, with the blanket sewn between them, were very thick. To get at it, risky or not, her head and shoulders were above the edge of the trench. Crying wasn’t helping, but it was hard to stop. Her leg hurt ten times worse than the time she broke her wrist when it became twisted in the rope swing back in Spokane.

She cut at the cloth until she was able to push the pants leg down. The wound was three inches above the knee. The bullet went in from the back and the hole wasn’t bleeding much. The hole in the front was bigger and blood was pouring out. It didn’t hit the bone and she didn’t have what Grandpa called a squirter. A squirter is the worst kind because it meant an artery was cut and you could bleed out fast. Squirter or not, Annie thought there was enough blood to bleed out quick anyways. As she squirmed to get in a position to work on her leg, bullets were still coming through her wall. One went by so near she heard it zing past her ear. She was expecting to get shot any minute.

Once again, she heard the voice of a girl.

“Ain’t nobody coming killer girl.” Annie was too focused on dealing with her shot knee and her pain to consider who it could be speaking, but she accepted the words as true.

She cut a patch of cloth from inside the pants leg and removed the sling from the rifle. After stuffing the hole in the front of her leg with snow, she placed the cloth patch over the wound, wrapping the flat cord of the sling around it several times to keep it there, being carefulnot to wrap it too tight and tied the ends. Grandpa had told her the only time your tie something tight was when you have a squirter.

By the time she finished tying the bandage the men had stopped shooting. It took a minute to get the courage to leave the trench. She crawled to where the twenty-two was leaning against the tree and took the sling off it, then crawled to the pack and grabbed a box of ammo for the hunting rifle. Her knee sent pain to her brain each time it touched the ground, but she crawled to the right end of her insubstantial battlement and peeked through a hole.

No one was in sight by the wagons. Despite what the girl’s voice had told her, the entire time it took to fix her knee she had worried someone would try to sneak to her position while they were shooting. She used the sling from the twenty-two to tie the pants leg back in place to pad her wound and prevent her leg from freezing.

She ejected the magazine from the rifle to reload it. Several minutes passed before the men began shouting again. Five of the nine were dead. There were four men to deal with and one of them was wounded.

“Are you alive over there?”

Again, she didn’t answer.

“I’m talking to you, you bastard. You still alive?”

“You reckon he’s dead?” another man shouted.

“You asked me the same thing last time, stupid. Why don’t you go over there and see?”

“I ain’t stupid, Jacobs.”

Annie started when she heard the name, Jacobs. He was the one who caused this. He was the one who deceived them into believing he was the man sent to guide them to Heaven. Hate made her want to rush over and confront him, to shoot him, to see him die. She continued watching through the hole for movement, but they were being careful.

Suddenly, someone carrying a rifle stepped from behind one of the wagons. Annie almost shot him, but at the last moment realized it wasn’t one of the men. The blanket was wrong. The cowards had made a woman step out to get shot. The woman walked around the camp for a minute. Annie didn’t hear anything, but she must have been called, because she went back behind the wagon.

“I think we killed the bastard,” the voice belonging to Jacobs, shouted.

“Go over there and see!”

It was a long moment before Jacobs answered.

“Hell no, I’m sending one of the women.”

The same woman came from behind the wagon and began walking slowly towards the patch of trees. Annie waited until the woman was close and then moved to be near the point where she would come to her wall. When the woman arrived outside the wall, she leaned over to peer behind it. It was Sue Ann Benson. She saw Annie’s rifle pointed at her.

“Don’t say a word,” Annie whispered in the deepest voice she could, “come through the gap and act like you’re looking for me.”

Sue Ann came through the gap and walked around the patch of trees, pretending to search.

After a few seconds, Annie whispered coarsely. “Stop where you are and look at me. Keep your mouth shut.”

Sue Ann froze and stared at Annie. Annie could tell she didn’t recognize her because of how much the homemade mask covered her face.

“I want you to shout what I say,” Annie commanded, still trying to sound like a man. “Nod you head if you understand me.”

She nodded her head.

“Shout ‘there’s a dead man over here.’ Shout it like you mean it.”

“There’s a dead man over here.” Sue Ann shouted.

“Say, ‘he’s been shot through the mouth.’”

“He’s shot through the mouth.”

“You sure he’s dead?” Jacobs shouted back.

“Bend over like you’re checking a dead man on the ground.

When Sue Ann bent over, Annie whispered. “Shout ‘he’s dead.’”

“He’s dead.”

Again, Jacobs shouted back. “Are there anymore over there?”

“Say ‘I don’t see anybody else.’”

“I don’t see anybody else.”

“Look around you dumb bitch.”

“Do it and come back here before you say anything to him,” Annie ordered, still pointing the rifle at her.

Sue Ann did a good job of acting and returned to Annie’s position.

“Say ‘there ain’t nobody else.’”

“There ain’t nobody else here,” she shouted

“You can bring you stupid ass back.”

Sue Ann glanced towards Annie in desperation.

“Tell him you’re not coming back. Get in the hole over there and stay in it.”

She looked to where Annie pointed. “I ain’t coming back,” she shouted. She squatted and crawled into the trench.

Annie painfully moved to the other end of the wall, using her uninjured leg to crawl with and allowing her hurt leg to drag limply behind her, leaving a thin line of blood in the mix of sand and snow. While she was crawling, Jacobs shouted again.

“If I have to come get you girl, I’ll beat you till you can’t walk.”

Sue Ann stayed where she was. Annie observed the wagons through a hole. After a few minutes, some of the women came from behind the wagons and walked around. After a while, more women came out. A man came out with them. He stopped, fired two shots at the stand of trees and ducked back behind the wagon. Annie was glad Sue Ann didn’t scream when she heard the gunshots.

The man came in sight again and walked over to where the women had grouped around the fire site. He started giving orders because the women began setting wood for a fire. He turned towards the wagons.

“You can come out,” he shouted. ” We killed the bastard.”

The rest of the women came out, along with two men supporting the one who had been shot in the thigh. They helped him over to where the others had gathered and sat him close to the fire.

The man who first came out said something to two of the women and they began walking towards the trees. Annie knew the man had to be Jacobs, and he was sending them to get Sue Ann. She wanted to shoot Jacobs, but couldn’t because the women were in the line of fire if any shooting began. When they came through the gap, Annie repeated what she did with Sue Ann and had them get into the other two trenches.

Annie’s heart was bounding with joy. One of the women was her mother. Now it was time to finish the killing. As she watched through the hole in the wall, she experienced peaceful relief. Despite the throbbing of her knee, her spirit was soaring. Her mother was safe.

She watched the men with a much calmer mind, without impatience, waiting for them to be far enough from the women that she wouldn’t risk hitting one of them. Her knee hurt and her crotch was wet with piss, but she was going to finish this job.

The moment came. Two of the men began dragging one of the dead men towards the wagons. Jacobs walked away from the group to relieve himself. Annie knew the wounded man sitting by the fire wouldn’t be moving fast.

She stood and used the wall to steady her aim as she had before. Her first bullet tore through the back of one of the men who were dragging the body. She shifted her aim and shot at the other man’s chest. He ducked in reaction to his helper screaming and letting go of the body. The bullet entered his forehead, spraying a long pattern of blood on the snow behind him. She stood to target Jacobs, but he reacted quick, grabbed a woman to shield himself and moved towards the wagons, dragging her with him.

The wounded man was trying to hop towards the wagons too. Annie shot him and swung back to Jacobs, hoping something would happen to give her an opening to shoot. Before he reached the wagon, the woman he was using as a shield began to fight him, kicking at his legs and bashing her head back trying to hit him in the face. She connected with his nose and blood spouted out. The pain made him drop his rifle. Suddenly the women rushed Jacobs as a group and began kicking and hitting him. They forced him to the ground and kept on kicking and stomping him.

One woman ran to the fire and returned holding a long sharp stick. She shouldered a woman aside and stood straddling Jacobs, the stick raised high. She used her weight to bury the point into his chest.

After a long moment of silence one of the women shouted towards the trees.

“Are you going to kill us too mister?”

Annie didn’t answer. She called for the women in the trenches to get up, dropped her rifle to the ground and went through the gap, limping towards the wagons. She had to see for herself Jacobs was dead. Sue Ann and the two women joined her before she’d hobbled ten feet. One of the women put Annie’s left arm over her shoulder, her mom took her other arm, and they supported her to the wagons. None of them tried to talk to her. When they arrived where Jacobs was pinned to the ground, Annie saw he was still alive. She stood staring down at him.

“Help me,” he pled like a baby, his voice making the long stick poking from his chest, quiver. Annie pulled the pistol from her belly pouch and squatted beside him.

“I’m going to kill you Jacobs. You’re going to a place where maggots will eat your soul forever.” She placed the barrel of the pistol against his forehead. Her hate went into the squeezing of the trigger. She felt the bullet was her. She killed him.

One of the women called out, the man Annie had shot twice was still alive. Annie stood, the pain from her knee nearly robbing her sanity. She handed the pistol to a woman.

“Kill him,’ she commanded, “Condemn his soul before you do.”

Annie knew these women, but in her pained daze, there was only one she could give a name to. She searched the faces of the women to find her mother and staggered the few feet separating them, falling against her, looking up into her face, feeling like a child again.

“Momma,” she cried out. Her mother stared at the masked face in puzzlement turning to recognition.

“Annie!” Missus Higgins cried out, wrapping her arms tightly around her little girl’s shoulders. “It’s my Annie!”

“Momma,” Annie said once more. She heard a shot ring out before she fainted.

CHAPTER 5

Someone was attempting to feed Annie, pleading for her to wake up and swallow. She choked on liquid trying to slide down her throat, the coughing jarring her body, sending pain from the injured knee like a burning fire all inside her. She opened her eyes.

“Annie. Oh Annie, I was afraid you were dying.”

It was her mother. Annie tried to tell her she was okay, but her throat was dry and tight. All she managed was a croaking sound.

“She’s burning with fever,” another lady said. Annie couldn’t see who was speaking. “Try giving her some water a few drops at a time.”

Annie closed her eyes while her mother used a finger to wet the dry closed lips. She did it over and over. Annie wanted to tell her how good it felt but still couldn’t speak. The water trickled into her mouth and wet her tongue. She opened her mouth wider. Her mother poured a tiny to trickle past her lips. Her tongue felt swollen as she tried to move the water around. Annie nodded and opened her eyes again. She wanted more water. She saw she was on a lower bunk inside a wagon and it was cold.

“I need to sit.” Her voice still sounded like a croak, but at least she could make words. Her mother remained kneeling where she was, but the other lady, Annie saw it was Missus Ellers, pulled the padding from the upper bunk and hinged it up to fasten it out of the way. Missus Ellers and her mother shifted around so they could lift Annie’s shoulders. Missus Ellers was a large woman and it took some doing to get into position. Moving her made her knee hurt. She screamed and they stopped. Annie spoke when the waves of pain went away.

“Move me a little at a time and stop if I scream.”

Several screams later, she was sitting. Her mother put padding and pillows behind her back and rearranged the blankets.

“More water,” Annie requested. Her mother tried to put the cup to Annie’s lips but she took it from her hands. Her throat was dry. She could only sip tiny amounts until it was finally wet. She felt she had never been so dry in all her life. There came a time when she could speak normal.

“I need more water.”

“What you need girl, is to drink some of the warm broth your mothers been trying to feed you,” Missus Ellers replied. “You haven’t eaten in two days.”

“I ate last night,” Annie responded, correcting her.

“Girl, you’ve been out for two days. Now do what we say. You’re feverish and you need some broth in you before it gets cold.”

Annie took the cup from Missus Ellers. The broth was rich and meaty tasting.

“Is there more,” She asked, handing the empty cup to her mother. She felt better and would have tried to sit up further if her knee wasn’t throbbing.

Missus Ellers leaned over the tailgate of the wagon and shouted for Sue Ann. A moment later, she was at the wagon.

“Annie, you’re awake. How do you feel?”

“Like she’s been shot,” Missus Ellers answered for Annie. “Fill this with broth and hurry with it,” she ordered, passing the cup. “Annie’s not ready to be talking a bunch of nonsense.”

“My knee hurts, Mom.” Annie whispered to her mother while Missus Ellers was occupied with Sue Ann.

“It’s going to be okay as soon as the swelling goes down, Honey.”

“You need to tell your child the truth, Lori, she’s earned the right,” Missus Ellers, said, pushing herself back into the wagon.

“You’re high on the truth, you tell her,” Annie’s mother retorted angrily.”

“Take it easy Lori, I didn’t mean to come off disrespectful. If anything, I’ve more respect for you two than anybody alive. I’ll tell her if you want me to.”

“Go ahead,” Lori said, “but say it gentle.”

“There’s not much of a way to say it gentle but I’ll do my best. Annie, your knee is infected and it’s swollen and ugly. If blood poisoning sets in we’ll need to amputate it.”

It took Annie a moment to understand what Missus Ellers was saying. When she did, she gasped and looked at her mother.

“You can’t cut off my leg, I’ll be a cripple.”

“Easy baby. Easy.” Her mother took Annie’s hand and held it in hers. “It hasn’t come to that yet.”

Sue Ann arrived back at the wagon and handed Missus Ellers a steaming cup.

“Get me a handful of snow, Sue Ann. This girl needs to drink this now, not in an hour.”

The second helping of broth warmed Annie from the inside out. She pondered the situation while she was sipping. She didn’t want them to cut off her leg, the thought of it made her knee throb even more. What she needed was to be in a place where they could take care of her.

“We need to get to where we can be warm,” she told them.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Missus Ellers stated. “It’s been snowing off and on the entire time you were out. The snow’s close to five feet deep.”

“We can’t stay here, we’ll either freeze to death or starve,” Annie said, regaining a bit of the confidence she’d been experiencing ever since the killings back in Butte. “There’s a church meeting-house a half days walk from here. If we can get there, we’ll be safe for a long time. There’s enough food and fuel inside for months and the building is tight.”

“We could leave the wagons and ride the horses,” her mother stated. “It’s too late in the day to head out now, but we can be ready to ride first thing tomorrow.”

There was a commotion outside the wagon and they heard a girl yelling.

“Don’t touch me, don’t touch me, can’t catch me, can’t catch me.” A strange girl with wild eyes and tangled hair, yellow like straw, thrust her head into the wagon and pinned Annie with her eyes.

“You are still alive.”

Despite the constant pain of her wound, Annie’s face lit with a smile. “I know you... I mean I know your voice. You were talking to me in the trees.”

“You couldn’t see me though, could you? She asked. Her dancing eyes would be on Annie for a second, then shift to other places in the wagon, and jump to her again.

“You couldn’t see me ‘cause I made myself invisible. Nobody can see me iffen I don’t want them to.”

“No, I didn’t see you. Who are you?”

“I can’t say my name ‘cause it’s an injun name and I don’t speak injun. You can call me Yum.”

“Girl, is there something wrong with you? Missus Ellers asked, “You’re talking crazy.”

“Maybe it’s you talking crazy and you don’t know it,” she retorted. “You know why you can call me Yum?” she asked, dismissing Missus Ellers and looking at Annie with her twitchy eyes.

“No,” Annie answered, “why can I call you Yum?” She couldn’t help smiling. Yum was alive, like a wild animal, and it made her feel good to have her near.

“You can call me Yum ‘cause I say yum when I eat something tastes good. I’m glad you’re alive little killer girl, but I ain’t ate since you finished killing those men. I got a need in me to say Yum. Iffen it weren’t for hungering, I’d still be invisible.

Yum continued speaking, responding to their confused expressions. “The injuns gave me powers. I bet you don’t know I was sleeping in the warm room with you back at the big building either and I was in the other place when you found the snowshoes too. I put on the little pair and followed you on foot instead of flying. I been following you since you left the murder place in Butt Hole Montana.”

“You need to get away from this wagon girl, there’s something wrong with you.”

“Gert,” Annie’s mother admonished, addressing Missus Ellers, “I know your heart’s broke, but there’s no call to speak hard to her.”

“And you don’t have any right to—.”

Annie interrupted Missus Ellers’ angry reply, “Yum is my friend. She kept watch while I was fixing my leg.”

“I didn’t know, did I?” she replied sharply. She leaned out the back of the wagon, sort of accidently pushing Yum aside and called for Sue Ann.

“Take the girl over by the fire and feed her. Watch out she don’t bite you, she’s a strange one.”

“The only one I might bite around here, lady, is you,” Yum shouted back, as she left the tailgate to follow Sue Ann, “but I’d probably spit you out.”

“You’re nothing but trash,” Missus Ellers said harshly as she pushed back from the tailgate.

Missus Higgins was set rebuke Missus Ellers, but Annie squeezed her hand and shook her head.

“I know your family is dead Missus Ellers, but I—.”

“Shut up,” she demanded, meaner sounding than a wild boar cornered by a pack of dogs. “My husband is dead and my Ellen’s naked for the entire world—.”

Annie spoke. “She’s not, Missus Ellers. I dressed her and buried her close to my brother and Grandpa. I couldn’t bury all the people, but I wasn’t going to leave Ellen naked in the dirt.”

Missus Ellers knelt beside Annie, stunned by her words.

Annie continued speaking to her. She knew how deeply Missus Ellers had to be hurting. She was still hurting too.

“Once we get to the building, back to where all the food is, we can stay ‘till the snow melts and take the wagons to Butte and bury our folks.”

Missus Ellers was crying. “I know you had to take care of your own,” she managed through her tears, “but I’ll be blessing you for what you did.”

Annie reached for her hand and held it tight. “Ellen was my friend and I loved her like a sister. I spoke words after I buried her.”

As Annie was talking, her stomach lurched and bile rose in her throat. “Mom, I’m—.” she wasn’t able to finish her sentence. She leaned forward and spewed vomit onto her blankets.

Annie passed out. The next thing she aware of, was someone hurting her leg. She tried to scream, to tell them not to cut it off, but her throat was again too dry and her tongue was swollen more than it was before.

They weren’t cutting her leg off. They were tying her to a horse. There wasn’t any way for them to do it without hurting her. The sun burned Annie’s eyes when she tried to open them. Her mother noticed her eyelids twitching.

“I saw your eyes move. Don’t try to talk. The weather’s turned miserable cold. We’re going to find the meetinghouse. Your fever’s worse and we’re going to where we can take care of you.”

While they finished tying her to the horse, Annie worked her tongue around to moisten her mouth. She squinted through one eye to see where mother was. She was right beside her.

“Yum knows where to go,” Annie croaked.

“The wild child’s gone,” her mother replied.

“Call her and tell her I need help. She’ll come.”

The next time Annie woke they were hurting her again. She didn’t remain awake long enough to know why.

The next time she woke someone was hurting her worse than any thing she ever felt before, worse even than when she was first shot. She’d peed on herself again. She could feel the warm wetness of it. Annie knew they were cutting her leg off because they kept cutting and cutting. She began moving around, trying to get away from the knife.”

“You’re killing this girl. It’d be more merciful to cut it off and be done with it.” Missus Ellers said.

“The leg’s not rotten yet,” Annie heard her mother say. It sounded like she was far away. “Hold her still. There’s still dead meat.”

Annie felt someone grab her arms. Her mother kept cutting and cutting and she passed out again.

Annie woke and her mother was cutting at her knee again. Now she felt like she was burning hot inside and floating in syrup.

“It don’t make sense Lori, you can’t put chewed up muck in her leg. The crazy girl doesn’t know what she’s doing.”

“All I know is, she told me it would make my girl well, and I’m going to do it. She says the Indians told her what to do.”

“She doesn’t know any Indians. She says whatever insane thing comes into her mind. Annie’s going to die if you keep cutting on her like this. You can see the blood poison going up her thigh. She’s in high fever with the infection.”

“If she’s still alive when the poison lines get to her hip, I’ll let you do the cutting Gert, until then, her leg’s staying where it is. Hand me the bowl of medicine, I’ve cleaned as much as I can.”

“This isn’t medicine, it’s a bowl of spit filled chewed leaves.”

“You can help me or you can get the hell out of this room,” Annie’s mother said. “This is my little girl lying here and I do with her as I think best.” Annie could tell her mother was crying.

“I’m staying Lori. I’m sorry. I can’t stand her hurt like this. She’s sucked in and dried out. She could die any minute.”

“I can see as well as you, Gert, and you aren’t helping... Pull the edges together, I’m ready to stitch.”

The next time Annie woke nobody was cutting on her. It took a while to realize Yum was talking to her and it took even longer to understand what she was saying.

“Wake up fore you dies killer girl. They already make plans on where to bury you. You gots to hurry ‘fore the spirits come take you.”

Annie managed to move a little. She was hot and felt like she was on fire.

“You need this medicine the Indians gave me. You gots to drink it all.” Yum told her. She pulled Annie to a sitting position, demonstrating strength beyond her physical size. When she put a cup to Annie’s lips, Annie gasped at the vile smell and twisted her head away.

“I’m telling you killer girl, if you don’t drink this you’re going to die. I don’t lie. You drink it now before the fat butt lady finds out I snuck in here. Please killer girl.

She put the cup to Annie’s lips again. She drank all of it even though she gagged with each sip.

Yum was back again. Annie was still burning with fever. Yum had more of the vile medicine. Annie fought drinking it and kept turning her head away. Yum slapped her hard on the face and told Annie if she didn’t drink, she was going to hit her knee with her fist.

Yum was back again. Annie wasn’t feverish this time and was able to open her eyes.

“The spirits done gave your life back to you killer girl. You still got to drink your medicine.”

This time she didn’t resist. Grimacing, she drank it all. It wet her throat and Annie was able to speak, but her voice was weak.

“Is my leg gone?”

“No, the spirits didn’t want just your leg, they needed all of you.”

Annie didn’t say anything else. She lay there glad to be awake and not hurting.

“It’s time for you to pay,” Yum said.

“Pay what?” Annie asked, not understanding.

“You needs to pay for the Injun medicine what fed away the death spirits.”

“What pay?” She asked again, still weak but becoming more aware, more alive.

“They want your hair to make a power thing. They want some of the killer girls’ power, but you got to give it, I can’t take it.”

“Help me see my leg,” Annie requested, “If it’s still there they can have my hair and a finger too if they can use it.”

“Killer girl done gone crazy with the fever. The Injuns ain’t got no use for no fingers.”

Yum pulled the covers down and Annie saw her leg. It was shrunken and there was a bulky clean white bandage around where she had been shot, but it was the prettiest leg she ever saw.

“Is it dead,” She asked. I can’t feel it.”

“You ain’t moved it lately. Can you feel this?” Yum asked as she jabbed Annie’s leg below the knee with the scissors she was holding.

Annie felt it enough to scream. Within moments, the room began to fill with women. Missus Ellers spotted Yum and grabbed her by her ear.

“I told you to stay away from Annie.”

“Go to hell fat butt lady, go to hell fat butt lady,” Yum chanted like she was singing.

Annie’s mother rushed to her side while this was going on.

“Oh my beautiful...”

Annie shushed her with a finger to her lips. “Make her let go of Yum.”

“Gert, let loose of the girl,” Missus Higgins, demanded. “Let go right now.”

“I told this girl to...”

“Let go of her now!”

Missus Ellers released Yum’s ear. Yum made a beeline for the door, dodging around the women in her way.

“Don’t let her get away,” Annie rasped, as loud as she could. “I still need to pay.”

Sue Ann and Martha managed to grab Yum as she reached the door. She fought them all the way back to the bedside.

“Be still Yum,” Annie demanded, “Be calm. You’re to collect what’s owed and I’m ready to pay.”

“What are you saying Annie?” her mother asked, moving to sit in a chair beside her daughter and taking a hand to hold. “What are you paying for?”

“I owe the Indians for all the medicine Yum’s been making me drink. The medicine kept the death spirits from taking me.”

“Of all the nonsense I’ve ever heard!” Missus Ellers exclaimed.

“It’s not nonsense. Annie’s sitting here talking to me, and her leg’s still attached to her body,” Annie’s mother replied hotly. “How many times have you been in here girl?” she asked, addressing Yum.

“I’ve been in here thousands of heartbeats expecting fat butt lady to catch me.”

“Enough of an answer for me,” Lori said. “What do we owe you?”

“Not me, it’s the Injuns what’s owed. They had to travel far, in many ways, to get the magic what fed the death spirits till they was full and didn’t need killer girl anymore. They want me to bring them her hair.”

“All of it?”

“All of it,” Yum answered firmly, “and not one hair missing. I’ll need something to put it in what don’t leak and killer girl has to lick around the lid to seal it.”

“Oh my lord,” Missus Ellers uttered, “this is craziness.”

“Sue Ann,” Annie’s mother, called out, ignoring Missus Ellers. “Go to the kitchen and bring us some kind of clean container with a tight lid. Martha, find something we can use to put around Annie to catch the hair. Yum’s Indian friends are going to be paid in full.” She was still holding Annie’s hand.

“Are you up to this Annie?”

“I will be. I need water and I need something to eat, I’m starving.”

“Glory,” Missus Ellers exclaimed, glad to have a mission. “You sit where you are Lori. What this child needs is some of my special beef broth. Someone fetch Annie some water, I’ve got work to do in the kitchen.”

By the time, Missus Ellers returned with the broth, Yum had finished cutting Annie’s hair. Martha had found a large piece of black plastic film which she spread to catch any hair Yum dropped.

Sue Ann provided a stainless-steel thermos bottle. Yum inspected it by sniffing at it and sealing her mouth to the opening and blowing into it until her cheeks puffed like they were going to explode.

The hair was placed in it. Annie licked the screw threads all around the top of the bottle. Yum screwed the lid on, whooped three times and raced from the room with it. Annie ran her hand over her scalp. Her hair was cut short and felt like her grandfather’s face when he didn’t shave for three days.

After she drank the broth, Annie was tired. Her mother made everyone leave and sat with her daughter until she fell asleep.

CHAPTER 6

It took three days of stumbling around before Annie was able to walk any distance on her leg. It still hurt like there was a knife stuck in it. Missus Ellers predicted the pain would go away after a while, but it would hurt when it rained.

Yum hadn’t been back since she ran off with the hair. Missus Ellers was fit to be tied, “Those Indians she was running with probably scalped her, and serves her right too, damn foolish girl gallivanting all over the place.” Annie could tell she missed Yum.

On the forth day, they had a funeral. A party of women made an expedition to bring Missus Benson’s body from the abandoned wagon. Sue Ann and Martha insisted on digging their mother’s grave. The two girls were almost grownups. Sue Ann was sixteen. Martha was eighteen. Martha and Jim Roche were planning to marry when they arrived in Heaven. Jim lay among the dead in Butte.

Directly after lunch the entire group gathered at the burial plot behind the church. The snow on the ground had melted, reduced to patches visible in shaded areas and it was warm enough for a light jacket or thick sweater. Missus Bensons daughters picked a place for their mother off to the side of the area. They didn’t want her grave her confused with the rest.

She wasn’t buried in a coffin. A tradition developed in Spokane to let the dead return to the earth. Four women carried Missus Benson to the grave, and laid her gently into it. She was tightly wrapped in sheets from head to toe and no part of her was visible.

Sue Ann and Martha put the dirt over her, using their hands to place each pound. They cried while they did it... everyone cried. When they finished, they asked Annie to say some words for their mother. It took Annie a bit of time to think what to say. While she thought, the women stood with their heads bowed. She gathered her words and spoke.

“We’re sending a wonderful lady back to the earth. Her spirit will be free to travel. Let her go to a place she can call home, because she likes to keep house. Missus Benson loves her daughters and, when she came around anyone, they were all she would talk about. If there are any girls there who don’t have mothers with them, they should be with her. They can keep her company while she waits for her daughters to finish living and come join her. Any girls she watches over while she waits will be loved, because Missus Benson sure knows how.

Sue Ann and Martha thanked Annie and kissed her cheek, before running into the church, still crying.

The next day, two things happened. One filled Annie with joy, the other with anger.

The first happened right after lunch. Most of the women were outside tending to the horses. Annie was in her room with the door open and heard a loud shrill voice which could only belong to Yum. She limped from her room toward the kitchen. As she drew closer, she could hear Missus Ellers speaking cajolingly to Yum. Annie crept to where she could peek around the edge of the doorframe. Missus Ellers was sitting on a stool with her back towards Annie. There was a short metal food counter in front of her. Yum was walking back and forth on the other side of the counter chanting like she does sometimes.

“Fat butt lady can’t trap me. Fat butt lady can’t catch me.”

“You know you want some of this pie little girl. I baked it last night for you.”

“Fat butt lady tells lies. Fat butt lady playing trick with pie.”

Annie couldn’t see the pie in front of Missus Ellers, but Yum sure could. Each time she turned to march past the counter again her eyes didn’t shift from the spot where the pie must be.

“I’m not trying to trick you girl. The pie is all yours, but you have to pay for it.”

“Yum stopped marching and stood staring at the counter.

“What kind of pie is it?”

“It’s yummy, yum-yum, blueberry pie.” Missus Ellers cajoled in a sweet voice. “I put sugar on top. You know you want this pie.”

Yum started marching again.

“Yum ain’t no fool, it’s a Fat butt trap so’s she can pinch my ear again.”

“I’m sorry I pinched your ear. I thought you were crazy and I was afraid you were hurting Annie. I promise I won’t be mean to you again. I made it to show you I want to be your friend.”

Yum stopped again.

“Iffen you made it so’s we could be friends why I need to pay for it?”

“A gift is an obligation, but when you pay there’s no debt owing.”

Yum walked back and forth a few times without saying anything.

“What you want for pay?” She asked, stopping directly in front of Missus Ellers.

“I want you to let me work the tangles out of your beautiful hair so I can brush it.”

“Oh, now I sees your trick. You wants to get me where you can yank my hair.”

“No Yum, I want you to sit on a chair in front of me, and while I untangle your hair, I’m going to pretend you’re my daughter. You don’t believe I’d hurt my daughter do you?”

“Your girl’s dead,”

Annie heard the pain in Missus Ellers voice. “Yes she is.”

Yum started to move again but changed her mind.

“Iffen I lets you do my hair is the pie all mine?”

“Every bit of it.”

“I reckon you can, but if you hurt me, I’m going to grab the pie and run with it.”

“Fair enough,” Missus Ellers agreed, “but your hairs tangled, I’m bound to hurt you a little. You let me know if it does.”

Annie left the door and limped back towards her room, warm inside, and it wasn’t because of a fever.

Her room was the first door you came to when you leave the meeting room in front. She heard someone in the meeting room, crying. Martha was sitting alone on a pew with her face in her hands, sobbing. Annie hobbled over and sat on the pew in front of her.

“I know you miss your mom, but you shouldn’t cry all alone like this. You’ve got friends here.”

Martha lifted her head. “It’s not only my mother. I’m crying because there’s badness in me.”

Annie asked, confused, “You’re one of the sweetest, nicest people I know. What makes you say there’s badness in you?”

“I can’t tell. I can’t ever say it to nobody.”

“Martha, we’ve known each other all our lives. I know you, just like you do me.”

Martha’s pretty face was streaked with her tears, and she had been crying for a long time because the skin around her eyes was dark.

“This is something new I didn’t know I had. You’re only thirteen, you wouldn’t understand.”

“Maybe I would if I knew what’s upsetting you,” Annie said, “but if you don’t want to tell me, its okay, I’ll stay with you till you’re better.”

“I’m not going to be better,” Martha buried her face in her hands again.

Annie stood and limped around the end of the pew. Her leg was weakening and beginning to throb. She had to onto hold the back of the bench for support. She sat, wiggling her arm between Martha’s back and the bench to hold her.

“I’ll sit with you.” Annie knew what it felt to be alone with sadness. They sat quiet, Martha crying and shaking and Annie wishing she knew what to say and wishing her leg didn’t hurt. Finally, Martha sat straight, twisted around so Annie couldn’t see her face and began talking.

“I liked it. I liked what those men did to me.”

Annie didn’t know what to say. It didn’t matter because Martha kept on talking.

“I pretended I didn’t, and I would scream like I didn’t when the men were doing me, but it felt good and I knew it shouldn’t. The more I liked it, the more I screamed like I didn’t. I couldn’t let the other women know, not after all the terrible things those horrible men did. I thought if I screamed like I hated it they would leave me alone, but they didn’t. They did me more, like it was a game to see who could make me scream the worse.”

Annie still didn’t know what to say. Martha took the silence as rejection. She tried to use her back to move Annie’s arm from behind her and turned to her.

“Now you know why I’m bad,” she continued, angrily. “You can leave me alone now, I don’t need you here.”

Annie held on tighter. “I don’t know about sex stuff, but I know you aren’t bad.”

“But I liked what they were doing.”

Annie considered her response. Martha watched her face, expecting her to say something. Annie shook her head and put her finger to her lips. After another moment of thought, Annie spoke what was on her mind.

“I guess I don’t understand sex. Mom told me I would when I get older and my body changes, but maybe it was something natural in you liked them doing you. Sex is supposed to feel good. If it didn’t, people wouldn’t get married. Didn’t you think you and Jim would do it after you were married, and didn’t you think you would like it?”

“I know I would, but it’s not supposed to feel good with men like them.”

“You told me, even though you liked it, you screamed, hoping it would make them stop. You did all you could do to stop them. If you had fought them, they would’ve beaten you and still gotten what they wanted.”

“I did want them to stop.”

“Then there’s no badness in you. You can’t help what you body likes, no more than you can tell yourself to stop tasting your food. I’ll say this to you. Don’t tell anybody else. Such things should stay in your mind private.”

“You’re a good girl Annie. Thank you for coming to talk to me. I’m not a bad girl... I know I’m not, but my mind was all twisted.”

“It’s easy to get twisted. I was all twisted up when I was following the wagons. All I thought of was killing those men. I was full of hate, and my mind was full of bile.”

“I couldn’t believe it was you doing all the shooting. Us women thought maybe one of the men they shot back in Butte didn’t die. So did Jacobs.”

“If it had been a man, he would know better than to build a wall of snow to hide from bullets,” Annie told her. “Did Jacobs say where they were taking you all?”

“I heard Jacobs and another man talking. They were taking us to somewhere near Salt Lake City down in Utah. They were happy they had so many women and horses to bring back with them. There’s a gang down there they belong to and I guess there weren’t enough women or horses to go around. Jacobs said it was a shame the only thing worth a damn now days are women, horses and food. He bragged there was a place called Wall Street where he controlled money, and women were a dime a dozen, but now they’re worth more than gold.”

“I guess they must have other women down there they stole,” Annie conjectured. “Those are some sure evil men. It makes me wonder how many people the gang killed to get women. They’re not just killers, they’re baby killers!”

“The gang has lots more women they own. Jacobs and the other men were always talking filth. Bill Knight, the boss of the gang down in Utah, is the one who sent Jacobs and the gang to kidnap us. Bill Knight likes torturing people too,” Martha added. “They thought it was funny that they hurt the real Mister Henry, the man who was supposed to guide us to Heaven. They made him tell where to find us in Washington.”

“How did they catch Mister Henry?” Annie asked.

“They heard him on the radio say he would be refueling at a military base in Utah. Knight and his men ambushed them when they landed the plane. After they figured out which one of them was Henry, they killed the rest.”

“That’s why Jacobs was a month late coming to us. Probably none of them knew how to fly the plane,” Annie surmised. “He told us his plane crashed and he was the only one lived.

“Jacobs was evil. I was glad you put a bullet in his head. You’re something else Annie Higgins. You’re the bravest person in the world.”

“And maybe I’m the dumbest too. I was real lucky not to get killed doing what I was doing, but I wanted my mother back.”

“Like I need to know I’m not a bad girl, you need to know you’re brave. Thank you Annie, besides being brave, you’re smart too.

Annie left. Martha wanted to be alone awhile longer. Annie needed to be alone too. She couldn’t get her mind off the other women the gang had captive in Utah. She thought of poor Mister Henry too, and how it must hurt to be tortured.

Pain from her leg was jabbing her brain something terrible, but she couldn’t resist a peek into the kitchen before she went to lie down. Missus Ellers was still in there. She had Yum in her lap, rocking her back and forth and singing a lullaby. Yum was sound asleep. The pie was on the table, untouched.

CHAPTER 7

Things settled in smooth for the next few days at the church and the weather turned much warmer. Annie still had a room to herself, even though there was no need for it now. She wished her knee would get better. It was still too tender to touch. Her mother had checked to see if it was festering again. Annie was happy when her mom decided it wasn’t. Just the thought of her digging around with a knife made Annie cringe.

Yum disappeared again not too long after the funeral. Missus Ellers was fit to be tied, worrying about Yum and constantly going to the front windows to see if she could see her. Annie thought it sure was funny how a person can be one way and suddenly be another. To hear Missus Ellers tell it, she always loved Yum.

Now the snow was gone, they were on their way to where Annie killed the outlaws, to bring the wagons back to the church. The horses were skittish from not being ridden, but after a few miles, they settled down.

Sue Ann and another lady stayed at the church keeping it warm until they returned. Annie’s mother tried to make her stay behind too, but Annie was itching to do something. Now, when the horse would step wrong and jar her leg, she wished she had listened to her.

They saw Yum at the wagons. She was on top of one, marching back and forth the way she does. Occasionally, she raised her hands to the sky and shook them as though she had the palsy. She climbed down as the women rode in. Her yellow hair was as messy as before Missus Ellers brushed it and she was just as wild, marching back and forth in front of us after we dismounted.

“Yum waits two days and the killer girl don’t come. Injuns tell me to be here, wait here. They don’t tell Yum she be here two days gittin’ froze-butt sitting in a damn wagon.

Missus Ellers went to her, trying to calm her down, but Yum danced away.

“Ain’t got no time for fat mama lady, I gots to talk to killer girl now, great talk from the Injuns. Come on killer girl, you come talk to me now so’s I can get mama lady to feed me. Yum ain’t had no yum for two days.”

Annie followed Yum away from the others, trying not to see the sun-warmed bloated corpses of the dead men. Yum led her behind one of the wagons and squatted, motioning for Annie to join her. When Annie told her she couldn’t bend her knee, Yum, stood and started to speak, but changed her mind and darted back to the end of the wagon.

“Don’t none of you others come over here, this is a special talking just for killer girl,” she shouted to the women and danced back over to where Annie stood.

“I wish you’d sit down. I talk better when I sit.”

“If you don’t mind how long it takes, I’ll sit down,” Annie told her.

“No, I needs to tell you now so’s I tell it all. I been here two days repeating things over and over so the pieces don’t fall away and now you’re here they wants to go worse’n ever.”

“I’m here now, Yum, tell me what the Indians say.”

“First thing ain’t got no telling to do, first thing’s got to do with touching. You needs to pull down your pants so I can touch your sore place with the magic, nothing-something, folded in here.” Yum spoke the words as though they made sense, pulling a small square of soft folded leather from somewhere within her layers of ragged clothing and urged impatiently. “Hurry killer girl and pull down your pants.”

Annie did what she asked. She was wearing two pairs of pants and long underwear over her panties. Yum danced with impatience during the time it took to get the shot-up knee exposed. The wounded place above it was an angry inflamed dent where the bullet blew out meat. Her mother had cut away even more, ridding it of dead flesh.

As soon as the wound was exposed, Yum squatted beside Annie, and carefully unfolded the leather square. There was nothing on the leather Annie could see.

“Look, look, killer girl, it’s what I told you. It’s full of nothing-something. I gots to touch it to your sore, you be real still so’s I do this right.”

Annie steeled herself for the pain she was expecting, but when Yum laid the piece of leather against her flesh, it was done softly and she barely felt it touch. What she didn’t expect was the voice booming out of Yum. She spoke with the deep voice of a grown man, and it was loud.

“Go to her, you cannot refuse. In the name of Haven’s Jake, I command you to make this human healthy and keep her healthy for all eternity.”

Women came rushing around the end of the wagon, some with rifles and some with pistols, and all of them ready to kill. They stopped in confusion, eyes searching for the man they’d heard speaking. All they saw was Annie standing with her pants down and Yum squatting beside her. Yum jumped up.

“I told you not to come, I told you not to come. This is private Injun thing. Go away now. Go away now. I still gots to talk.”

“What’s going on Annie?” her mother asked. “We heard a man back here.”

“All you heard was Yum sounding like a man,” Annie told her. “You need to go away like she says.”

“You needs to go fast before I forgets things.” Yum was agitated. She began making pushing motions with her hands, not touching anyone, but making clear they needed to leave in a hurry. When they were gone, she spoke to Annie.

“Did I say the words when I touched you?”

“Yes you did. What was it you touched me with?”

“The leather was covered with invisible little nothing-somethings to make you fit to do the things you are going to do.”

“What things, Yum?”

“Some things now and some things later, and some things you won’t know to do until you know to do them.”

Yum pulled something black from the folds of her clothing, and began dancing and jumping hysterically.

“I don’t wants to say it. I don’t wants to say it. I don’t want to say the nasty thing.”

Annie reached out to hold her still, but she spun away.

“Killer girl needs to tell me to say it or I won’t say it. I don’t want to say it.”

“What ever it is you need to say, say it to me now,” Annie demanded. “And stop dancing around.”

The demand put an instant stop on Yum’s movements. She froze in place, staring blankly at nothing and began to speak with the voice again.

“You must cut off the heads of the men you killed. Put the heads in the bag. Do not touch them with your bare hands. You will know the purpose for this. Do not turn from this vileness, for the vileness of your enemies will give you strength. Allow none of their body fluids to touch you. After you leave this place, go directly to your loved ones where the killing began. We covered them deep with the snow. It is melting. Already time grows short. When the flesh is gone from their bones, it will be too late to guide their spirits to where you want them to go. Bury your loved ones.

“Annie Higgins, you must follow the desires of your heart, not of your mind. When the time comes, you will know your path. We sent you the power of Haven. Even now, it is inside you. This we do because you are a child of the Earth. Be strong and stand straight. Do not bend with the weight of those you must carry. Lift your burden high and rejoice you are chosen.”

Yum unfroze and stood shuddering.

“I’m not going to watch. Nasty, nasty things I said to do. Now Yum gets yum. Yum goes to my fat mama. I love you killer girl, but this you gots to do is nasty, nasty.”

Yum danced away, leaving Annie standing there with her pants down. She bent and examined her wound. It was as angry as always. She did not know what she expected to see, but Yum claimed the leather was full of magic. Annie retrieved it from where Yum had dropped it on the sand. She examined it and smelled it, but couldn’t tell there was anything special on it. She pulled her pants up and gathered the plastic Yum had dropped. It was a large bag made from thick, strong plastic and in good condition like plastic is when it’s never been in the sunlight.

Annie remembered the voice she had heard coming from Yum. It didn’t cross her mind the words were Yum’s. It was magic. Grandpa would have scoffed at such a notion, and she would too, if not for Yum. Yum was guileless. The only thing left was actual magic. The only magic she had ever heard of was rumors concerning Heaven. The voice had invoked the name of Jake, one of the founders of Heaven.

Annie considered what the voice told her to do. She did not think Grandpa would say, “You have a job to do, the best thing is to get it done.” She thought he would say “Yuck.” It was up to her to tell herself she had a job to do.

As she went around the corner of the wagon, she almost jumped out of her skin. Martha was running towards her with an axe in her hands. She stopped when she saw Annie and waited for her to get close.

“I heard what the voice told you. I’m going to do the cutting off part, and you can put them in the bag. The voice didn’t say you had to do the cutting.”

Annie wasn’t going to disagree with her. “Are you sure you can do it?” she asked.

“I’m going to do it because of what I told you. It won’t be any harder than splitting firewood and I’ve split my share of it every fall.”

The bodies were already stinking. The smell close to them was gagging foul. The two girls couldn’t help making puking sounds. They backed away from the bodies to rethink what they were doing. The other women were ignoring them. They were hitching the horses to the wagons and made a point not too glance their way. Yum and Missus Ellers weren’t to be seen. Annie guessed Missus Ellers had her in a wagon feeding her.

“We should put something over our faces to keep us from smelling them,” Martha suggested. “I can chop their heads off, but I need to get past the stink first.”

They used washcloths as masks. Annie’s mother saw what they were doing, came over with a turpentine bucket, and used a stick to smear dabs of the strong pinesap on their masks. She brought rags for Annie to handle the heads. Martha and Annie went back to the bodies, starting with the one Annie shot in the trees.

“We’ve need to do this nine times,” Martha stated. “Let’s break it in stages. First, we go from body to body. You stretch the man’s head out to give me a clean chop and get out of the way so nothing splatters on you.”

Martha had a sure stroke with the axe and each head was severed from its body with a single swing of the axe. The bodies were already putrefied and Annie had to grip each side of the head to move them straight for her to chop. The skin wanted to rip and peel off. Even with the masks and strong smelling pinesap, some of the smell came through anyway. They did it nine times and hurried from the bodies.

They waited until they were sure they weren’t going to puke and went back for the heads. Martha held the bag open and they went from body to body as Annie picked up heads and dropped them into the bag.

They managed six before the skin on one of the heads peeled loose and left Annie holding a handful of face and scalp with the skull hanging below it. Martha dropped the bag and ran from the area. Annie followed her, and when Martha stopped, she tore the mask off and puked along side her. It seemed like forever before they felt able to bag the last three. They dragged the bag from the bodies and tied it closed with a piece of wire.

Annie had to sit. Her leg was burning like there was a hot coal stuck in the scar. It was itching and it was all she could do not to pull down her pants and dig at it with her fingernails. She called for her mother and asked her to get someone to help put the bag in a wagon.

After the heads were loaded, her mother and some of the other women helped Annie into a wagon and they went back to the church. They were there only long enough to load on more supplies for the trip to Butte.

CHAPTER 8

Two days travel brought them to Butte. They left the church in three wagons but one had a wheel come apart and they had to leave it behind. Counting the Ellers wagon, two wagons were stranded on the road. Losing a wagon made the remaining wagons tightly packed, because this time they didn’t leave anyone behind at the church. Burying their kinfolk and friends was a job for all of them. Annie thought it could sure get uncomfortable and stinky with twenty-two people packed in only two wagons. To make it worse, the crippled wagon held most of their supplies and those had to be packed in with them.

Annie’s mother made a place for her under a lower bunk where she could lay out of the way. It was tight under there, but at least no one would be bumping her knee.

She was in misery. Her leg itched more and more after Yum put the piece of leather against her wound. Her mother had to tie rags around Annie’s hands at night to keep her from digging at it. She put a bulky wide bandage on the knee for the same reason. Along with the itching, came hunger. She had never been so hungry in her life. As soon as she ate, she would be starving again. She thought it was the something-nothings Yum had put on her causing the itching and the hunger

Early on the morning of the third day, they arrived back at the caravan in Butte. The sky was overcast with the cloud cover hanging low and dark. The gloom made their old campsite in the Walmart parking lot appear the sad place it was. Annie thought the day was perfect for what they needed to do. If the sun had been bright and the day beautiful, it would have been harder to face the dead. They stopped the wagons a short distance from the caravan and stood in a tight group trying to get themselves ready. The bodies, visible from where they were standing, still had low mounds of snow on them. Yum wasn’t anywhere in sight. Finally Missus Ellers said, “I’m going to tend to my husband,” and walked towards the wagons. Others followed her. Annie took her mother’s hand and led her to the little patch of trees where she had buried Will and Grandpa. They stood at the mound of dirt covering them. Annie felt a desperate longing to speak with Grandpa again, wishing they were back in Spokane where they were all still together. She would love one more day of exploring with Will.

Yum came while they were grieving. She came gently without her usual whirlwind of movement and chatter. She stood quietly across the gravesite from them, and waited to be noticed.

Annie bent to touch the earth over her loved ones. Her knee wasn’t hurting anymore, and even the irritating itch was going away.

“I miss you Will. Grandpa, you are inside of me. You’ll never be dead in my mind.” She stood and gave Yum her attention.

“Do you need me Yum?”

“I don’t, but the Injun man does. He wants to talk to you before you leave this place.”

Annie glanced toward her mother. Her mother spoke without looking up from the grave.

“You two go. I’ve some things to say to Will I didn’t say to him while he was with us and some apologizing to do to Dad. I was hard on him after the dogs killed your father and there’re some things I need to apologize for.”

Yum led Annie from the Walmart and out of the city until they came to a place where the ground was dug out. The skeletons of huge machines surrounded a vast pit. Close by the edge of the hole, a man was sitting next to a small fire. He heard them coming and turned to watch as they approached. He was dressed in regular jeans and had on a plaid jacket like one Annie had seen in the Walmart hanging on a rack. His hair was reddish brown as was his short-cropped beard.

“It’s great to finally meet you in person, Annie. Grab some dirt and sit by the fire. I know it’s not very cold, but a fire does more than warm the body, it warms the spirit.” His voice was rich in tones. Annie recognized it as the deep voice Yum had used.

She sat on the ground on the opposite side of the fire facing. Yum began pacing back and forth, impatiently, like she had somewhere to go.”

“Sit down Little Bird and listen. There are words you need to hear.”

Yum did as he asked.

The Chief turned to Annie with a smile on his face. “Little Bird is the name we gave her. Yum is a fun name she uses to disarm those who might wish her harm. She’s so full of life, and the spirit of the Earth, she can’t keep still. She is a beautiful person.

“I know she is, Annie replied, “I love her like a sister.”

Yum spoke. “I am your sister, and I’m Chief Knows It All’s sister too. I’m a sister to anyone who don’t hurt people. Chief Knows It all should know how much he’s hurtin’ me, making me sit here gittin’ cold butt from the ground.”

“I’m sure you’ve noticed our Little Bird is rather given to expressing herself dramatically, and may I say,” giving her a sharp tone, “sometimes impolitely.”

“You needs to shut up, know it all, Knows It All. You need to get to your business ‘fore we dies of old age. I’m feeling a dance coming and my feet are going to start moving no matter what.”

“You don’t look like an Indian,” Annie said, addressing the Chief.

“What should an Indian look like, Annie?”

“In pictures we had in our school books Indians had black hair and they didn’t have hair on their faces and chest like you do. I guess I was expecting you to be half naked with eagle feathers in your hair.”

Chief Knows It All, laughed. “Those must have been some old pictures. The truth is, before the nano plague, there were approximately a million Native Americans alive in the forty-eight states. Contrary to those pictures, you would’ve had a hard time telling a Native American from the general population. Many were business owners, college professors, soldiers, you name it. Even the ones who lived on the reservations dressed in regular clothing. After the plague, there were less than two thousand full blooded Indians left alive, and those few are scattered all over, in every state.”

“But your hair’s not black.”

“I’m only one quarter Indian. Some members of our tribe have no Native American blood at all. With our tribe, it’s the way we live, not our actual bloodline. We’re the new Native Americans.”

Yum couldn’t take it any longer. She sprang to her feet, jumped and twirled for three seconds, then sat, glaring at Chief Knows It All, daring him to reproach her. He simply smiled, He had a kind, gentle face and Annie could tell he adored Little Bird.

“It won’t be much longer. If you want, you can run to the rock and back,” he suggested, pointing to a large stone a hundred yards from where they were sitting. Maybe it will burn off some of your energy.”

Little Bird leaped to her feet and bounded away, spinning and leaping as she went.

The Chief watched her for a moment before turning his attention back to Annie.

“Her birth name is Priscilla Echols. We were traveling the Interstate 25 near Cheyenne, Wyoming two summers ago. We heard an explosion on the road ahead of us. When we arrived at the source, we found a pickup truck engulfed in flames. The spare gas they were carrying somehow ignited. We didn’t believe anyone could be alive in the cab of the truck, but Priscilla began screaming. Several of us were severely burned pulling her out. The only reason she didn’t die was her mother and father covered her with their bodies.

“It could have been chance, but we prefer to believe they were trying to protect her, nonetheless, she was burned beyond recognition, like a roast coming from the oven. The meat was cooked from her bones and—,” the Chief, grimaced and turned his face from Annie for a moment. “Please forgive me,” turning back to her. “I was lost in the horror… I guess the main thing is, the top of her head had been exposed to the heat and a large portion of her brain was destroyed.”

Annie pictured what he’d described. “Oh, the poor little girl. Why isn’t she scarred?”

“Now we come to the gist of why you’re here. There are tiny particles on the earth. They’re microscopic and you can’t see them unless millions are clustered together. These particles are not native to our planet. They are alien invaders. The people in Georgia, the ones in Haven, call them nanos. Nanos is a short term for nanobots. Nanos are extremely tiny machines with almost magical properties. As you probably know, the nano’s caused the plague and took apart our cities and other large structures. Jake of Haven has declared war on them with the intent of driving them from our world. I’m not sure if his is the wisest course or even if it’s possible. Still, from what I understand, Jake, along with the other Guardians of Haven worked out some sort of deal with them.

“We, of the tribe, live in harmony with the nanos, just as we do with all of nature. We pleaded to them to help Little Bird. We asked them to restore her body so she could once again soar like the eagle and be one with them and with the earth. The nano’s took our plea and ran with it. As you can tell, not all of her mind-functions are complete and many of her memories are gone. She does not remember being anything but Little Bird. Her body and mind are mostly composed of nano particles imposed throughout her.”

“Can she fly like she says and make herself invisible?”

“She doesn’t actually fly, it’s more like, but not exactly like, teleportation, being here and being there without having to travel the space in between. It is a manipulation of time. For her, time passes at a normal rate, but to the observer her movement is instantaneous. It’s nano science. The invisible part is nano science also and yes, she can disappear at will.”

“What does all this have to do with me?” Annie asked. “Did you put those nano things in me when Yum, I mean, Little Bird, touched me with the leather?”

“Yes I did. I know I was taking a liberty, but our Shaman foresees you achieving a great deed. In a vision, he foresaw the massacre of your people here in Butte. Our tribe was moving within an hour of his vision but we had far to travel and arrived hours too late. When we realized you were alive, the Shaman made us stay quiet and observe you. We watched you bury your grandfather and your brother. We witnessed your thoughtfulness in burying the desecrated young woman. We heard the words you spoke over their bodies. We heard the vow you made to rescue the women of your tribe and to avenge the murders of the men and babies.

“The Shaman would not let us come to your aid. He saw you would prevail in your quest. Of course Little Bird couldn’t resist being right there with you the entire time, just in case you did need some help. She does what ever pleases her. Even if we had the least desire to control her, how do you control a spirit with the ability to fly and disappear at will?

“Annie, our Shaman sees you are to embark on another quest and this time he wants you to possess some protection. Unlike what they did for Little Bird, the nano’s do not give you any obvious special powers. After they’ve been inside you a few days, your health will improve dramatically. You won’t have super powers, but they will keep your body in perfect condition and aid in healing your wounds faster. Your senses will be sharper, your physical abilities will be enhanced and your stamina will be through the roof.

“You will continue to age, but only to the point the nano’s consider to be optimal. For a woman this is about eighteen, maybe a few years more or less. Your leg is healed. If you don’t want the nanos in you, I can command them to leave your body.”

“Maybe…,” Annie started to say before realizing she didn’t know what to say. The Chief could call it science all he wanted, but it sounded like magic to her.

“Before I answer, what is this new quest your Shaman sees?” Annie asked.

“You already know, but it goes beyond the rescuing of more women. The Shaman sees something involving a large number of people, but his vision is fuzzy. You are on your way to Salt Lake City and he can’t see if you are successful in your quest. He knows you will affect the lives of many along the way.”

Annie saw, yet didn’t see, Yum appear behind the Chief. It was like she wasn’t there, but had been there for quite a while, like time was working funny. Yum reached out, tapped the Chief sharply on his shoulder, and let out a whoop. The poor Chief was so startled, Annie was amazed he didn’t mess his pants.

“Damn,” he exclaimed, “you need to stop with your practical jokes.”

“And you need to tell me why I gots to be here. I could be where my fat mama is and be gittin’ some yum and some loving. After I finishes my yum, I gots to go down the road to let the people know Killer Girl’s coming so’s they can be ready. I done listened enough. I gets to fly and I gets to spread the news. ‘There’s new law coming to town, ‘cause Killer Girls coming around.’”

They watched Little Bird dance away, spinning and turning, and chanting until she was out of sight.

Annie laughed. “I hope your Shaman took her into account,”

“I was going to say the same thing,” the Chief agreed.

“How did you get your name,” Annie asked.

“My name is not Chief Knows It All. Little Bird invented that name. For the moment, I am the Chief. A new one is selected yearly. We drop our given names when we join the tribe. I am called Teacher.

“I taught a course in ancient native customs at a university. As you can imagine, I know how people survived and lived as primitives. Joining the tribe was a no-brainer. The American natives weren’t perfect. They had wars and territorial disputes like other cultures, but they weren’t driven to dominate their environment, but rather to live in harmony with it.

“Jake of Haven gave us special permission to form our culture apart from the rest of humanity as long as we don’t develop a separate language or expand our numbers beyond a certain size and we give our children the option to join the main society developed by Haven.”

Annie grinned and chuckled, “You gave a lot of answer to a small question. I’ll call you Chief Knows it All, I like the way it sounds when I say it.”

The Chief chuckled in agreement, “I am becoming accustomed to the name. Even other members of the tribe sometimes use it.”

“I know where I’m going from here,” Annie said, “and I’m going to get an earful of ‘no you’re not’, from my mom. I reckon I’ll keep the nano things in me and see how they do. If you don’t need me anymore, I should go help with the burying.”

“I will walk with you. The other members of my tribe are there with your people. I too must give aid.” Chief Knows It All, rose, and extended his hand to help her to her feet.

“Annie,” he put both hands on her shoulders and gazed into her eyes, “when I see you, and now touch you, I realize how young and little you are. I am amazed and troubled this load has been placed on your shoulders. The road we travel in life is the record we will leave behind us. The road ahead of you is thousands of miles long. No matter what direction you choose, or what course corrections you make, always be positive you’re following what your spirit tells you to do.”

He gazed upon Annie for another long moment. He gave her shoulders a gentle squeeze before dropping his hands. “I will go with you to your people and explain to them, the path of my tribe will be the same as theirs as far as Cheyenne, Wyoming. We will protect them until then.”

*

The women wrapped the dead in sheets from the Walmart and took them to a cemetery the Chief led them to. Even though the tribe members helped, and the bodies were buried shallow, evening was near by the time they arrived back at the Walmart. The women hurried to get a meal ready and insisted on feeding the chief and the twenty members of his tribe who were with him. He agreed they could share the one meal with them, but in the future, they would provide for themselves. The Chief, along with Sue Ann and Martha, ate with Annie and her mother. The rest of his tribe were scattered among the other women’s tables. While they were eating, Annie told her mother she was going down Interstate 15 to Salt Lake City and would meet with them in Cheyenne. Saying she wouldn’t be traveling with the caravan was bad enough, but when Annie told her why, Annie’s mother went a little crazy. Annie received her earful of “No you’re not,” and a whole lot more. For a while, it seemed the Chief should run away before she scalped him. She conceived the notion he put the foolishness in her daughter’s head.

“Over my dead body,” she shouted. She was on her feet and rip roaring mad. “I just finished saying goodbye to all my family, excepting you, and now you say you’re going to Salt Lake City by yourself to free a bunch of women without the gumption to do for themselves. You’ll get yourself killed down there... if you don’t die on the way.”

“I’m going, Mom. I made up my mind as soon as Martha told me they have other women they use as slaves.”

“They’ve been slaves for a while already. They can wait for a proper rescue party. It’s not a job for a thirteen year old girl.”

Annie leaped to her feet. “It wasn’t a job for a thirteen year old to be chasing after you all either, but I came anyways. Now there are other women in the same fix down in Salt Lake City and there is no one coming to save them. Some of those women there’re using are as young as me.”

“I heard Jacobs talking, and one of the girls is only ten, but they’re not doing her yet. Jacobs said Knight has a rule they have to be at least thirteen.” Martha interjected.

“You need to shut up, Martha,” Missus Higgins shouted. Annie is not going.” She reached out, pulled Annie tight in a hug, and burst into tears. “I can’t lose you too.”

Annie returned the hug and patted her mother’s back in an effort to calm her. “I have to go Mom,” she whispered. “The Shaman saw it in a vision.”

Missus Higgins pushed her daughter away and rounded on the Chief.

“If you and your Shaman are set the women down there need saving, why don’t you take your men and do it yourselves? How dare you put this stupidity in my child’s head?”

The Chief was unperturbed by her anger. He answered her in a calm voice.

“Our path is to guard you and your wagons as far as Cheyenne. Our women and children are there, with only a few old men and boys, to protect them. Annie’s path was decided by her before we arrived. We took steps to protect her on this journey, but it is her journey, not ours.”

“That’s the biggest crock of... Shamans, and journeys and paths. The only path she’s going to follow is right beside me all the way to Georgia. We can let the Guardians of Heaven know what Knight’s doing and they can send somebody... For that matter, why can’t they send buses or trucks to get us right here? ”

“They don’t have enough modified vehicles or fuel to handle the load,” the Chief responded to her question. “Haven’s resources are stretched thin dealing with emergency situations even more dire than yours. We spoke on our radio and they asked us to escort your wagons as far as Cheyenne where our camp is. They will know if the resources will be available after we arrive, if not you will be on your own.”

Annie raised her hand to get their attention.

“Mom, I know this is hard, and what I’m going to say is hard, but I’m going down the fifteen, with or without your blessing. If I can save those women one less day of suffering, I won’t be able to like myself if I don’t.

Missus Higgins face was racked with the pain of her emotion. “Please don’t do this Annie, you’re all I have left,” she begged.

“I’m going Mom. I’m afraid of going, but I’m going. I’m filled with anger burning inside me. Jacobs was sent by the gang leader in Utah. I‘ll free the women and make Bill Knight and his men pay for what they did to Grandpa, and Will, and Ellen, and all the rest.” Annie gasped for breath and tears burst from her face as it twisted into a mask of pain. “They killed Grandpa and they killed my brother.”

Missus Higgins continued to plead, but Annie remained firm in her commitment. In the end, all Annie’s mother could do was accept it.

It took ten days to get the wagon train ready to roll. The wagons with broken wheels were repaired and brought back to Butte. Thanks to Annie’s grandfather, one wagon had been outfitted as a rolling workshop and stocked with repair parts, including spare wheels. They stopped by the church and loaded on supplies to replace those consumed by the delay.

The supplies were distributed to all the wagons. The Bensons wagon would function as a supply wagon only. Sue Ann and Martha could barely bring themselves to go near it, much less ride in it. They would travel with Annie’s mother.

The Chief took Annie aside for one more talk the day before the Caravan moved out. He led her to the grove of trees and they sat beside the graves of the ones she’d held dear. Annie sat staring at the graves of Will and Grandpa as tears flowed down her cheeks.

The Chief kept his silence. Annie dried her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater and turned her attention to him.

“What did Yum mean, or rather you, since it was your voice she used when she put those nano things on me, “For all eternity?”

The Chief assumed a thoughtful visage before responding.

“The nanos inside you are will be with you as long as you wish them to be. I told you, you won’t age past a certain point. Consider the aspects.”

“I did. If I don’t age and the nano things keep me in perfect health, I guess the only way I can die is from a serious accident or I get killed.”

Again, the Chief took a moment to respond.

“Annie, it goes deeper. Even if you die, it will depend on how dead you are. The nanos will know you thoroughly, every thought, every memory. If you die, they will repair you and bring you back to life. If you are totally destroyed, say in an explosion, they may simply rebuild you from scratch.”

Annie let his words sink in. “Would I still be me? Doesn’t the soul leave when you die?”

“Annie, I have never died, I cannot answer your question. None of us, not even the Shaman, has the power of the nano’s within us. We weren’t sure they would go to you. I will say we were strong in voicing our request to them. Annie, to tell the truth, if not for what they did for Little Bird, I would have a hard time believing the nanos exist. Even so, I still felt sort of foolish chanting with the Shaman over the piece of leather Little Bird carried to you. ”

Annie spoke and her tone drew the Chief’s full attention. “I’m afraid of going to Salt Lake City. It’s not Knight’s men or him filling me with dread. It’s the hate inside me. I know, like I knew when I was going after mom, I’m going to kill them, but I don’t want to live forever full of hate.”

“Annie, I’m going to make a guess, mind you, it’s only a guess, but it is possible each person’s soul or spirit is unique to one body. I believe you will find an end to the hate. I would council you on one thing and this is why I wanted to speak with you once more. Some people say seeking revenge is wrong. I’m not one of those. The man or men, who sent the evil to you, deserve what you bring to them. I would council to keep the hate in a separate compartment. Do not let it color the other parts of your spirit. Do the job, count it done and leave it behind.”

CHAPTER 9

The Chief explained the purpose of the heads. His Shaman claimed the heads of your enemies contain strong magic to ward off evil. The Chief gave his own opinion they were simply to terrorize anyone who saw them. Dealing with the heads fell on Annie and Martha. No one else would come near the bag. Annie, with the Chief’s help, fastened eight, metal-curtain-rods, purloined from the Walmart, to the four corners of the front and lead wagons. The rods extended four feet above the roofs. This time she and Martha donned real masks and plastic gloves obtained from the Walmart. After dousing the masks with vanilla extract from the spice section, they climbed to the top of the first wagon. The Chief handed up the plastic bag full of heads.

Martha opened the bag and caught a puff of fetid air directly in her face. She immediately began gagging, a second later the stench drifted to Annie causing her to do the same. The vanilla extract was no match for the odor of the putrefying flesh.

“Oh God, I can’t do this,” Martha managed to gasp.

Through a sheer force of effort, Annie gained control of her stomach.

“You don’t need to be here Martha. I can do this by myself.”

Martha shook her head, “Just give me a minute, I’m going to—,” Martha didn’t finish her sentence. She ripped her mask away and bent to vomit on the wagon top.

Annie turned away, fighting nature as she listened to the retching sounds coming from behind her. Eventually there was nothing left in Martha’s stomach.

Martha fumbled another paper mask from the package. “I’m okay now Annie, but the vanilla smell was making it worse.”

Martha held the bag open for Annie as they moved from corner to corner on the roof of the wagon. The heads were in much worse condition than when they were first put in the bag. They were slippery and hard to handle with the plastic gloves. Even worse, much of the flesh on the skulls was rotten, and came loose from the skulls as they were removed from the bag. The skull cavity was full of maggots, and as Annie forced each head, neck first, onto a pole, they fell out like a putrid rain. They finished placing the heads on both wagons and hurried to where Missus Ellers had set a washbasin on top of a barrel. Annie was carrying the bag with the one remaining head still in it.

“It’s going to take more than soap and water to get this smell off us,” Martha declared. She was extremely pale from the ordeal.

“You’re not kidding,” Annie, agreed, “I’m going to the Walmart and clean Jacobs’ head out and see what I can do to stop the stink.”

Martha made a face of disgust. “You’re taking his filthy skull with you?”

“The Chief says the heads hold power to frighten your enemies. I reckon I’m going to need any bit of help I can get. As soon as you finish washing, you should go inside the Walmart and do some shopping. That’s what I’m doing after I finish with Jacobs’ head. I don’t ever want to see these clothes again.”

“This is the nastiest thing I’ve ever done. Look at the wagons. I can smell them from here. They make the wagons scary and nasty.”

Annie did look. The heads were gruesome and frightening, with skin hanging in flaps from the skulls and the rotten eye sockets oozing slime. She liked them there. She could feel the power the Shaman claimed they possessed.

“They are nasty,” Annie agreed. “Martha, you and Sue Ann are going to be riding with my mother. We’ve plenty of ammo. With the extra guns and rifles the killers had, there’s enough for everyone to be armed. Before the caravan leaves, I want both of you to practice using pistols and rifles. I’m expecting you to keep her safe for me.”

“Will you show us how? We’ve never had a gun in our hands.”

“The Chief or somebody else will teach you,” Annie, responded. “I’m leaving tonight while Mom’s asleep. I wrote a letter for you to give her in the morning.”

“I wish you weren’t going to Salt Lake. Now I wish I didn’t tell you they had the other women.”

“I’m glad you did, Martha, and I want to thank you for helping me with the heads. You’re a good friend.”

“Me and Sue Ann didn’t know you were leaving this soon. You know the young mare Sue Ann rides? The one she calls Angel.”

“I sure do.” Annie replied. “She’s beautiful.”

“Sue Ann wants you to ride her. She’s the gentlest horse in the world and she’s strong.”

“I was going to take one of the killer’s horses, but I wouldn’t mind riding Angel. Could you get her saddled for me after sundown?

“We sure can, and Sue Ann found a set of saddlebags for her too.”

“Thank you Martha. I’ll meet you at the west end of the Walmart where Mom can’t see me leave. My gear is already there. Bring Sue Ann with you so I can thank her for Angel and say goodbye.”

Annie used new kitchen utensils from the Walmart to scrape the brains from Jacobs’ head. Even though the outer skin was loose, it took a bit of work to remove all the fleshy bits from the skull. She used a large plastic bowl for the final cleansing of the skull. The last thing she did was replace the water with the contents of several large bottles of mouthwash and leave it to soak while she cleaned herself. She used a fresh bowl for her wash water and scrubbed herself raw before changing into new clothing from the racks. The finished skull still had a strong odor, but she figured the smell would fade pretty fast now that it wasn’t anything but bone.

Annie’s mother was at their wagon with Martha and Sue Ann. When the two girls saw Annie approaching, they excused themselves from Missus Higgins and walked away. Her mother stood by the wagon watching her. As soon as Annie was within reach, she pulled her daughter to her bosom.

“Annie, my baby girl,” she cried out, her voice filled with emotion to match the tears flowing from her eyes. She held Annie tight for several long seconds before speaking again.

“I know you enough to know you’re going to sneak off tonight, I won’t make it hard on you when you leave. You’ve made up your mind and I can’t change it, but I want you to stay with me until you leave.”

“I will,” Annie replied, as tears of her own began to flow. I’m scared and I need you to hold me.”

Her mother tightened her arms, drawing Annie even closer to her bosom. “I told your grandpa what you’re going to do. I sat by the grave and told him what has happened since he died. You know what I think he would have said to me?”

‘The girls’ got to do what she’s got to do,’ Annie supplied.

Her mother managed a small laugh. “You do know your Grandpa. He loved his sayings.”

“Mom, let’s sit by the graves and not grieve while we’re there. Let’s talk to them like they’re still alive and just remember them.”

*

Annie helped clean after the supper Sue Ann and Martha prepared. The sun was lowering in the west as Missus Higgins walked with Annie to where her gear was piled. They talked and hugged while they waited for the girls to bring Angel over. The three of them helped Annie pack and rope her gear.

“I’m going to say my goodbyes and I’m going to leave. Mom... I’ve cried all I’m going to cry. I love you and you will see me again in Cheyenne. If I’m not there, you make the caravan wait ‘till I am.”

Her mother fought back tears and hugged Annie tight for a long time before finally releasing her. “Nobody will leave. I’ll hold them there a year if need be.”

“Martha, you and Sue Ann take care of my mom.”

Martha began crying. “You’re too little to be doing....”

Annie shushed her with a hug.

Annie released Martha to hug Sue Ann. “Thank you for loaning me Angel. I know how much you love her and I’ll take care of her.”

Annie mounted Angel, reined her around sharply and heeled her into a gallop. She didn’t look back as she rode away.

*

My Diary by Annie Higgins

May 29, 2028

It’s been way over a month since I’ve written. The last time I wrote I was excited and happy, now I’m not happy at all. Grandpa and Will are dead. They were murdered!!!

Remember I wrote that Boss Henry came to Spokane to lead our Caravan to Heaven, how he was supposed to be arriving in a plane, but the plane crashed and he had to walk over two hundred miles? That’s not what happened. The man was a phony named Jacobs. His gang ambushed Boss Henry’s plane and they tortured him into telling them where to meet us. I guess none of them could fly the plane. They made up the crash story.

I remember when he first came into camp. I was in the meeting hall with the other people when he explained why he was late. There were seventy-five of us at the meeting. After he finished talking, he asked for someone to radio Heaven to let them know what happened and he’d contact them after he rested. I guess he knew better than to call himself, since he wasn’t Boss Henry. Afterwards, he wouldn’t let anyone near the radio. He told us it was on Haven’s orders for security reasons.

When we arrived in Butte Montana, he had his gang waiting for us. They snuck into our camp at night and killed all but the women and teenage girls. They even killed the babies. I’m writing like it doesn’t mean anything because if I write the hurt inside me, I would cry.

I had to stop writing for a while because I cried anyway. I’m okay now and the sun is going down, I need to finish writing before it gets too dark to see.

If it wasn’t for my mom helping me escape they would have caught me too, but they chased me and shot at me. I found a place to hide and they stopped hunting for me. I was asleep when all the killing happened. When I woke, everyone except the women and teenage girls were dead. The evil men were gone off with the women and horses.

It took me a while to figure out what to do. I didn’t know how to get to Heaven by myself and I wanted my mom back. I followed the tracks of the wagons they took with them and when I caught up with them, I shot all the outlaws. They managed to shoot me too, in the leg. The bullet blew out a hunk of meat and it got infected. I almost lost my leg and nearly died.

Mom and the rest of the women are on their way to Cheyenne, Wyoming with some new kind of American natives (Chief Knows It All explained Indians are from India) leading them, but I’m on my way to Salt Lake City to free more women the gang has captive. I’m going to kill the boss of them, Bill Knight, because I figure he’s the one most to blame for killing Grandpa and Will and the rest.

I’ve been on the road south for three days. I spent last night in a church building where I stayed before but it was scary being in the place alone. It’s warmer than it was before and I’ll be sleeping in my tent from now on. Riding Angel, the horse Martha lent me, sure does make traveling easier. She’s gentle as can be, but she’s strong and fast. I figure from the map the Chief drew for me I’ve still three hundred seventy five miles to go until I get to Salt Lake City.

Anyways, other stuff happened, but the sun’s going down. I’ll write more next time.

CHAPTER 10

Annie made good time. The weather remained dry and the Interstate roadbed was mostly intact. She continued to avoid human places, preferring to camp under the stars. Ten days had passed since she left Butte, and except for one miserable day when the temperature plummeted and brought an icy, freeze-on-the-skin drizzle with it, the days had been sunny and above freezing.

Her leg was completely healed and there wasn’t the tiniest of scars. True to what the Chief had told her, the nanos in her body brought her to the peak of physical health. She was still thin, but anytime she flexed a muscle she was amazed at how hard the muscle was.

Her eyesight, already sharp to begin with, was even better. The improvement came on so rapidly, until her eyes adjusted, it made distant objects appear closer than they were. Her sense of hearing followed suit. Once, while resting, she watched a hawk circling low. As she watched, she became aware of a soft rustling sound. It dawned on her she was hearing air as it passed over the hawks’ wings.

She was within a hundred miles of Salt Lake City when calamity struck. As she passed under a freeway overpass, she heard barking and growling on the bridge above. A pack of dogs, with a huge, ugly mixed-breed in the lead, came rushing down the gully bordering the concrete edge of the bridge. Angel reared in fright, tumbling Annie off. She landed awkwardly and felt her left forearm bend underneath her as she impacted the surface of the road. Her head hit the pavement, she felt a moment of nauseating pain, and dizziness before her world went black. Luckily, for her, the dogs initially gave chase after Angel.

Annie awoke to a world full of spinning pain and the smell of cooking meat. It was dark and she was lying on her sleeping bag close to a fire. On the opposite side of the fire, a burly man was sitting on an upside-down plastic bucket, holding some kind of meat skewered to the end of a long stick, over the flames. He noticed her movements but waited for her to speak. She gathered her wits and tried to sit. A wave of dizziness overwhelmed her, causing her to fall back to the pad with a groan. Her left arm felt like something was gnawing on it.

“I don’t reckon you feel none too good,” the man said, realizing she was in no condition to rise. “Lie there ‘til you do, this black tailed rabbit’s gonna take a while. I ought ta cut it smaller so it cooks faster.”

The man removed the meat from the fire and used his fingers to slide it off the stick onto a metal pan on the ground beside him.

“Damn!” He popped two fingers into his mouth to cool them before pulling his knife from his scabbard. He began sawing at the rabbit, cutting it into smaller pieces.

“Who are you?” Annie finally managed.

“Bert, name’s Bert. What be your name?”

“Annie.”

Bert started with surprise. “You ain’t possibly coming down from Butte are ya?”

Annie wasn’t able to answer. Nausea hit her and she rocked onto her side and vomited.

“I was afraid of that,” he said in a concerned tone. I reckon ya got ya’self a concussion and a knot on ya head.”

Annie waited until the nausea faded before speaking.

“Who are you?” She asked again.

“I told ya before, I’m Bert. I came on ya, as the dogs was a’coming back for ya. I killed three of them ‘fore they run off. The big-un took four shots ta drop.”

“Are you going to hurt me?” Annie asked.

“Naw girl, I ain’t agoin’ ta hurt ya. I done fixed your arm and I’m cooking ya some rabbit. Does that sound like I’m going ta hurt ya?”

Annie, thought of Angel, and attempted to sit. This time she managed.

“The horse, is she....”

“Your horse is right behind you with mine. She came back on her own ‘bout an hour ago.”

Annie started to turn, but moving her head made her want to puke again. She tried to move her left arm, but it hurt too much. It was wrapped with strips of cloth from her wrist to her elbow. The ends of two sticks protruded top and bottom from the wrappings.

“Thank you for helping me. Those dogs would have eaten me alive while I was passed out. Why did you ask if I was coming from Butte?”

“Cause your name’s Annie. Crazy little girl came through and been telling people down around Salt Lake, “Killer Annie’s coming around, and there’s new law coming ta town. You don’t fit my picture of a cold blooded killer.”

“That was Little Bird. She’s not crazy, she’s…. she’s just different.”

“Ya can say different iffen ya likes, I still say crazy. Are ya really on your way ta kill Bill Knight and his men?”

Annie started to answer, but a wave of blackness passed through her mind. She tried to fight it off, but it was too strong.

Annie woke to the sound of Bert whistling. The sun was lifting in the east and, as she struggled to sit, she felt none of the vertigo she’d experienced the night before.

“Hello Bert,” she called out to let him know she was awake. Bert turned from where was squatting, going through her pack. He stood, holding two packs of dehydrated meals.

“Good morning ta you. I see you ain’t showing signs of no amnesia.”

“No, and I’m not going to throw up. Thank you for taking care of me. Is my arm broke. It’s throbbing like it is, and it’s itching like crazy?”

“It ain’t broke in two, but it was bent like the bone might be split. I had ta wrap it tight ta straighten it. Probably why it’s itching. There’s some left over rabbit and I thought maybe you might like some’a your food with it. Are ya hungry?”

“I sure am.” Annie twisted her head. “Where’s Angel, I thought she came back?”

“Angel, huh? Kind’a fits her. The dogs come sniffing around again last night. I let loose on’m with a load of buckshot. Didn’t kill none, but judging from the blood trails, I hit two of’m. I doubt they’ll be back. Your horse took off when I shot. She’ll come around soon enough when she hears us talking.”

Bert busied himself with preparing breakfast, whistling like he was doing before. Annie sat, trying to ignore the itching of her arm and forehead. She could tell without touching her head, she had a huge lump. It stuck out so far she could see it by lifting her eyes. She knew most of the itching was coming from the nano things working in her.

She watched Bert as he moved. He was a wide man, broad in the shoulders and torso. His legs were thick and stout. He wasn’t tall, but he stood straight without slouching, giving him the appearance of tallness. His reddish brown hair was to his shoulders and was tangled and unkempt, as were his overgrown mustache and beard. For all that, he came across as dignified and decent. Annie liked him.

“You know what goes on down in Salt Lake. Are you from there?”

“Yes and no,” Bert replied, lifting his eyes from the metal pot he was using to mix the meals with water. “You might say I’m from all around Salt Lake City, but I don’t live there. Ever since my wife Lucy died, I been at loose ends. After my two boys up and decided ta go ta Haven last year, I roam from place to place. I visit with the homesteaders what’s got families. I bring fresh meat and they invite me ta eat and sometimes over-night with them. It gives me a bit of time like I belong to a family.”

“I’m sorry your wife died,” Annie said with sympathy. “It hurts when you lose people you love. Are there a lot of people around Salt Lake?”

“Leave out the trash crowd Bill Knights’ got banded together, there’s probably a hundred twenty five and maybe a few more what’s got homesteads. After the Mormons picked up and left ta hide from the Haven crowd, people sort’a drifted in from all over these past years.”

“How many people are in Bill Knight’s gang?” Annie asked.

“Not counting the whores and slave girls he keeps around him, he had twenty-nine, but if what crazy girl says is true, he’s only got twenty since nine of’m won’t be coming back from Butte.”

“I told you, Little Bird’s not crazy, just different.”

“Different as hell is what she is. She don’t call herself Little Bird down here. Said her name’s ‘Death Word Speaker’. She’s telling folks, Killer Annie’s coming to kill all the evil men and free the women. She’s telling them after you kill Knight’s men they all need to get ready to leave ‘cause you’re going to lead them to Heaven.”

Annie laughed, “She sure can get herself worked up.”

“She has us half believing her. She told us you killed Jacobs and his men in a gunfight. Did ya kill all those men?”

Annie told him what happened. As she talked, Burt arranged stones to set his pot on and raked a pile of coals between them. By the time, she finished the telling, the pot had come to a boil and Burt raked most of the coals from under it. When she was done talking, Burt sat quietly for a bit.

“Damn girl, Little Bird, didn’t tell no tale half as wild. When bullets started coming through your snow wall, I’da shit myself, pardon my language. Ya sure you ain’t making this up?”

Annie nodded towards her pack. “Jacobs’ head is wrapped in plastic tied to my pack. You can look at it if you want.”

Burt glanced at the pack and shuddered. “I reckon I’ll take your word for it. How come ya carrying his head wit’ya?

By the time she finished telling him about Chief Knows It All, and answering questions, the meal was finished.

“I’ll be damned,” Bert exclaimed, “I can see you had ta go after your Ma, but I’ll be damned if she shouldn’t of tied you with rope ta keep ya from coming down here. Shooting people in a town ain’t like taking pot shots out in the open. You’re going ta get yourself killed. They’s some rough bastards with Knight and one fellow named Big Ben, he’s a psycho. He likes ta cut people. I reckon ya ought ta turn around and see if you can catch ya people.”

“I vowed to free the women and avenge my family,” Annie replied angrily, “and you need to stop cussing ... How come you and the folks around here haven’t done anything to free those girls he’s using for slaves... and you know what else he’s using them for! You all should be ashamed of yourselves!”

“Whoa, little lady,” Burt exclaimed, his own anger showing, “you shame yourself. We’ve gone against Knight. The man ain’t stupid and he knows how ta use his men in a fight. He was a combat officer before the plague and they kicked our asses. We lost seven men in the fighting. Afterwards, Knight’s men came out killing whole families ta get even.”

Annie felt her cheeks reddening. “I’m sorry.”

Burt started to make a caustic reply, but changed his mind when he saw the tears begin to flow from her eyes.

“Its okay Annie, ya didn’t know, but I’m telling you, what needs ta be done can’t be done by a little girl. You need to be with your mama where you’ll be safe. Time will come for Knight ta pay his dues.”

Annie considered his words and as she thought, she heard her grandpas’ voice speaking to her. She opened her mouth to let the words flow.

“I know I’m a little girl and it won’t be easy. I might get killed, but I’ve got a job to do and as soon as my arm’s healed, I guess I’ll get on to doing it. Bill Knight killed my Grandpa and brother as much as Jacobs did. My grandpa said “Once you decide to do something you might as well get it done.” I’m going to Salt Lake City and I’m going to kill him, and if his men get in my way, I’ll kill them too.”

Bert started to reply to her declaration, but Annie interrupted him before he could speak.

“If Bill Knight had killed your boys I bet you wouldn’t be sitting here talking to me. I bet you’d be doing your best to kill him the same as I am. You know you would!”

Bert regarded her in silence for a long moment before speaking.

“You’re right. I would have gone after him no matter the odds. Thing is, I would’ve planned my moves ta be sure I won. I’m not going ta try ta change ya mind anymore, but I am going ta tell ya what I know of his setup. You may change ya mind ya’self once you know what you’re going against. If you decide to go ahead, at least you’ll be better able ta make your plans.”

“I’d like you to, because I’m not changing my mind.” Annie paused and asked, “What are you doing out here this far from Salt Lake City?”

“I’m chasing two fellers what visited one of the homesteaders. Sometimes some of Knight’s men get randy and go off alone without his blessing. He don’t try stoppin’em, but when they do, they’re on their own, and fair game for anyone who wants to kill them. It’s one of the ways he controls them. The two I’m after raped the daughter of some friends of mine.”

“Why’d they come this way? The common sense thing would have been to head back to where Knight is.”

“They would if I’da’ let’m. They know it’s me what’s on their trail and I’ve built a reputation for no mercy for any of his scum. I stayed between them and Knight and driving’em north hoping ta bring them ta bay.”

“They’re probably going to get away because of you helping me.”

“I scouted around a bit while you were out. They tried disguising it, but their trail split a few miles further on. One of them’s circling to get behind me.”

“I guess you need to get back to your chase.”

“I do iffen ya for sure okay.” Bert agreed. “Let me clear away our breakfast mess and I’ll fill you in as ta what I know.”

CHAPTER 11

Bert was right, Angel wandered into camp while he was describing Knight’s base. Bert fed her a bit of grain from his saddlebag. When he saddled his horse and rode off, Annie felt very alone and very frightened by the things he’d told her concerning Knight’s base.

The place where Knight and his men stayed was a square fortress with a thick concrete wall enclosing three buildings. On the two front corners of what Bert called, ‘The Compound’, were tall guard towers which were always manned. The buildings outside the walls, close to the compound, were bulldozed away making it impossible to sneak close. Bert did say there was one building, over three hundred yards away. It would make a good spot for a sniper if it wasn’t for the fact Knight had Army rockets. Bert told her Knight had an artillery piece, but he stopped using it a few years ago after one of the old rounds exploded and killed some of his men.

Bert drew a picture of how the buildings were laid out. Because he’d spent a lot of time on top of the building out in front of the compound watching, he knew what all the buildings were for.

The main building at the center of the back wall of the compound was Knight’s headquarters. He lived inside on the top floor along with his two Majors. The headquarters building had three floors. The ground level was used for meetings and eating. The middle level was their entertainment center where they had pool tables and a bar. The other two buildings were on opposite sidewalls of the compound. One of them was where Knight’s men slept and the other was where the female slaves and “whores” slept.

There was one more building inside the compound. It was smaller and was attached to the end of the men’s building. Bert said it was their armory where most of the weapons were kept.

Bert told her the compound was, in his words, ‘A tough nut to crack’. The walls were two feet thick of reinforced concrete and the buildings were made of stone. Knights’ men were armed with automatic weapons and they had what he called “Rocket Propelled Grenades,” bombs fired from a rifle.

Bert also drew a map to the Compound. Before he left to recover the trail of the men he was chasing, he handed her another map he’d drawn and took a few more minutes with her.

“I shouldn’t be encouragin’ ya,” he began reluctantly, “but if ya determined ta go through with this, you’ll need something more’n a rifle to fight with. Back a few years ago, before Knight showed up, I went ta the National Guard Base there in Salt Lake. I took a lot of weapons from the Armory and hid them in other places on the base. Good thing I did because it was one of the first places Knight ransacked. If ya follow my map, ya ought ta be able ta find the stuff I hid.”

“I don’t know how to use anything but a rifle and a pistol,” Annie told him.

“Manuals with most of’m telling how ta work’em. Take whatever you can use. There’s rockets and grenade launchers. A couple of sniper rifles hidden there too. You’ll find freeze dried food in cans packed in with the rest.”

Annie decided to stay at the campsite to allow the Nanobots in her body to heal her some more. The knot on her forehead had shrunk and her splinted arm was itching less which she took as a sign it was healing fast.

She spent the next morning caring for Angel and sorting through her gear. She cleaned her rifles and pistol. Tidying the campsite, she thought of Bert’s description of Knights’ compound. It didn’t take much time to realize the futility of trying to formulate plans against a place she hadn’t seen yet.

After her midday meal, she removed the wrappings from her arm to see how it was healing. To her surprise, the arm appeared and felt normal. The bruise on her forehead was barely noticeable even when she pressed it with her fingers. She was gaining a deep respect for the gift Chief Knows It All had given her.

She slept most of the afternoon. When she woke, the evening chill was settling in. She built a fire from the banked coals and prepared her supper. While she was cooking, she kept hearing noises and worried the dogs were sneaking around. She knew one of the men Bert was after had circled to get behind him and maybe he had seen her campfire. As she was preparing to get her rifle, a rabbit came bounding through the campsite. This caused her to laugh at herself and blame her nano-heightened hearing for making the rabbit sound larger than it was. She filled her plate and sat by the fire to eat. As she was taking her first bite, it occurred to her the rabbit had a reason to run panicked through the camp past a fire. The sound of heavy footsteps followed her thought. A man, holding a pistol came walking out of the darkness and sat on the ground on the other side of the fire.

“Couldn’t help but smell your food cooking, don’t mind if I do,” eyeing the pot on the coals. “Get me a spoon.”

Annie was too frightened to speak. The man was thin and his face was narrow with a mean countenance. Like Bert, he was unshaven. Unlike Bert, there was no air of dignity surrounding him. Annie could smell the stink of his body even though it had to pass through the flames to reach her. He had a rifle slung from his shoulder and held the pistol in his hand pointed at her.

“I told you to get me a spoon you little bitch,” he snarled, “I’m hungry and I’ll beat the hell out of you if you don’t get moving.”

Annie stood to do what he asked, glancing towards Angel where her weapons were, angry at herself for not being armed, all she had was Will’s hunting knife concealed by her bulky sweater. She pulled a spoon and another plate from her pack and approached the man, keeping her distance as she handed it to him.

“You ain’t needing to be scared right now,” he said with a short laugh, I’ll get what I want from you after I’ve et. Set your skinny ass back where you was so I can keep an eye on ya.”

Annie did as he told her. She watched as he slopped down the remains of her food, foregoing the plate and eating from the pot. Her plate sat, uneaten, on the ground beside her. Fear faded as she watched him eat. A cold anger built. He was part of the gang who killed her Grandpa and Will. She knew he was one of the rapists Bert was after.

The man finished off the food and stood, wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his jacket.

“I’m going to get me some of what I want, girl,” walking toward her. “You try fighting it, I’ll bust you up.”

“I’m not going to fight you mister,” Annie replied meekly. “You can do whatever you like as long as you don’t hurt me.”

The man swung, slapping the side of her head. She staggered back from the blow.

“Shut your fucking mouth you little cunt and drop your pants and drawers and get on your back.”

Annie undid her belt buckle, taking care he didn’t see her knife. She felt embarrassment as she slid first her jeans and long underwear down and then her cotton underpants.

“All the way off,” the man snarled.

She stepped out of her clothing. She lay on her back close to her jeans and watched him as he laid his rifle down and dropped his pants. His erect penis was hard and huge to her.

“Damn girl, you ain’t got no hair.” He was on her in a rush, using one arm to brace himself and used his other hand to guide his penis. His attention was on what he wanted. He didn’t succeed.

Annie twisted to reach for her jeans and slid Will’s razor sharp hunting knife free from its sheath. She plunged it deep into his side before tilting her wrist and slicing it out, opening his belly. The man screamed in pain and rage. Annie felt the wetness of him as he lost control of his bladder. Her mind was cold as she plunged the knife once more into him. The man rolled off her and tried to stand but only rose as far as his knees. Blood and guts began falling from under the edge of his coat as he knelt there, staring in disbelief as Annie stood and pulled on her underwear and pants.

“Shit girl,” he said, plaintively, tears flowing, all his toughness gone as he tried desperately to hold his guts in, “why’d ya go and cut me?”

Annie observed him in silence as she buckled her belt. She moved to him and put the knife to his throat.

“Don’t move an inch, or I’ll slice your neck to the bone.” She felt for the pants around his ankles until she found his pistol and moved out of his reach.

“I cut you for what you were going to do to me and I’m going to kill you for what you did to my Grandpa and brother.”

“You already killed me ya stupid bitch,” He screamed at her, “my fucking guts are falling out.”

“You’re not dead yet. You’ll die after I condemn your soul.”

A voice, calling her name, caused Annie to whirl around looking for a new target. She loosened her finger from the trigger, realizing it was Bert.

“Don’t shoot me,” he called out. “I’m coming in.”

Bert rode into the circle of light cast by her fire, dismounted and stood staring at them for an instant before dropping to his knees in front of the man who was clutching his bloody belly with both hands.

Bert barked a laugh before speaking. “Little girl gutted ya like the pig ya are, Randy. You’ve got ta be the stupidest man alive. This here is Killer Annie and there’s a new law in town.”

“Go to hell Bert Miller.” The man spat in Bert’s face.

Bert backed handed him, knocking him onto his back. The man screamed again as he fell, his hands slipping up, dragging his jacket and shirt with them, exposing the two gaping wounds in his belly. More of his guts spilled out and slid onto the ground beside him.

Bert stood and used a rag from his pocket to wipe the spit from his face. As he was pulling his pistol from his holster, Annie moved to the man and knelt beside him, placing the barrel of the pistol she’d taken from him, on his forehead.

“This man’s life belongs to me, Bert,” she told him.

Randy shrugged his head to push the pistol away. Annie felt coldness pass through her mind. She pulled the pistol away a few inches in order to forcefully jam the barrel into his mouth, splitting his lips and shattering his teeth. Ignoring his feeble efforts to strike at her and not caring about the blood pouring from his mouth, she held his struggling head in place and spoke loudly above the choking sounds he was making.

“You, along with Jacobs and Bill Knight, killed Grandpa and my brother Will. Now I’m going to kill you. Your soul is going to where it’s always dark, always wet and always cold and you’ll be by yourself forever.”

Blood spurted from Randy’s mouth as the round entered his head. Bert watched in stunned silence as Annie stood and went to her pack for a towel to wipe the blood from her face and arms. She went to the fire and threw on more wood. He continued his silence as she sat and reached for her cold plate and began eating. He moved to sit close to her, wanting to say something, but he couldn’t find the words. Finally Annie spoke.

“He deserved dying. He saw a girl all by herself. He thought he could come eat my food and rape me, and nothing would happen to him. Bill Knight’s going to be thinking the same way when I go after him. He’ll think all I am is a little girl. That’s how I’ll get him.”

“You’re right,” Bert said. “Randy was trash. I caught the other one last night. Put a bullet in his head while he was sleeping and circled back for the one I thought was behind me. I guess he was double-crossing his mate, and headed for the compound. Once I found his trail again, I knew he would probably spot your camp. I got here as fast as I could.”

“I’m glad you did Bert, it would have been lonely here with only his body for company.” Annie started crying, sobs racking her small frame.

“Do you want me ta hold ya or something?” Bert asked, at a loss for how he should respond to her pain.

“No,” Annie managed to gasp, “I need to cry right now. I’m missing my family.”

It took time, but Annie finally cried herself dry. Towards the end, she moved close to Bert and allowed him to hold her. He patted her as you would a little child and whispered words of comfort until her body stopped shaking and her breathing slowed to normal. He held her a bit longer before pushing her back to see her face.

“Are you goin ta be okay? I know it’s hard killing people.”

“Killing him didn’t mean anything to me except he’s one less man Knight has to back him. Two less, counting the one you killed. I was crying for my Grandpa and my brother. The only thing making me mad is, after I kill all of them, my folks will still be dead. At least they won’t be able to make other people feel as sad as I am.”

“Nothing ya do will replace the one’s what’s lost,” Bert agreed. “Now we killed the two I was after, I reckon I’m free to ride with ya... Iffen ya want my help?”

Annie considered his question. “I wouldn’t mind your help if you’re offering, but I don’t want anybody in charge of me.”

“I’m offering,” Bert replied with a low chuckle.“Annie, I’m not afraid of much, but I damn sure wouldn’t want you mad at me and on my trail. You’re a pretty little thing, but you’re a killer for sure. Bill Knights’ days are numbered. ”

Annie took offense, “I’m not a killer Bert. I’ve just got some killing that has to be done. There’s a difference.”

“I don’t mean what I said inna bad way. Yeah, ya damn right there’s a diff’rence. I meant, ya don’t hold back when there’s killing needing ta be done. Same’s me and I don’t feel like a killer neither.”

“I guess us non killers ought to drag Randy’s dead body out of our camp and get some sleep before we go to Salt Lake and kill Bill Knight and his gang.”

Bert smiled, “Am I seeing ya sense’a humor shining through?”

“No,” Annie replied grimly, “There isn’t anything funny about what we’re doing. Get a rope for his legs. I reckon you and your horse can do the dragging. I need to wash and change. He peed on me.”

CHAPTER 12

It was late afternoon on the fifth day of riding when they arrived at the outskirts of Salt Lake City. Annie tried to push the pace, but Bert advised it would be best not to be worn out when it came to planning what had to be done. Annie countered with, “Each day the women are there, it’s one more day of suffering for them.” Bert countered with, “Iffen we don’t do it right, we’ll likely get ourselfs dead, and they’ll go right on suffering.”

Bert reined in his horse and motioned for Annie to guide Angel to his side.

“We’d best be leaving the freeway now. Sometimes Knight sends out patrols and it’d be best ta avoid ‘em. Sides, I’m ready for a hot bath and a sit down meal, how’s that sound ta ya?”

“It sounds like heaven,” Annie replied, the thought of being clean easing her impatience to make miles.

“I figure we’ll ride ta the Davis place. Bill Davis has one of the best setups for a hot bath, and Marge, his wife, sets a tasty table.”

The sun was lowering behind the hilltops as they rode onto the Davis farm. The house was huge with two floors and a wrap around porch on both levels. Flickering light was shining from every window on the bottom level. There were several people sitting in chairs near the open front door. They stood when they saw them riding towards them. Annie saw a few children run into the house.

“You can put your guns away,” Bert called out to them as they drew near, “it’s me.”

“That you Bert? Who’s riding with you?”

“Somebody you need to meet,” he shouted back. “You goin ta invite us in, or do we ride on?”

“How don’t you shut your trap and ride in.” he called back. “You know you don’t need permission.”

Bert and Annie rode to the hitching rail in front of the porch and slid from their horses.

“Jarrod, take their horses to the barn and get them fed and bedded down. Take Ben with you to help,” Bill Davis directed.

Two boys passed them as they ascended the three steps to the porch. One was nine or ten, and the other Annie’s age. The oldest smiled and gave Annie a quick assessing look as he passed.

“You two grab a chair and set a bit,” Bill said. “I’m sure Marge’ll be out soon’s those other young’uns tell her you’re here.” Bill remained sitting, but a younger man stood to shake Bills hand.

“Did you catch those bastards?” He asked.

“Mind your tongue Eli,” Bill demanded.

“Sorry Bill. Did you...?”

“I’ll tell ya in a bit, Eli,” Bert replied, cutting him short and nodding his head slightly towards Annie.

A heavy lady came bustling out the door as they were sitting, “You may as well stand back up Bert.” Bert regained his feet to submit to a powerful hug.

“Where’d you find this little thing? She asked, turning her attention to Annie.

“A hundred miles north’a here,” he replied, “We’re tired and hungry, and she’s longin for a hot bath. Her name is Annie.”

“Is this the girl...?”

“Yes she is,” Bert said, interrupting her, “Let’s let her get to the bath while we talk.

“There’s still hot water in the tank.” Missus Davis turned towards the front door to shout. “Beverly, come out here.” A young woman several years older than Annie came hurrying through the door and joined them on the porch.

“Annie, this is my daughter Beverly. She’ll show you to the bath house and get you clean clothes to put on.”

Annie stood, a bit overwhelmed, meeting so many people all at once. Beverly took her hand and led her back down the steps and around the side of the house to a building a short distance away. At one side of the building was a large metal tank on an elevated platform. Hot coals from a fire were glowing under the tank and pipes ran from the tank to the building. When Beverly opened the door, a blast of hot moist air came pouring out.

“Lord, it gets hot in there,” Beverly, exclaimed. “Move back so I can fan the door.”

Annie did as she asked and Beverly began swinging the door open and closed, trying to force in cooler air.

“How’d ya meet Bert?” Beverly asked as she worked.

“He rescued me after some wild dogs scared my horse and threw me. I was knocked out.”

“Your name’s Annie?”

“Yes, Annie Higgins.”

“There was a strange girl come by our place. She told us a girl named Annie is coming here to kill Bill Knight and lead us all to Haven.”

“That was Little Bird. At least you didn’t call her crazy like most people do.”

“You are the Annie she was talking about.” Beverly said, puzzled. “She made you out to be bigger and older... Meaner too. She told us you could kill with your eyes and have liquid iron for blood and had real nails sticking out of your fingers, like claws.”

“I guess I am that Annie,” Annie replied, smiling, “Little Bird does get excited with words... Is the room cool enough now?”

Beverly showed her how to control the water flow into the huge ceramic tile tub. She adjusted a regulator valve on a radiator before going back to the house to get Annie a change of clothing.

The tub was large and took a long time to fill. Annie fiddled with the controls, keeping the mix as hot as she thought she could stand. She moaned with pleasure as she slid gingerly into the steaming water. She soaked for several minutes before Beverly returned with clothing and a large towel. She placed those on a bench by the sidewall and sat beside them, assessing Annie, quizzically.

“Do you want to be by yourself?” She asked, “I can leave if you want.”

“No.” Annie replied, “I’d like it if you stayed.”

“I meant to hurry back, but I stayed to hear Bert talking. Your Little Bird friend might stretch words, but I guess you’re every bit as dangerous as she made out. You sure are little though. I bet you don’t even weigh ninety pounds.”

“You don’t need to be big to kill evil men,” Annie countered, “just determined, and it doesn’t hurt to be a good shot.”

“Bert said you killed Randy.”

“Yes I did, he tried to rape me.”

“He did rape me. Him, and the other son of a bitch, caught me riding home from our neighbor’s a few miles from here.”

“I’m sorry,” Annie, replied with compassion, “at least they’re dead now. Bert killed the other one.”

“I’m glad they’re dead, but it don’t make me any cleaner, and Eli, my husband, he’s the man you saw out on the porch with my dad, he treats me different now, like somehow I’m not decent anymore because those other men had me.”

“Did you talk to him?”

“Oh, he says he’s okay, but he doesn’t talk to me the same and since it happened he won’t touch me at night. Lately he’s even been rough on our boy, Ben. It’s like he’s mad all the time.”

“I don’t understand why you say you’re dirty. It wasn’t your fault what happened. Eli should be ashamed of himself.”

“Life changes people,” Beverly replied resignedly. “Lordy girl,” she exclaimed, changing the subject, “I can tell it’s been a long time since you’ve had a real bath, your water’s filthy. Give me the rag and bend over. I’ll scrub your back.”

When Beverly finished scrubbing her back, she insisted on draining the tub and starting the bath all over again. While it was filling, she went back to the house and returned with a cardboard carton. Annie was soon in the lap of luxury, experiencing the first bubble bath she’d ever had.

*

The sounds of the household preparing for a new day pulled Annie from a fitful sleep. Her night had been nightmares, disjointed images of men and blood and screams. She lay in the strange bed, disoriented and still filled with terror from the lingering remnants of her dreams. She was glad when she saw the door open and Beverly peek around the edge to see if she was awake. Annie motioned for her to come in.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Annie told her. “I had scary dreams all night.”

“It’s no wonder you did. After you went to sleep Bert told us what happened to your caravan and you killing all those men to get your mother back.”

Annie nodded towards the window. “You people sure get started early. The sun’s not even up.”

“Last night, Pop decided no matter what, it was time to get the people around here ready to go to Haven. They want to be ready to pull out as soon as we get our people back from Knight. He has my sister there. They took her two years ago.”

“I can see you wouldn’t want to leave without your sister.”

“I can’t wait to see her again. I know she’s going to be different because of what’s been happening to her, but once we get her back we can fix her.”

“Just let her know she owns your hearts.”

“Oh, she does,” Beverly, responded emphatically. “Do you believe you can get her away from Knight? Bert says you can.”

“I can’t promise I will, but I’ll try.”

Beverly smiled a hopeful smile. “Your trying will probably be better than most. Hurry and dress. Breakfast is ready. I’ve need to get back to the kitchen. Come down and get a chair when you’re dressed.”

When Annie entered the dining room, she found a long table already surrounded by the large family. There were only two vacant chairs. One was beside Bill Davis. She knew it probably belonged to Marge, his wife. The other was beside Jarrod. He smiled as she came towards him, and Annie knew he’d arranged for the chair to be vacant. He stood and held it for her to be seated. Everyone saw him do it and he blushed crimson. Annie pretended not to notice and thanked him.

Marge called for Beverly and they made several trips in and out of the kitchen bringing platters of food. There was confusion and a lot of chatter as the food was passed around for people to serve themselves. Once plates were full, everyone lost their voices and concentrated on eating. Annie was ravenous and had two helping of everything. She didn’t feel guilty, because when they were finished, there was food left on the serving dishes.

No one left the table. Bill Davis began talking about the places he, along with Eli and Jarrod, had to go to get out the word, moving day was coming. While his father was talking, Jarrod tapped Annie on her leg to get her attention. When she turned to him, he tapped her leg again and dipped his head meaningfully where his hand was. Annie took the note and pencil he secretly passed to her and opened the folded paper in her lap where no one could see. On it he had written, “You sure are pretty.” Annie scribbled, “You are too,” and passed the paper and pencil back to him. After he read her answer, he was puzzled for a moment and then smiled as he blushed again. Annie thought it sweet of him to notice her.

When the conversation at the table turned in a different direction, Annie’s attention was pulled from Jarrod to what Eli was saying.

“Am I the only one at this table with a lick of common sense? No offense to you Bert, but do you think we’re going to leave Bill Knight and his men to you and a little girl to deal with? What makes you believe you two can do what the men around here couldn’t do? All that’s going to happen is a lot of people are going to die, and it won’t be Bill Knight or his men.”

“Mind your tone Eli,” Bill Davis said from the head of the table.”

“Bill, I’ve a right to a say at this table.” Eli responded. “I’m not saying the girl's not brave or her hearts not in the right place, but this is a job for real men to do, not a child.”

Bert didn’t agree with Eli’s tone either. “Now hold your horses, Eli. She may be—.”

“I can speak for myself, Bert,” Annie interjected, fighting to control the burst of anger threatening to take her voice away.

It became quiet at the table. Annie could hear birds chirping outside the house. They were waiting for her to speak. She calmed her mind and arranged her thoughts.

“I was talking to Beverly this morning. She told me Knight’s had her sister for over two years. He has other women there too. Maybe he’s had some of them even longer than he’s had your wife’s sister. You can’t go after him because he might hurt those women if you do. Bert told me the one time you did go against him, you lost the battle, and Knight came and killed whole families to teach you a lesson.

“I came down here to kill Bill Knight and his men for killing my family. There’s nothing going to stop me. You’re right Mister Eli, I am a little girl, but I want to ask you something,” she said, pointing her finger at him, but speaking quietly. “What real men are you talking about? Your wife was raped not long ago and now, in your mind, she’s not decent any more. Next time they come through, they can pull your pants down and do things to make you no good. Beverly is beautiful, and she’s clean and nice. It’s for sure her heart and mind is cleaner and purer than yours. Bill Knight is the one who caused her pain, because he’s hateful. Now you’re hurting her, maybe you’re hateful too. Maybe Bill Knight’s got you whipped, but no body else at this table is.”

The entire time Annie was speaking, Eli was growing angrier and redder in the face. He surged to his feet and slammed both hands hard on the table.

“How dare you come in here, eat our food and insult me?” He shouted. You’re nothing but—.” Eli stiffened like someone had hit him. He stopped talking and looked around the table at everyone staring at him. His eyes drifted from person to person, lingering longest on his wife, tears streaming down her face, longer on his son Ben, scrunched fearfully in his chair. His eyes came back to Annie and his anger went from him as he gazed into her eyes and nodded.

“You’ve rightfully shamed me in my home, in front of my family and my wife’s family, but I’m not whipped.” His eyes shifted from her and his demeanor changed. “Please, I apologize for my outburst... Beverly, would you take a walk with me? I need to talk to you. You come too Ben. You’re my boy and I you need to know I love you.” Tears began to flow from his eyes as he moved towards his wife. “I love both of you.”

After they left the dining room, no one was willing to be the first to speak. Finally Bill Davis stood.

“Damn Bill Knight and the hurt he’s caused. Jarrod, let’s get the horses saddled. Bert, Annie, do what you’re going to do. Bert, I don’t know how you’re planning on freeing my girl, but pay attention to whatever Annie has to say. She has more sense than any of us and a hell of a lot more courage.”

“Amen to that,” Marge added.

CHAPTER 13

Annie and Bert were on their way shortly after breakfast. Once they entered Salt Lake City, she let Angel follow Bert’s lead.

All the tall buildings were gone. Grandpa told her, that a few months after the plague had run its course, a white cloud came and took all the high buildings down. When they finished, where the buildings had sat, were plastic-covered blocks of what the buildings were made of. According to him, all the blocks were pure elements. Some of them were huge. He said the white clouds took apart the dams all across the world, but there wasn’t any flooding because of how careful they worked.

Like in Spokane, the streets were filled with abandoned cars and trucks. Among them, on the roadbed and the sidewalks, were the scattered bones of the plague victims. Bones and skeletons were a fact of life and Annie was used to seeing them.

The military base was on the other side of the city, close to where the mountains began. Annie was glad Bert was with her because riding through the deserted streets of the city was creepy and strange. She couldn’t imagine there ever being enough people to fill the sidewalks and roads. The low hanging clouds, which filled the sky and blocked the sun, didn’t do much to dispel the thought there were eyes watching them from the windows of the buildings and houses they rode past.

The base wasn’t as creepy, maybe because it felt more open and there weren’t as many bones. The buildings were weathered, some had parts of their roofs missing and many had windows broken, but almost all of them were still standing. Annie continued to follow Bert’s lead. He stopped at a building in a row of long narrow buildings. It was the same as the others except for a truck with faded camouflage paint, sitting on four flat tires, parked in front of the one he chose. They tied the reins of their horses to the bumper of the truck and she followed him through the unlocked door.

Inside, she saw bunk beds lined along two walls with a path down the middle. There was a wooden chest at the foot of each bed. Three of the bunks had skeletons on them and there was a skeleton on the floor. Bert stepped over the bones but Annie walked around them as she followed him down the length of the building to a door at the other end. Tall windows lined the walls on each side and it was as bright inside as out, but still gloomy.

“This was a barracks,” Bert informed her, whispering. “Most of the soldiers who were still on base died over in the chapel. There weren’t many left here, most of the soldiers deserted during the crazy times when the death started.”

“Why are you talking so low?” Annie asked. “Are there people around here?”

“I didn’t realize I was,” Bert replied with a soft laugh. “Being in places like this gives me the willies. There’s no one around here for miles, but I keep ‘specting somebody ta jump outta the shadows.”

“Will and I would be spooked sometimes. It’s worse when you go into a place and it’s dark inside.”

Bert opened the door at the far end of the barracks and she followed him into a tiny apartment with a single, bigger bed and a desk with a chair. There was a small kitchen and a separate bathroom for whoever had lived in there. Bert went to a door near the bathroom and opened it. The inside of the closet was filled with cases and boxes.

“We’ll sort as we empty this,” Bert told her. “I didn’t put things in any kinda order when I brought ‘em over. I’ll pass things out ta ya and ya can stack ‘em close ta the bed. We’ll use it for a table ta sort what we want ta take from here and then go next door where I put other stuff.”

Bert had done a tight job of packing the material in the closet. The pile grew as they worked. They were both sweating when it was empty.

“You sure did put a pile of stuff in a little closet,” Annie shook the corner of the dusty blanket covering the bed before using it to wipe sweat from her face.

“There’s this much agin next door,” he replied. “The three long crates what are alike, have four LAAWS each, and the four gray boxes, M79 grenade launchers. The flat crates have M16 rifles and all the small crates and boxes are ammo. There’s four different kinds of rounds for the grenade launchers.

“What do you mean those boxes have laws in them?” Annie asked, eyeing the containers quizzically.

“M72 LAAWS,” Bert corrected, saying the letters. “It’s a one shot rocket tube. LAAW stands for Light Anti-Armor Weapon. It’s for blowin up buildins and people too. We’ll be takin a load of this lot with us.”

Annie assessed the pile skeptically. “The horses can’t carry this and leave room for us to ride.”

“You’re right there,” Bert agreed. “Soon’s we separate what we need here, we’ll do the same next door. Half mile from the base is a stable with a small horse-drawn covered wagon I parked inside. I reckon we should’a gone there first.”

The closet next door proved to hold claymore mines and M16 rifles along with the two sniper rifles and cans of freeze-dried foods Bert had mentioned before. They made the trip to the stable and returned with their horses hitched to the wagon. After a quick lunch, they sorted through the munitions.

“We’re goin ta want all the disposable rocket tubes with us,” Bert informed her. “When we leave here, we’ll head south for a few miles ta get further from Knight’s compound. I’m figurin we need ta practice fire some of them and the grenade launchers too. Truth is I ain’t fired none of them’em neither. At the same time, we’ll know if they still work, what with them being nigh on ten years old or better.”

“I’m glad you’re with me Bert. I’m scared about what we are going against.”

Bert, set the box he was taking out to the wagon down on the bed and turned to Annie with a serious expression on his face.

“There’s somethin I need ta tell you Annie. I’m half scared ta death too. I’ve never done anythin brave in my life.”

“But you were chasing after those men who raped Beverly,” she responded in a confused tone. “That was brave.”

“Annie, I’ve killed four men in my life. The one you know I was after, I shot him while he was sleepin, the other three, I shot in the back. I’ve ain’t faced any danger head on like ya. I ain’t a brave man. Girl, like I said, I’m plain scared. I hate ta tell ya this, because I’m a grown man, and I should be the one givin you confidence, but I’d be doin ya wrong ta pretend I’m something I’m not.”

“You’re brave enough to be here with me right now and you’re brave enough to go with me, so I guess you’re wrong.”

“Oh, I’m going with ya, but any plan I make in my head to get at Knight plays out ta, we might kill a few of them, but we end up dead too.”

Annie nodded in agreement. “If I was trying to make plans, mine would probably come to the same thing. Maybe you should stop thinking until we get to where he is and we can make one plan and do it.”

Bert burst with laughter. “Sometimes ya say some of the simplest things and make more sense than a whole room full of smart people. Let’s get the rest of this loaded. We should get the practice in before dark and then we’ll take the wagon closer ta the compound and hide it. Early tonight we can sneak ta the building in front of the compound and let ya see his layout.”

“Will we be safe? Won’t the guards in the towers see us?”

“I’ve done it dozens ‘a times. There’s a gully in back of the buildin we can use ta go ta it without bein seen.”

“Why didn’t Bill Knight knock the building down with the rest?”

“I asked myself the same thing the first time I went in. Found out he booby trapped the stairs and the second an’ third floor hallway.”

“What kind of traps?” Annie asked with concern.

“He’s a sneaky devil. He put explosives inside the walls of the stairway and in the halls upstairs. Under carpet-runners he’s put pressure switches to trigger the mines.”

“All we need to do is be careful where we step,” Annie said, relived.

“For sure,” Bert agreed, “but there’s some what’s hardwired ta the compound. All he has ta do is trigger it from there and the building blows.”

Annie gave Bert a confused look.

“We don’t need ta worry, I disabled those too,” he told her, noting her confusion. “One night, when it was dark and pourin down rain, I sneaked over ta the wall where the wires go through, and dug down in the sand, and snipped ‘em.”

Annie smiled. “He still believes he can blow us up if we’re in the building.”

“Exactly,” Bert replied, returning her smile.

CHAPTER 14

It took some time for Annie and Bert to figure out how to extend the tubes and arm the one shot missile launchers. They fired several of them, as well as several rounds from the grenade launchers. Only one of the rockets failed to launch. All for the rounds for the grenade launchers fired properly. Bert spent a bit of time altering a belt to fit Annie’s narrow waist. To the belt, he attached a holster for her pistol and a canteen. Annie strung Will’s hunting knife onto it.

They built a small fire to warm some freeze-dried chili. When they finished eating their meal the sun was beginning to set. Bert rounded the horses they had set free to graze and hitched them to the wagon.

Annie found traveling through the empty city streets to be even scarier at night. She could not shake the feeling people were watching them. They rode side by side on the buckboard seat with Bert holding the reins. She eventually slumped against Bert and fell asleep. After a couple hours of travel, he reined in the horses and gently shook her awake.

“Keep ya voice low, we’re not far from Knight’s compound. Take a minute ta wake up and we’ll go on foot from here.”

“I’m awake now,” Annie responded. She went behind a car to relieve herself while Bert led the horses pulling the wagon through the open rollup doors of a warehouse. She joined him inside.

“We’re in Brigham City, a few miles north of Salt lake City,” Bert informed her. Knight’s compound is about a mile from here.”

Bert removed a rolled blanket from his horse to carry with them. Annie followed him from the warehouse. They came to a place where a huge expanse was bulldozed flat around a large walled off area. Annie could see the top of a building projecting above the walls. Light shone in several windows. As Bert had told her, there was only one tall building still standing near the cleared area and it was set far from the front of the compound. She stopped to stare at Knight’s fortress. Bert squatted beside her and motioned for her to do the same.

“The compound is like I pictured it, except the buildings are larger than I thought they would be. The whole place is bigger than I thought and it’s stronger too,” Annie whispered.

“Yep,” Bert agreed. “Thing is, if it weren’t for the fact he’s got folk’s loved ones in there, we could blast Knight’s stronghold to pieces. Once we get inside the buildin, you stay close ta me. I reckon I’ll hold ya hand ta guide ya ‘cause it’ll be black as tar in the stairwells. The third floor is where he has pressure switches under carpet runners. The hallway is on the back wall of the buildin facing away from the compound and it’s mostly windows. There’s enough moonlight tonight ta light the hall and let you see where I step. The stairways will be pitch-black. I don’t like ta use light when I’m in the buildin, but this once I’ll use a lighter so’s ya can see the steps. Ain’t any booby traps in the first and second floor stairs, but there are two in the third floor stairway. Don’t step on the third and fifth step. Once ya lift ya foot ta a step it counts as one.”

“Don’t step on the third and fifth step,” Annie repeated.

She followed Bert. A shallow ravine led almost to the entrance of the three-story building outside the compound. The building shielded them from view of the two guard towers. They entered and Annie held Bert’s hand as she followed him across the lobby to a door.

“Once we get inside the stairway you won’t be able to see,” he whispered. “Keep aholt’a my hand until we get ta the base of the third set of stairs. When we get there, let go so you can hold onto the rail while you count steps. Remember. First time ya lift ya foot counts as one. Whatever ya do, don’t step on the third or fifth tread or its Sadie bar the door.”

“What does that mean?”

“Means we’ll be dead if ya mess up.”

It was pitch black inside the stairwell. Annie could not see Bert in front of her, much less her feet. If not for the comfort of his hand, she would not dare venture into such blackness. She stumbled on the first few steps until she found the rhythm. She stumbled again, and, not knowing they had reached the landing, she lifted her foot for one more step.

“Sorry,” Bert said, “Should’a warned you.”

At the landing for the third set of steps, Bert stopped to whisper some instructions.

“I’ll go first. I’ll put your hand on the rail before I do. Best would be to go to the second step and get both feet on it, skip the third one, and get both feet together again on the fourth before skipping the fifth one. I’ll light the lighter when you say you’re ready. Keep a firm grip on the rail and you’ll be okay.”

Bert placed her left hand on the rail and went up the stairs. Annie hesitated, attempting to stop her body from shaking. She blindly shuffled her feet forward until her toes touched the bottom of the first step and let Bert know she was ready.

The old disposable lighter broke on Bert’s first flick of the wheel, the top pieces coming loose and flying in all directions.

“Damn, I only brought the one. Touch with your hands and count the steps. You’ll be okay.” At least twenty seconds passed without him hearing any movement from Annie. “Are ya comin,” Bert whispered.

“I’m coming Bert, just not very fast. I’m peeing on myself scared.”

She lifted her foot and mounted the first and the second. She bent to touch the edge of the third step and felt for the top edge of the forth step before going to it. She repeated the process for the fifth step. A few steps later Bert once again wrapped her hand in his.

“We’re almost there.”

The door at the top of the third landing opened into a wide hallway with one wall completely glass. Moonlight streamed in and was blindingly bright as they emerged from the dark stairwell.

“It’s not tricky from here, follow close and step wide over the places where I do,” Bert instructed.

It was a long hallway and there were a few sections of carpet at regular intervals. Bert stepped widely over four places and Annie followed suit. Three-quarters of the way down the hall, Bert turned right and Annie followed him to the end of a short hall to a door with a sign on it, ‘Johnson Masters and Associates’.

Bert guided Annie to stand outside the door and retreated a few feet. “Give me a second ta hang my blanket.” He unrolled the blanket and attached two corners to hooks set high in the wall on either side.

“I rigged this some time ago ta block the moonlight from gettin’ in when I open the door. We need to be crawling when we go in. There’s a window facing the compound. Once we get in, crawl straight to it.”

Annie did as he said and crawled to the window with Bert close behind her and peered over the edge. Electric lights on metal poles lit the yard of the compound and light shined from windows of the three buildings clearly visible from where they knelt, three stories high. Annie could see a man in each of the corner guard towers. Several men and women were outside of the buildings.

Bert spoke close to Annie’s ear. “Knight’s place is strong set. The electric comes from solar panels on the roofs of the buildins. He’s got a deep drilled well inside the compound and plenty of food stored.” He reached in his pocket for the scope he had taken from Annie’s small rifle and handed it to her.

“It sure is a strong place,” Annie stated, after surveying the compound for several minutes.

“This ain’t no push over we’re going against. Knight runs an orderly operation.”

“I can see why you couldn’t rescue the women.”

“Like I said before, it’ll be a tough nut ta crack,” Bert asserted. “Are you gettin’ any ideas yet?”

“No,” Annie answered truthfully. “Why are there so many people moving around this late?”

“It’s Wednesday night, party night. Wednesday evening, Knight plays cards with his officers, and his men get time with the women. Knight don’t mess with the women, he prefers his sex young, boy or girl. Right now though, he has him a favorite boy he stole from the Gibbs family. He’s had the boy near on a year. He’ll want fresh meat soon.”

They watched the compound a few more minutes. Annie touched Bert’s knee. “Let’s go, I’ve seen all I can see.”

Going down the dark stairwells was scarier because there were more steps to count to get to the booby-trapped ones. It was late when Annie and Bert returned to the warehouse where they had concealed the horses and wagon. Bert led the horses outside and hobbled their legs. It turned chilly during the night and Annie woke up shivering. She moved her bedroll close to Bert and slept with her back against his, basking in his radiated warmth.

*

“I have a plan,” were the first words Annie spoke to Bert who was still half-asleep.

“Give me a minute outside for some mornin business and I’ll be glad ta hear it.”

When Bert returned inside, he saw Annie had set fire to a small pile of twigs and steam was rising from his kettle.

“Hurry and make your coffee,” she urged. “We’ve got a lot to do today.”

Bert rummaged for his cup and jar of instant coffee. “You’re full’a fire and spunk this morning. I thought seeing Knights place might’ve took it outta ya.” He spooned coffee into the cup and filled it from the kettle. Annie watched as he swallowed a gulp of the steaming liquid without flinching. “Tell me this plan of yours.”

He listened patiently without interrupting, shaking his head occasionally as she spoke.

“Let me get the sum of this plan. You want me ta dress ya like a dollar whore and you’re going to sashay inta Knight’s camp and make some sort of plan once ya get inside. Annie, ya just told me the dumbest plan I ever heard. Ya be gettin’ ya self in the devil’s den with no way out.”

“There’s no other way to get close to Knight. We can’t shoot into the camp because he’ll use the girls and women as shields and threaten to kill them.”

“We kep hit’n the same roadblock.”

“You see, it will take a different way. I can get in, and if nothing gives me a plan, I can make an excuse to leave on the promise to come back. You told me he likes young girls and boys, and he’s probably tired of the boy.”

“Oh, I ain’t a doubtin ya can get in, it’s the gettin’ out what bothers me. I don’t like this plan at all. I promised ya I would only help ya and not take charge and I won’t, but I’d be wrong not tellin ya I don’t like something.”

“I’m doing it, and I’m doing it today while I’m ready and before scared can set in. What do we need to do first?”

“I reckon the first thing would be findin ya some duds. That part’s easy, the stores is full of fancy clothes, women ain’t had much need for them sort a things and the lady stores will have plenty ta choose from. Makeup we can get out’a any drugstore.”

Annie stood from where she was sitting on the other side of the fire. “Let’s go and get what we need and then go over our parts of the plan.”

“Whoa girl, I ain’t finished my coffee and we ain’t going no where’s on an empty belly. Big man like me needs his breakfast.”

Three hours later, they were back at the warehouse and Bert was admiring his handiwork. Annie was dressed in a one-piece red silky-pullover dress. She wore a padded bra under it to hide she only had beginning breasts. They managed to find stockings and some dressy red shoes with flat bottoms.

Their first two attempts at applying makeup failed comically. They realized neither of them knew what they were doing and settled for only the lightest shade of red lipstick and nothing else. A string of fake pearls and two red plastic bracelets finished her ensemble. Bert stepped away to survey her.

“We didn’t turn ya inta a dollar whore, but you are mighty pretty. We done a good enough job for Knight ta be a’fancying you.”

“You remember the hand signals?”

“I do. If ya raise ya right hand, I shoot any man I can. Left hand means watch for anybody tryin ta shoot ya. No hands means no shootin and both hands means blow the towers and armory with the rockets.”

“You should leave now, Bert. I’ll wait long enough for you to be by the window in the building before I go to Knight’s camp. I’m scared but I should be okay once I get moving.”

“Ya ain’t the only one what’s scared. My stomach’s knotted and I’m not the one goin in. You be careful in there girl and if ya don’t see an opportunity ta save those girls, ya get yourself outta there. Ya hear me?”

“I hope there is a plan I can make. I’m all out of ideas if getting inside doesn’t give me one.”

CHAPTER 15

She gave Bert a half hour lead before setting out to go to Knight’s front gates. As she walked through the streets of the deserted town, it felt as though the windows of the buildings and homes were smiling, rather than menacing. She had already thought of what to say if she decided to leave without doing anything. She would tell Knight she needed to go get the rest of her clothing and belongings.

As she walked, her mind was crowded with thoughts of different situations which could arise after she was inside. Some of her thoughts were terrifying and she made herself stop worrying about what she couldn’t know.

Knight’s compound came in view, and with the razed and flattened area surrounding it, it definitely seemed menacing. A vision and a memory flooded her mind. She and Will were snapping green beans at the kitchen table. Her mother was at the stove with a bench covered with her canning jars. A pot of water was boiling on one eye of the wood-burning stove, and her mother was using it to sterilize the lids and jars. Another pot filled with beans was on the other eye and each time it came to a boil her mother would empty it into a jar and seal it before setting another batch to boiling. Grandpa and Mister Roberts were at the dining table near them and Mister Roberts was telling Grandpa a war story. She remembered Mister Roberts saying, "sometimes things ain’t clear and you have to think on the fly”.

As she walked to the tall double gates of the compound, she knew the only thing she could do was think on the fly from that point on. Both of the tower guards watched with curiosity as she approached. One of them shouted something to her but he was too far away for her to understand. She left the gate and walked toward the tower, fighting with her eyes not to glance towards Bert’s window.

Halfway to the tower, the guard shouted to her again.

“What you want here girl?”

“I’ve come to see Bill Knight.”

“You got an appointment?”

“What?” Annie shouted back.

“I’m funning you. Go to the gates and wait for them to open.”

Annie returned to the gates and waited. She heard noises on the other side and one gate swung out enough to admit her. The young woman who opened it stepped aside as Annie came through. She had long brown hair made into a ponytail and was dressed in jeans and blouse with sports shoes on her feet. Annie guessed her to be twenty years old. Annie saw fear and sadness in her green eyes.

“What you doing here girl?” the woman asked.

“I’ve come to see Bill Knight. Are you a slave or a whore?”

“Girl, are you crazy, this ain’t no place to come willing. Get out of here while you can.”

“I have business with Knight. I guess from how you spoke you’re not one of his whores, you must be a slave.”

“They ain’t much difference, we’re all whores here, and you’ll be one too if you don’t get away from here right now.”

Annie saw a man come from the main building centered on the back wall of the compound directly across from the gates. She spoke quickly to the girl during the long interval it took for him to cross the open space.

“Shut up and listen!” Annie demanded. “I told you I’ve got business here. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but you tell the slave women and anyone else you can trust, not to come outside.”

“Why, what’s going to happen?” the woman asked.

“I don’t know, but if shooting starts, stay inside, maybe lie down under something.”

“Are you Killer Girl Annie?”

“Yes, now be quiet!”

As she turned to the man who was within speaking distance, Annie wondered what Yum had been up to.

“I’m here to see Bill Knight.”

The man stopped close to her. “You can go, Judy,” he ordered, waving the young woman away.

“Yes sir, Big Ben,” Judy hurried away as though she was more than glad to leave his presence. Ben turned his attention back to Annie.

“What you want with Bill, girl?”

Annie didn’t like the man’s eyes. They were light brown and had a mean look in them. His long black greasy hair fell past his shoulders. He had a pistol and a huge knife belted to his side.

“What I want with Bill Knight is private between me and him,” Annie told Ben.

“Watch your tone with me you little bitch or I’ll cut it out of you.”

“You’ll be cutting something that belongs to Bill Knight,” Annie said, trying to keep fear from ruling her voice. “You need to take me to him right now.”

“I’ll take you girl, but you might not be what he wants to see today.”

Annie followed him across the wide courtyard and through the door into Knights headquarters building. The large room they entered was full of tables and had a platform with a speaker’s podium at the far end. Big Ben led her to an opening with stairs leading to the upper levels.

“You go first so I can watch your little ass move. I might be having me some of it in a while.”

Annie preceded him up the stairs, conscious of his mean eyes behind her. She tried not to let her ‘little ass’ move too much. She knew he was the man, Bert said, liked to cut people. They climbed two sets of stairs to the top floor. The door let out into a large space similar to the bottom floor in size. There were four billiards tables set in an open square in the middle of the floor. Annie saw there were a few tables with playing cards on them. This space had a bar counter at the far end. Two men were sitting in front of it on bar stools.

“Where’d you find the girl, Ben?” One of them called as he led her across the room to a door.

“Nothin’ to do with you fools. This little pigeon belongs to Knight. If he decides he don’t want her, you can get the sloppy after me.”

Big Ben opened the door and roughly shoved Annie through it. As Annie struggled to retain her balance, pandemonium erupted in the room.

“It’s too late now, it’s too late now, you needed to run while you could, There’s a new law in town ‘cause, Killer Annie’s come around. I told you she would. I told you she would. It’s too late now, she’s already in town.”

Annie regained her footing and stared in amazement at the source of the words. Yum was bound hand and foot to a heavy chair.

“Annie, Annie is just in time. Fat man wantin’ to cut my throat.”

“Hush Yum,” Annie commanded. She glanced around the room. The light streaming through three tall windows lit the space. There was a wide desk near the back wall. On the left side of the desk was an open door leading from the office to a long hallway. Annie saw a woman with no top on, standing in the hall, peering in her direction. A man with gold-blonde hair and a skinny beard was sitting in a chair behind the desk. He had a long scar from his cheek down the side of his neck just as Bert had described.

“You must be Bill Knight,” Annie said. “I’ve come to see you.”

“And you must be ‘Killer Annie’ this crazy nut has been yapping about. Boys, this here is Killer Annie. She’s come to kill me.”

Besides Knight and Big Ben, another man was sitting in a chair near the wall near the door Ben had pushed her through. Two more men were standing close to Knight’s desk. They both had brown wavy hair and were tall with slim waists and broad shoulders. Annie thought they were twins. The two men had pistols strapped to their sides. At Knight’s words, they burst out laughing.

Knight joined in. “It’s a hoot ain’t it? Ten feet tall with iron skin to block bullets and eyes shooting beams of fire. Ben, you can slit the crazy girl’s throat. Take her outside to do it.”

Ben pulled his knife and went to Yum’s chair. He dug at her scalp to grasp a handful of her tangled hair. “I’m gonna take her to one of the back rooms and give Little Ben a taste before I kill her.” He leaned to untie the ropes with his free hand.

“Get out of here Yum!” Annie screamed, “Disappear and fly. Now!”

The men in the room gazed upon Annie as if she was crazy. They didn’t see Yum fade to white and disappear. The ropes binding her fell in several pieces to the seat of the chair and to the floor. They did hear Big Ben scream. He was standing behind the now empty chair, dumfounded. One of his fingers and his thumb were lying in the seat of the chair. The other fingers were on the floor. The finger on the chair was flexing. The stubs attached to his hand were squirting in rhythm to his heartbeat. Annie had to dodge to avoid the flying blood.

Bill Knight surged to his feet behind his desk. “What the fucking hell.”

Annie turned at his voice and caught a glimpse of movement outside the window. It was Yum, floating in the air about thirty feet away on the same level as the room. Annie had noticed the guns of the two men standing near Knight’s desk were in open holsters. Thinking on the fly, she shouted excitedly, pointing at the twins to get their attention.

“There she is, outside the window,” she shouted, moving her finger to point at Yum. As she hoped, they rushed to the window, one behind the other to see Yum. Annie was right behind them, and she didn’t slow down. As the men neared the window to the left of the center one, she put her hands in the back of the trailing man and shoved with all her strength. The bottom of the window was less than knee high. The man in the lead went through the glass, taking parts of the wood frame with him. He flipped outward, and down. Annie continued pushing the second man, yanking his pistol from his holster in the final second before he too went out the window.

She turned in time to see the seated man stand, his hand clutching for his pistol. She fired in haste and her bullet hit him in the side. It was enough to slow him down, and her next round entered his heart. A fountain of blood gushed from his wound. He fell, hit the chair and rolled face first onto the carpet-covered floor.

Big Ben may have been dumfounded about losing his fingers, but it didn’t prevent him from knowing he needed to get out of the room. He ran for the door leading to the hallway. Bill Knight had the same thought, and got in Big Ben’s way. Big Ben shouldered him aside and sent him spinning and sprawling back into the room.

Annie fired a quick shot at the doorway and was sure she hit Big Ben before the door closed.

Bill Knight was scrambling across the carpet, going for the gun the man had dropped when Annie shot him.

Annie fired a round into the carpeted floor in front of him and moved to block his way. “You better stop moving, Bill Knight, or I’ll kill you here and now. Don’t try to get up or I’ll shoot you in the head. I won’t miss.”

Annie could hear people shouting in the area outside the office door leading to the large room. She backed toward the door, keeping her pistol pointed at Knight, fumbled behind her back and turned the handle of the deadbolt.

She returned to Knight. “Is there any other way in here?”

“Fuck you bitch, my men will bust in and I’ll be teaching you, you don’t fuck with Bill Knight.”

Annie bent and shot him through the fleshy part of his thigh, aiming not to hit the bone. She jumped away as Bill Knight screamed and curled into a fetal position, clutching his leg where she had shot him.

“Is there any other way in here from downstairs or out there,” she asked again.

Knight did not answer. He remained curled on the floor, whimpering.

“I’ll shoot you again, Bill Knight,” Annie said, again moving close to him. “This time I’ll shoot your arm.”

The threat was enough to get his attention.

“No, goddamn you. That’s the only door.”

Annie heard a noise at the window and saw a hand pawing at the sill.

“Don’t move or I’ll shoot you dead,” warning Knight as she again backed from him. As she neared the window, she heard someone begin banging on the door of the office from the big room.

“Bill, what’s going on in there,” a male voice shouted.

Annie shot at the door three times. A man screamed in pain, “God fucking damn, I’m fucking shot.”

Annie shot once more through the door and turned her attention to the window. The second man had found something to grab as he went out and was attempting to pull himself back inside. He didn’t have the strength to manage it. Annie watched him try once more to lift his body. She hid her pistol by her side and waved to the tower guards who were watching her intently as she sat on the windowsill, avoiding the broken shards of glass in the remains of the frame. The guards had their rifles ready but not aimed at her. She figured they were confused about what was happening in Knight’s office. Annie was still facing where Knight lay.

“You may as well let go,” she told the man hanging onto the windowsill. “If you don’t, I’ll shoot you in the top of your head.”

“Please help me,” the man gasped, I won’t hurt you, I promise.”

“I’m not in a place to trust you.” Annie told him. “If you drop you’ll probably break some bones, but if I shoot you in the top of your head you’ll be dead.”

“I’m not going to drop. I can’t do it. Please help me.”

Annie risked a quick glimpse away from Knight and shot the man in the top of his head. A second later, he hit the ground and Annie heard his bones breaking. She stood and moved quickly from the window, out of sight from the tower guards, retrieving the other pistol from the floor as she went.

“You’re a god damn murdering bitch,” Knight said from where he lay, lifting his head.

Annie waved the pistol menacingly. “You’d best put your head back to the carpet, Bill Knight, or I’ll murder you.” It crossed her mind she hadn’t seen Yum since she pushed the men out the window.

CHAPTER 16

Several minutes passed while Annie sat in a chair, guarding Knight. The men outside the door were again shouting to him, wanting to know what was going on. Annie’s attention was torn between watching the two doors and keeping her attention on her captive. He had recovered somewhat from being shot and she ordered him to crawl to a wall to sit against. He was glaring at her with hatred written on his face.

“You know there’s no way you’re leaving here alive, bitch.”

She stood and moved closer to him, but stayed out of his reach. “Lay back down.”

“Fuck you, skank. My men out there will put holes all through you.”

Annie could hear the men in the big room whispering. From small noises, she could tell someone was in the hall behind the other door. She strained to understand the whispering. She caught a few words, one of them was ‘rush’.

“Bill Knight, I told you to lie back down. Do it or I will shoot you again. Lay on your stomach.” She aimed her pistol at his chest.

Bill’s defiance fled as rapidly as it formed. The flat cold way Annie spoke registered and he lay down as ordered.

“I’m not going to kill you yet. I need you alive to get out of here, but if I tell you to do something and you don’t do it, I will shoot you where it won’t kill you.” She moved to be at the feet of his prone body.

“Tell your men you’re okay. Tell them, and tell them not to come rushing in here. Say it now, or I’ll shoot your shoulder.”

Bill raised his head from the floor. “I’m okay boys, I’m alive. Don’t do anything stupid. Stay out there till I call you.”

“What’s going on Bill?” one of the men shouted back.

“Tell them you’re a hostage and you’ll be killed it they do anything stupid. Don’t add any extra words like you did just now, or I will shoot you again.”

Bill lifted his head again. “Boys, if you hear....”

Annie had already picked a target. She shot Bill’s hand where it lay flat on the floor. He screamed in agony and rolled onto his back, clamping his other hand to his wounded one. Blood flowed through the fingers of the clinching hand. Annie put another bullet through the door to discourage any rush. She shouted to the men on the other side of the door that Bill was still alive.

“Bill Knight, I told you to say only what I tell you. You need to stop whimpering like a baby and pay attention to what I tell you to do. If you do anything else, I will shoot you again. Lay back down on your stomach.”

His face was now full of fear. He lay back and rolled over.

“Call to them and tell them you’re still alive.”

This time, Bill did exactly as she told him to do.

Annie returned to the chair and pushed it to a position where she could better see Bill and both doors. She sat to consider the situation. She noticed her thoughts being distracted and narrowed the source to a large clock mounted on a wall. The clock was shaped like a naked woman and the hands were where the belly button would be. To her nano-enhanced ears, the whirling movement inside it was loud enough to be an irritant. She left her seat, lifted the ugly clock from its hanger and smashed it on Bill’s desk. It shattered into several pieces and the noise stopped. She returned to her seat. A plan was forming in her mind.

“You had twenty nine men before you sent Jacobs to kill and rape and steal the women and our horses. I killed those nine. That leaves twenty. The two who raped Beverly Davis are dead. Eighteen. Two more went out the window and I shot another man. Fifteen dead. Big Ben went into the hall. There are thirteen men running free outside your door. Am I right?

“I don’t know, goddamn you. I wasn’t paying you no attention. I’m fucking bleeding to death.”

“I don’t see enough blood leaking out of you yet for you to die, you son of a bitch. I want you to do something and you better do it right or I’ll make you leak faster. I need to be able to see all your men. You’re going to tell them to go out in the yard where I can see them. If they don’t, I won’t need you. You had better make them obey. Do I need to shoot you again to convince you?”

“If I do, will you promise not to kill me?” he asked, pleading.

“No, Bill Knight, you killed Grandpa and my brother Will and a lot of other people I love. When I came in here, I told you your life is forfeit, but my grandpa says as long as there’s life there’s hope. You’d best do what I told you while you still got hope. Besides, I can shoot you more without killing you.”

Annie decided to shoot the door again and clicked on an empty chamber. She tossed the useless gun, chambered a bullet in the other pistol and shot through the door. Bill screamed at the sound of the round being fired.

She stood from the chair and carefully went to peek out a window. She could tell the guards in the towers knew something was going on. Both were kneeling behind the tower walls, aiming their rifles towards the windows. One of them caught a glimpse of her. He fired a round and the bullet passed by her close enough to hear it whizz, causing her to flinch.

Someone outside shouted for them not to shoot anymore until they knew what was going on. Annie left the window, raised the arm of the man she had shot dead, to see his watch.

“Tell them, Bill. You want them all out front in the next ten minutes and you want the tower guards down too. Make them do it or I will kill you before I leave this room. Do it now!”

Bill lifted his head to shout. “Who’s out there?”

“I’m here, Bill,” a man shouted back.

“All of you go find Hank. Tell him to get the men out in the front courtyard. Tell him the tower guards too.”

“Are you sure Bill, we want...?”

Bill twisted his body to see Annie. She had her pistol aimed at his head.

“You don’t want shit,” he screamed. “Shut the fuck up and do what you’re told. Tell Hank he has ten minutes.”

From the sounds, Annie heard from the large room, most of his men must have been in there. A few minutes later, she could hear voices through the broken window. One voice, louder than the others, was calling for the guards to come down to join them.

Annie lifted the dead man’s arm and checked the time again.

“Bill, crawl to the broken window. When you get there, stand where they can see you.”

She moved to the edge of the window furthest away where no one could see her from the ground outside. She kept her eyes on Bill as he painfully crawled to the window. He glanced at her and she could see his fear. When he managed to gain his feet she saw he had wet himself. She waited until he was standing in front of the broken window before risking a glance at the courtyard. Men were milling around out front, all of them armed with rifles and most had pistols strapped to their sides.

“Tell them to get closer together and stop moving around. You say anything else, I’ll shoot you dead Bill Knight. You still have hope.”

“Hank,” Bill shouted, “get the men in formation.”

One of the men cupped his hands to his face and shouted back. “What’s going on, Bill?”

Bill looked desperately at Annie.

“You’re the Boss of them. Make them do what you tell them to do.”

“Hank, do what the fuck you’re told. Get the goddamn men in formation.”

The man, Hank, began shouting and the men gathered into a ragged group. Annie took count. There were thirteen men.

“They’re all there. Tell them to throw their rifles and pistols far away from them.”

“They aren’t going to want to,” Bill told her. Annie thought he was ready to start bawling.

“If they don’t, you will die where you stand,” she told him, moving the pistol to get his attention.

“Hank, if you and the men don’t do what I tell you, she’s going to kill me. I done been shot twice. I want all of you to toss your weapons.”

“Toss them far, I told you,” Annie repeated, raising the pistol in a two-hand grasp, pointing it at the face he turned towards her.

“Toss them far,” Bill shouted hastily. “Do it fucking now.”

It took a lot of shouting from Hank, but the men tossed their weapons.

Even though it was too far, even with her enhanced eyesight, Annie tried to see Bert in the window of the building far outside the walls. She knew he had to be watching the compound through the sniper scope on his rifle.

“Where is the boy Bruce,” Annie asked.

“He’s back in the bedrooms.”

“Big Ben ran into there. Who else is with him?

“I don’t know, maybe two or three women.”

“Damn,” Annie instantly felt guilty for cursing, but she thought, even Grandpa might call it damn bad news. “Get Hank to send one man over to the women’s building and tell all the women to leave and go behind the building outside the gates. Tell him there are men in the building with sniper rifles ready to cut them to shreds if he doesn’t.”

“You’re a damn liar,” Bill said, regaining some spunk, “I wired the building with explosives.”

“Not any more, your booby traps were found and the wires from here were snipped. I told you not to do anything but what I say. One more time and you’ll go flying out the window with a hole in your head.”

“You fucking bitch,” hate returning to his face.

“You sure do cuss a lot. Do what I said or your hope will run out.”

“The only thing I’m hoping for is ten minutes at you with a knife,” turning to the window to follow her instructions.

It took longer to convince Hank to send a man to let the women go than it took to make them toss their guns. Bill won out, and Annie watched the women and girls leave through the gates.

“Tell Hank to stay where he is and not let any of the men move.”

While Bill passed on those words, Annie came to a decision. It was time to go. She did not know what to do concerning the three women and the boy in the back bedroom area. She did not know what Big Ben’s condition was, but she did know he still had his pistol with him. She realized she had freed all she could. It was time to leave.

Bill Knight was leaning against the frame of the broken out window, clasping his shot hand. Blood was still seeping from between his fingers. Annie saw the leg of his jeans had a large dark spot where she had shot his thigh. She did not see any blood running from his leg to the floor. She moved from her place beside the last window in the row, went to the door, unlocked the deadbolt and backed away from the door.

“It’s time for us to leave. You’ll be going out the door first.”

“I can’t walk. You shot me in the fucking leg. Maybe you’re so stupid you forgot.”

Annie pointed her pistol at him and pulled the trigger. Wood exploded from the wooden frame of the window near his face. Bill screamed, his clasped hands going to his face where splinters had hit him.

“Tell them you’re coming out and they’d better not move,” Annie commanded him. “If you can’t walk, you’re no use for me and I’ll be condemning your soul before I leave.”

Bill shouted her instructions and limped from the window to the door.

“Go through and walk to the stairs,” Annie ordered.

She allowed him to get several feet into the room before she peeked around the edge of the door. There was no place in the room to hide except behind the bar. She divided her attention between watching the bar, and Bill’s back. It took a long time to get down the stairs. Annie felt he was faking his hardship, the way he leaned against the rail and paused on each step. She did not call him out on it. All she wanted was for him to keep moving.

When they reached the ground floor, the windows there allowed Annie to see the men standing in the courtyard. The women had not closed the gates when they left and the opening seemed huge to her.

“Bill Knight, order your men to lie down. As soon as they do we are going out the gates.”

Bill opened the door to the courtyard and did as she told him. Hank tried to get the men moving but several balked.

“What’s going to happen to us, Bill, now there ain’t no women to keep the farmers off us?” one of them shouted. “They’ll come kill us all.”

Annie pushed Bill stumbling through the door. She stepped through the door as he fell and fired a shot at the man asking questions. Her bullet hit him in the stomach and he fell to his butt, holding his belly and squalling.

“All of you better do what Bill Knight told you or I’ll signal for the snipers in the building to start killing you.” Annie shouted.

Seeing the little girl shoot one of their comrades and the threat of the snipers took the argument out of them. They lay down on their stomachs.

“Go straight out the gates, Bill Knight, or die right here.”

“I did what you wanted. Let me go. I’ll get the men and we’ll leave and none of you will ever see us again.”

“Go out the gate, Bill Knight,” Annie told him.

“Please, I’m begging you. I didn’t have nothing to do with killing your people, it was all Jacobs’ doing. Please Killer Annie!”

Images of the bodies scattered among the wagons of the caravan flashed through her mind and she had no pity for Knight.

“He was your man. You sent him to our camp after you tortured Boss Henry to death. Out the gate or I’ll shoot you dead.” She fired a bullet beside his feet to get him moving.

She followed his slow, limping form toward the gates. He started crying and it slowed him even more. They were still fifty feet from the gate when two things happened. A hole appeared in Bill Knight’s back and blood splattered the ground in front of him as he fell.

Before Annie could react, for the second time it felt like someone chopped her with an axe. A bullet slammed into the upper part of her right shoulder, spinning her around and causing her to drop her pistol. Annie fought an impulse to vomit. She tried to focus on her surrounding.

She could hear someone shouting. “Bitch. Up here bitch.” She fought her way past the burning pain in her shoulder and located the source of the gunfire. There was a bare-breasted woman standing in the broken out window with the barrel of a rifle resting on her shoulder. Annie had seen the red-haired woman in the hall. Big Ben was behind her.

Annie wanted to raise her right arm to signal for Bert to watch for any man trying to shoot her, but her wounded arm would not move.

“I got your attention now you little bitch?” Ben shouted.

Annie was exposed where she stood. She could feel blood running down her side and fought another wave of nausea and her head dropped. She saw the still forms of the men she had pushed from the window lying crumpled at the base of the wall. Lifting her head back to the window made her dizzy. Big Ben no longer held the rifle. He had a knife pressed to the woman’s throat.

“I want you out of here and the women back. Do you hear me girl? I’m going to kill this one. In fifteen minutes I’m going to kill the other two women and Knight’s little boy-girl. Fifteen minutes bitch.”

With his last words, Annie watched in horror as he slit the woman’s throat. Her blood spurted a wide crimson spray from the window. Bert fired immediately afterwards. Annie knew the bullet went through the woman and hit Big Ben because he screamed and shoved the woman away and out the window before ducking from sight.

One of the men lying on the ground surged to his feet and made a dash toward where they had tossed their weapons. Bert fired again with the sniper rifle. The bullet hit the man in the back and he fell to the dirt.

A moment later, a streak of smoke and fire came out of the broken window, going directly towards the building where Bert was hiding. It went through a window near Bert’s sniper point. Several windows blossomed with huge balls of fire and smoke. A second later Annie heard the explosion. Smoke and fire blossomed again and she heard a second explosion. Furnishings and building debris flew from the windows. She saw Bert flying among them. Most of the building collapsed, creating a cloud of dust to obscure her vision.

Annie was dismayed at the sight of Bert falling, but her attention went to another man making a dash for where they had thrown their guns. The pain in her arm was fading to numbness. Her pistol was at her feet. She grabbed for it and fired at the man. The gun felt clumsy in her left hand and the first shot missed. The second shot caught him high in his left side below the armpit. He hit the ground in a nosedive, sliding several feet further.

Annie turned the pistol towards Knight’s men. Two more were on their feet, but flopped hastily back to their bellies. She heard another shot inside Knight’s building. She flinched, but no bullet came near her. A moment later, she heard a different voice calling from the window. A young boy’s head peeked over the sill.

“I shot Big Ben. Can we come out now?”

The effort of shouting back for them to come out caused another bout of pain to flush in her shoulder. Moments later the boy and two women came from the building and joined her. Annie felt woozy and she was having a hard time focusing. She kept her attention mostly on the men and only peripherally saw them.

“Get guns from where they threw them and come back here,” she ordered.

She grew even more dizzy waiting. The last thing she heard before passing out was a woman asking if she was okay.

CHAPTER 17

“Wake up Annie. Can you hear me?”

Annie could hear Beverly, but she didn’t want to wake. Her shoulder felt like it was on fire and the more aware she became, the more it hurt. She could tell she was on a bed, and when she did open her eyes, she saw she was back in the bedroom at the Davis ranch. The light of the setting sun coming through the window of the room was painfully bright.

“I am awake. Can you close the curtains? The light hurts my eyes.”

Beverly went to close the curtains, talking as she did. “The doctor is downstairs in the den working on Bert. He’s already been in and checked on you, but Bert’s really messed up. He told me to wash your blood off and clean around where you were shot … Are you crying?”

“My shoulder is burning and throbbing. It hurts, Beverly.”

Beverly cleared the top of a bedside table and lifted a pan of steaming water from the floor. “The doctor said the bullet shattered your collar bone but didn’t hit anything major on its way out. He’s going to try and put a pin in it. I’ll wash your front first. I can wash the back part without lifting you.”

Beverly continued talking as she rung the water from the washcloth and gently began washing the blood from Annie’s chest and shoulder.

“Doctor Albertson said Bert might not make it. He’s been blown-up by bombs and stove-in from falling three floors. There is barely a bone in his body not broken and he’s cut awful. Doctor Albertson thinks he’s going to die.”

Annie tried to sit and a wave of pain swept through her shoulder. “I need to see Bert,” she managed to squeak. “Help me stand.”

“You can’t go down the steps as hurt as you are. Mother would....”

“I’m going.” Annie tried again to sit. She screamed in agony. This time the pain knifed straight from her shoulder into her brain and brought more tears to her eyes.

It was a long minute after the wave passed before she managed to gasp. “Go get the men to carry me,”

Annie was insistent, and despite the doctor being against it, Bill and Eli carried her down the stairs and into the den. Annie tried not to, but she cried out and even screamed with pain several times.

Bert was lying on a large bed folded out from the couch. He was naked, and to Annie’s tear filled eyes, there wasn’t a place on his body without either blood seeping or a bone sticking out. The front of his face was gone, as if somebody took a knife and cleanly sliced his lips and nose and the middle part of his forehead off. He sounded like he was gurgling rather than breathing.

“Lay me close beside him,” she said, her voice barely a squeak. The men shifting her into position caused her to scream again.

“I hope you people are happy now. You started her bleeding again.” A man stated.

“I reckon she’s earned having her wants heeded, Doc,” Bill Davis said.

“She’s just a little girl. Move out of my way.”

“No, don’t touch me,” Annie demanded, as the doctor bent to examine her shoulder. “I want all of you to leave me and Bert alone in this room.”

“Little girl, you need to lie still and let me work. You’re hurt and—.”

Bill spoke up. “Doctor, this is Killer Annie lying here in my house. She took my daughter Jean away from hell, and killed most all of Knight’s men. If she told me to piss in a bucket and drink it, I wouldn’t ask her why, I’d just do it. Doc, you told me Bert is in pain and dying. You wanted to put him out of his misery. Let’s leave these two alone. Annie’s not bleeding enough to bleed to death.”

*

After they were gone, Annie turned her head to Bert. She was lying on her back with her hurt shoulder close to his shoulder. His eyes were closed and his damaged face and the way his breath sounded going in out made her begin crying again.

“Bert,” Annie whispered, “you are a brave man and I love you.” Annie thought of the simple kindness he showed to those who knew him.

“You nano things inside me, I want you to listen. Chief Knows It All and the Shaman sent you into me because I’m supposed to do something grand. I don’t know what it is, but I do know I’ll do it, but I want to ask you for a favor. I promise not to ask again … I mean I promise not to ask too often... I want some of you to please go into Bert here beside me and make him whole again. I’m going to ask you in the name of Jake of Heaven to … no, I’m going to ask you to do it for me.

Annie reached with her left hand to her injured shoulder, stifling her screams so no one would come rushing back into the room. She made sure to get plenty of her blood on her fingers before making a quick surging movement to half roll onto her wounded shoulder. She smeared blood on the open wounds on Bert she could reach. The weight of her body on her shoulder pulled screams of agony from her. The Doctor and members of the household rushed back into the room. Annie did not see them. She had passed out again.

*

When Annie regained awareness, she was once again in her room upstairs. The curtains were open and soft moonlight lit the room. Her shoulder was throbbing and there was a familiar, awful itch coming from her neck and shoulder and half her chest. Her left hand tried to move to scratch it, but couldn’t. A woman she did not recognize was sitting in a chair beside her, holding her hand.

“Hello Annie, I’m Jean. The doctor gave you a shot for pain but you keep trying to scratch at your shoulder. He wanted to tie your arm so you couldn’t move it, but Mama told him you weren’t going to wake hogtied.”

“Tell the Doctor I thank him. You can let go of my hand now, I’ve already had a go-round with this itch and except when I’m sleeping, I can fight myself not to scratch.”

“I’ve been holding it over two hours now. I don’t mind, but you’re strong for such a little thing. A couple times you almost pulled me out of my chair.”

“Did the doctor put a pin in me while I was passed out?”

“No, he came to see you after Dad and Eli brought you back in the room. He cleaned the blood off and put a bandage on. He left to go tend to Bert. He wanted to give Bert a shot to put him out of his misery. He made Mother mad and she told him get to out of Bert’s room, she had the patience to comfort him while he died natural.”

“Bert’s dead?”

“What … oh, I’m sorry … No, Bert’s not dead, he’s….” Jean stood and lit a kerosene lamp before going to the other side of Annie’s bed.

“Can you see any of your shoulder?” she asked, turning down the cover.

Annie could barely move her neck. “No, my head won’t turn. What did you want me to see?”

“There is some sort of a filmy strange powdery white stuff on your skin around where you were shot. After my mother ran the Doctor away from Bert, he came up here. The white stuff was starting to come on your skin. The Doctor tried to wipe it off with his fingers. It stung him and he started cussing. He tried to wipe it off with a rag, but it didn’t come off. He tried scraping it with one of his instruments from his bag and the stuff passed through the metal.”

“But Bert... He’s not dead?”

“No, but he’s covered head to foot with the same white fog except there’s more of it. It’s so thick you can’t see any of him.”

“I don’t hurt much now. I’d like to go see him. I’m hungry too, and thirsty. I’m really hungry and thirsty.”

Jean went to get her Mother. Marge told Annie there wasn’t any need for her to be out of bed and there wasn’t anything to see but a white cloud where Bert was. Marge was full of questions about what was happening to Bert, but all Annie could tell her was, it was tiny little machines all over him and she hoped they were making him well.

While Marge was talking, Beverly arrived with a tray of food. Annie drained the glass of milk on it.

“What happened at the compound after I passed out?”

“Girl, there’s a story to tell,” Jean declared.

“If it’s going to be a long story maybe I will need some more food and a lot more to drink. I’m hungry and thirsty.”

CHAPTER 18

While Jean was speaking, Annie was restraining herself from eating like a pig at a feeding trough. She was so hungry it was all she could do not to bury her face in the fried potato and meat hash on her plate.

“I was one of the women in the rooms upstairs. When the shooting started, me and—.” Jean choked with emotion and a tear flowed from her eye. She squeezed her hands to fists. Her face clenched tight for several seconds and then relaxed.

“I’m not going to cry. I’m not there. I’m at home with my family who love me. Annie, when the shooting started, I was in a room putting makeup on Bruce, the little boy Knight was using. I guess Knight thought it made him less of a pervert if Bruce was more like a girl. Bruce is only twelve, and the things Knight did, hurt him something terrible.”

“Anyways, me and Bruce were peeking out the bedroom door when Ben came into the hallway. A bullet came in with him. It hit him in the side, went through him and hit the wall close to us. Lena, the redhead woman Ben killed, was in the hall. Ben dragged her into a bedroom and made her bandage his hand and side with strips from a bed sheet.”

“I thought I hit him,” Annie interjected. “I wish I killed him, if I had, Lena would still be alive.”

“You hurt him enough, he was going to die. Stinky stuff was turning the bandage tied around his side mostly brown. Ben was raving mad. He made me and Lena and Bruce and Glory, Glory was Ben’s private whore, stay with him in the bedroom closest to Knight’s office.

“He opened the window and we could hear Knight shouting instructions to the men outside. When Ben heard you were leaving with Knight as a hostage, he figured you were going to dance right out and leave him and the rest of the men to the ranchers and farmers. Knight didn’t know it, but Big Ben hated him. You and Knight started across the courtyard. Ben pushed Lena into the office and took a rifle from the gun closet in there.”

“I guess he took a rocket from there too.” Annie surmised.

“That was after. Anyway, while he was fussing, making Lena stand still to use her shoulder to prop his rifle on, Bruce snuck to the gun closet and grabbed a pistol. The poor boy stood behind Ben with the pistol pointed at Ben’s back, but he couldn’t pull the trigger, all he did was stand there and shake, and finally run out of the room with the pistol.”

“He’s a little boy,” Marge said. “There are a lot of grown men who might have frozen.”

“I’m not faulting him,” Jean said. “Right after he ran out of the room, Ben cut Lena’s throat and he got shot by Bert, this time in the same shoulder as his hurt hand. It didn’t slow him down much. We found out the bullet went through Lena first.”

Annie interrupted Jean again. “I saw when it happened. Big Ben cut Lena’s throat and blood spurted out. Bert shot through her after she was cut.”

“Dad figured she was.” Beverly elaborated. “Lena was as good as dead from the cut and Bert’s bullet going through her heart was a blessing.”

“What happened after Lena went out of the window,” Annie asked.

Jean continued telling what happened after Annie was shot.

“Ben went back to the gun closet and I ran out the door to get the pistol from Bruce. It took me a minute to find him. He was hiding under a bed, crying. By the time I got back to Knight’s office, Ben had fired the rocket and was trying to catch Glory. Glory didn’t want to be caught and was dodging him around the desk. I came through the door at the wrong time and he kicked my feet from under me. He kicked the pistol loose and it went skittering back into the hallway.”

“Shot twice and all his fingers gone from one hand and he was still dangerous. Ben was the worst of the bunch,” Marge said.

“He sure was,” Jean agreed. “The son of a bitch used my hair to drag me to my feet. Bruce came back into the room. He had the pistol again and he was crying to beat all. He told Ben to get his goddamn hands off me. Ben pushed me down and started towards Bruce and Bruce shot him in the heart. Big Ben stood there for at least two or three seconds then he fell sideways and was dead.”

“I’m glad he’s dead,” Annie said around a mouth full of food.

“Amen to that,” Marge agreed. “Death Word Speaker showed up. She told us you were at the fort killing Knight and his men.” Marge noticed Annie’s confused expression and stopped talking.

“No, it’s okay, Yum changes her name so often I forgot what she was calling herself down here.”

‘Yum?” Marge repeated.

“Another name Death Word Speaker uses, and she has others.”

“She is one complicated child. Anyway, Bill and Eli saddled the horses like there was fire chasing them and lit out of here. I wasn’t staying behind while my other daughter might be in danger. I had Jarrod hitch the horses to the wagon and me and Beverly got to the fort almost as fast as Bill and Eli.

“Jean and the other girl—.”

“Glory,” Jean supplied.

“Jean and Glory had what remained of Knight’s men corralled against the wall by one of the towers. They had to shoot two of them to get them moving. Little Bruce was trying to help you, but he didn’t have any idea what to do and you had already bled a gallon into the dirt. Bill and Eli took over from the girls guarding Knight’s men and shot all but two of them. Jean and Glory vouched for those two.”

“It’s over.” Annie asked. “All of them needing killing are dead.”

Beverly shook her head and spoke. “No not yet. Bill Knight is in our barn. He’s dying, but he’s taking his damn time. Death Word Speaker told Dad not to kill him. She claims he belongs to you.”

“It would have suited me if your dad and Eli had killed him with the rest. Little Bird has her—.

“Little Bird?” Jean said, quizzically.

“Death Word Speaker.”

“Oh, another name,” Jean stood and took the tray with Annie’s empty plate from her lap. “Are you still hungry?”

“I sure am... and maybe two more glasses of milk if there’s enough?”

“There’s plenty,” Jean replied, going to the bedroom door and shouting for Jerrod. Jerrod stepped in instantly.

“Boy, you don’t need to be out in the hall listening,” Marge declared. “I reckon you heard what Annie wants. Don’t be all day.”

“My boy has a crush on you, Annie,” Marge remarked as soon as she was sure Jerrod was out of earshot.

“He’s a sweet boy,” Annie said.

“More than you know,” Marge agreed. “There is a lot left to tell you. Are you okay or would you rather hear it later?”

“I’m better since I ate, and the nano things must be stopping my shoulder from hurting, but it sure does itch. What happened to the other women we freed?”

“They’re back with their folks. Bill and Eli put you and Bert on the wagon. They stayed at the fort with the women and the two men they spared. As soon as we moved you and Bert inside, I sent Jerrod to tell the Doctor he was needed, and from there to the Douglas farm where the ranchers and farmers were gathering for the trip to Haven. He was to let them know Knight’s men were dead and if they had any kin at the fort, they needed to go get them.”

Beverly interrupted her mother “Jerrod rode his horse to death. It’s over fifty miles to Doctor Albertson’s place. Jerrod’s horse fell out five miles short and Jerrod ran the rest of the way. The Doctor loaned him a horse to finish his errand He cried all day yesterday. He raised his horse from a colt, had to bottle feed it because the mare died birthing.”

“He’s over it now, and I know he’d still ride as hard if he had to do it again,” Marge said. “You all hush, I hear him coming.”

Jerrod came into the room and brought the tray to Annie’s bedside.

“Are you f-f-feeling better,” he stammered, blushing as he set the tray for her.

“Yes I am. Thank you Jerrod, and thank you for getting the doctor here.”

“Maybe you d-d-didn’t even need him with the magic in you.”

“They’re machines, not magic,” Annie corrected, “and they are slow to work. Me and Bert could’ve bled to death if the doctor hadn’t gotten here when he did. You saved our lives.”

“I rode Lightning to death, but I’d d-d-do it again for you.” Jerrod blushed again and rushed from the room.

“Puppy love is about to kill him,” Marge said.

Annie stifled a yawn. “I think he’s wonderful... I need to eat this food in a hurry. The nanobots are going to put me to sleep and I’m glad. I don’t itch when I’m asleep.”

“Eat,” Marge said. “My girls will watch over you.”

CHAPTER 19

On the third morning after arriving at the Davis farm, the itching in Annie’s shoulder wound lessened and turned into an unbearable tingling sensation from her neck to the fingertips of her right hand. The nanobots were no longer visible and there was no evidence, no scar, nothing to indicate she was injured, but Annie knew they were still working on the inside parts. She was unable to move her upper arm and shoulder because the nanobots somehow had them immobilized. She was able to turn her head slightly and bend her right arm at the elbow. Her greatest joy was finding she could wiggle off the bed and stand without pain. True to their word, the women of the house had kept her company throughout this time.

On her feet again, Annie’s first desire was to see how Bert was doing. With Marge anxiously beside her, she went down the stairs to where Bert lay on the foldout couch-bed.

She had been told all she would see was a white dense fog conforming roughly to his shape without any features, but she felt the need to be near him and speak to him just in case he was awake and alert inside the cloud. The first thing she noticed was a mound in the cloud where his stomach should be. Beverly was sitting in a chair near where Bert lay. She spoke as Annie and Marge entered the room.

“He hasn’t moved.”

“He’ll likely be in the cloud two more days at least,” Marge said. She stopped beside her daughter and turned to speak to Annie.

“Bill spoke to Haven early this morning on the radio and talked to Doctor Herman.”

“He spoke to Heavens’ Doctor,” Annie repeated incredulously.

“Why shouldn’t Bill talk to her, Honey? The proctors in Heaven … Dog gon’it … Haven … are simply people like us. The rumors of magic have most people believing they are some sort of super beings.”

“Jake and his family and lots of others are,” Annie replied with certainty, they don’t age and they are super strong.”

“Only because they’re infected like you, but inside their minds they’re as human as you and me. Doctor Herman says Bert might be capsuled for—.”

“Encapsulated,” Beverly, corrected.

Marge gave her daughter a frown. “Same thing … Encapsulated for as long as a week.”

“Why is there a lump on his belly,” Annie asked.

“Doctor Herman told Bill we should pile food on Bert and the nanobots would use it for material to repair him, otherwise they would rob material from other parts of his body. She told us raw food would do. This way he won’t come out starving.”

“Did Doctor Herman tell Bill Bert’s going to be okay?” Annie asked.

“Better than okay. She told Bill, if the nanobots stick to what they usually do, when they’re fixing somebody, they come out better than they were. Told Bill they heal the body completely, even old injuries and age diseases like arthritis. If they do, they’ll probably give him a perfect nose. I might miss the little crook it had from getting broken in a fight.”

Annie went closer to the bed and bent over to place her head near to where Bert’s should be. “I don’t know if you can hear me Bert, but the people in Heaven say you’re being made whole again. You are back at Bill and Marge’s house and we’re waiting for you to wake. I hope you are asleep and don’t itch. You were hurt so bad you would be itching out of your mind by now. Hurry and get well. I love you Bert.” A tear rolled from Annie’s eye and fell on the cloud-like particles surrounding his head. The spot where the tear landed turned deep sky-blue and the blue color spread out in a circle, fading to white.”

“Has Yum been back?” Annie asked as she straightened. “Is she here?”

“She was here for a little while yesterday,” Beverly said.

Marge expanded on Beverly’s statement. “She’s gone and found another sizable group of fifty farmers and ranchers from down near Provo. She says there are some smaller groups and individuals scattered here-and-there fairly close by. Eli rode out yesterday to help them get organized. Your wild friend convinced them they needed to go to Haven with us…. What’s wrong with the little girl? Why’s she so twitchy and out of control?”

“She’s broken.” Annie, retold the events, Chief Knows It All, told her of the accident which almost killed Priscilla Echols, and how the nanobots had to replace most of her mind and body with the little machines. Marge and Beverly were near tears at the end of her telling.

“Poor little thing. She doesn’t know who she is and can’t remember her family.” Marge said. “What she needs is someone to love her.”

Annie agreed. “I think Yum’s found a mother with a lady in our caravan... If she would stay in one place long enough to be mothered. She can’t keep still.

“What are your plans now, Annie? Beverly asked.

“I need to get to Cheyenne, Wyoming. My mother and the caravan are probably there by now, waiting for me. I can’t leave until Bert wakes. He’s going with me.”

“Bert may have had enough of riding with you.” Marge said wryly.

“I’ll talk to him after the nanobots let him wake up.

“I was joking. He’ll ride with you,” Marge said, “He pretty much owes you his life.”

“He saved my life too. He and I are even. He’ll come with me because it will be the right thing for him to do.”

Marge laughed, “With Bert, if it’s the right thing to do, he’ll do it. Are you hungry? Would you like us to help you back to your room and bring you something?”

“No... I mean, yes I’m hungry, but I don’t need help. I can eat downstairs. I have a job to do before I eat. I need a pistol and I want you to make sure no one is in the barn. Bill Knight is waiting for me.”

Marge left to clear anyone from the barn area. Beverly waited until her mom went out the front door before speaking to Annie.

“Eli has been different ever since you faced him in the dining room. I wish now I had spoken to him the way you did. I reckon a woman gets into the habit of the man running the family and she sometimes forgets she can talk too. I’m not going to let someone treat me low down again.”

Annie’s thoughts and ideas which ran through her mind while lying in the bed for the past days came to the surface of her mind.

“I’m finding there are lots of people who don’t know they have a voice. They let other people tell them, who they are, instead of knowing for themselves. A person has to stand where they are, for who they are. Sometimes you get hurt like Bert did, sometimes maybe even die like Grandpa did and my brother Will, but if you back away from who you are and what you should do, you deserve what you get. It is easy for me to say this, but in a way, while I believe it is true, the people who are mashed down sometimes don’t know how to stand or even they can.”

Beverly spoke. “I was one of those mashed down. Eli talked to me after we left the table. I realized while he was talking, it was the first time he ever talked to me. Always before, he was talking at me. He told me, if someone came through and pulled his pants down and did bad things to him, he knew I would hold him and cry for him. He cried for me, Annie, and for the first time, the words, I love you, coming from him made me know he loved me. Not just someone to be with, to make babies and make house with, but… I don’t know… the real and whole me as a person and it felt different and right.”

“The Shaman foresees me doing a great deed and I know what it is,” Annie said. “That’s why I need Bert with me.”

“You’ve already done your deed. My sister is back with us and Knight’s gang is done for. Heck, it was a great deed you did rescuing your mother and avenging you family and friends.”

“I don’t think those were the deeds the Shaman meant. There is a plan growing in my mind. I’m going to Cheyenne to my caravan and tell them to wait for your people to join with us. By the time you folks get there I should know my path.”

“Your path should be to stay with your mother and your people and go to Haven and be a little girl. You’ve done enough killing and....”

Marge called for Annie from the front door. Annie stood and gave Beverly a quick hug. “I’m going to be who I am,” she said, as she went out the door to where Marge was waiting.

Marge gazed at Annie with concern. “Everyone knows to stay away from the barn till you’re finished with Knight. I left a pistol on a workbench inside the door. He’s in the third stall on your right... Are you certain you want to do this? Doc Albertson was by early and he’s sure Knight’s going to be dead by this evening, tomorrow morning for sure. You killing him will be cold-blooded murder”

“No mam. It will be hot-blooded murder. I told him his life is forfeit and I intend to take it.” Annie replied flatly. She turned from Marge and made the long trek to the barn.

The barn was huge and smelled of horses and hay. The open doors softly lit the aisle down the center to another set of open doors at the far end. Annie entered and her nano-enhanced eyes immediately adjusted to the dimly lit space. She stopped at the workbench. With her fingertips, she touched the grey metal body of the pistol lying on it. For some reason, she expected the gun to be warm, but it was cold.

As she stood there, she could hear Knight, moaning. The sound of him was low and weak. The coldness of the gunmetal seeped into her, the sound of the murderer touching her emotions and stirring memories of the weeks leading her to this barn and to the gun.

The fingers of her left hand grasped the metal, her index finger slipping naturally, almost familiarly through the trigger guard to rest against the trigger. She worked the slide action to be sure there was a chambered round. A bullet ejected as a new one seated. She left the workbench and went to the gate of the third stall, opened it and stepped inside.

Bill Knight lay on his back on a bed of hay. His shirt was gone and there was a large square bandage taped to his bare chest. The skin around the bandage seemed to be glowing dull-red to Annie’s eyes. Someone had cut away the pants from the leg she had shot. The leg, along with his bandaged hand, was swollen to shapelessness. He was awake, watching her as she entered, his eyes yellow-tinged and lifeless with his breath coming in slow, wheezing pulls. He didn’t try to speak. Annie went to kneel beside him.

“Bill Knight, I’m here to collect what is owed. Seeing how you’re suffering, it might be fitting to let you endure it to the end, but I will keep my word to you. My grandfather, my brother, all the others were murdered on your say. My mother and my friends raped on your say. People down here murdered and raped on your say.”

Bill Knight tried to speak but even to Annie’s ears, it was inaudible. She bent closer. “I don’t want to die,” Bill whispered. Annie sat back as if burned.

She remained kneeling beside him, staring down at the face of the man who had brought sadness to her and to many others. She again became aware of the gun in her hand. Now the metal was warm, drawing heat from her body, leaving behind coldness in her heart.

“I told you back at your compound your life was forfeit, Bill Knight. There is no hope for you. Not now, and not after you are dead. How you are lying here. Weak. All by yourself. Hurt. This is how you will be for the eternity lasting forever after living. It will be damp, dark and cold there. The bugs will find your hurt places and they will eat your body. Their meal will never end and neither will you.”

Annie placed the pistol against his forehead and spoke to him in a low calm voice. “I condemn you Bill Knight. You will take my hate with you and leave me clean. My job is done.” The sound of the gun echoed in the huge dim cavern of the barn, overpowering Bill Knight’s last feeble effort in life, as he squeaked the word, “no.”

*

The next day the nanobots left Bert’s body. It happened at night. Marge walked into the kitchen before daylight to begin preparations for breakfast and saw him sitting at the dining room table drinking a cup of coffee. Her scream was not a scream of joy. It was a terror-filled shriek, which brought the household rushing to the dining room, Bill and Eli with their pistols drawn.

“Are you planning on shooting me over a cup of coffee Bill?” Bert asked, as he stood. Where’s Annie? Is she okay—?” He stopped talking and took in the faces of the others.

Bill Davis found his voice. “Annie is fine. Have you seen yourself in a mirror?”

A worried expression crossed Bert’s face. “Am I scarred? I know I was hurt ... I think maybe I should be dead. I remember gettin’ blown out the third floor window. Am I—?”

Marge interrupted his questioning. “Bert, you damn handsome devil. You scared the crap out of me. Go to the hall bath and take a gander at yourself.”

Annie came into the kitchen shortly afterwards.

“Ben told me Bert’s awake. Where is he?”

“Oh, he’s up alright,” Jean, answered. “He’s in—.”

Bert reentered the kitchen, a smile plastered on his face.

Annie couldn’t believe her eyes. “Bert?”

“It took me a while ta believe it, but it’s me alright. You look like you’re ready ta faint. I reckon I’d be a’faintin’ myself if I weren’t so damn healthy.”

“Oh Bert, you’re... young.” Annie said.

Marge laughed, “It’s for sure he doesn’t look fifty something instead of his forties. Like he took care of himself instead of bumming around the country hunting for two-legged varmints to kill. Dog gone nanobots had to go and fix his nose too. I knew I’d miss it.”

Bert was confused. “Nanobots? What ta hell’s been going on.”

Annie went to him, took his hand in hers, and led him back to his coffee. She sat in a chair beside him, still holding his hand.

“There is a story to tell you, Bert.” Tell him a story they did.

CHAPTER 20

Annie and Bert were traveling east on Interstate 80. In a little over three weeks, they had crossed the more than four hundred miles separating Salt Lake City and Cheyenne, Wyoming. They were only 15 miles from their destination, but it was too late in the evening to continue. Bert reined the horses and guided their wagon into the parking lot of a convenience store. He and Annie climbed from the wagon, both of them stretching and groaning with the pleasure of standing after hours of riding.

“I’ll take care of the horses if you’ll get the fire going,” Annie offered. I’m ready to eat the rabbit you shot and maybe my saddle too. I’m starving.”

Bert laughed,” I’ll throw mine in the pot with yours. We should’ve stopped for lunch. The horses are probably ready to eat us. Give’um half of the grain what’s left. We’ll give water in the morning, they watered plenty at the last creek we crossed.”

“I thought we had a chance to make it all the way,” Annie replied as she loosened the cinches on the harnesses. “Angel getting a stone bruise slowed us. If we make it tomorrow, it’ll be late in the day. We’ll be walking the rest of the way to let her foot heal. I promised Sue Ann I’d take care of her.”

Bert gathered firewood while Annie prepared the horses for the night. As she worked, she thought about seeing her mother again. She was excited, but also filled with dread, knowing how upset her mother would be when she told her about her new plans.

While the rabbit was roasting and the dehydrated vegetables were warming in the pot, she and Bert sat in comfortable silence across the fire from each other, lost in their own thoughts. Curiosity caused Annie to break the silence.

“What are you thinking Bert?”

“Lot of things, but mostly how two little girls came and shook the pinning’s outen under everybody. Thinking how life can be one way and all of a sudden take off in a different direction with no warning.”

“Living is like that,” Annie said. “Things happen and life changes.”

“Them’s true words,” Bert agreed. Just like this wagon still loaded with rockets and grenades. Came down ta it, they didn’t do a damn thing for us. “When we pull into your ma’s camp tomorrow, I don’t want to be within slappin distance when ya tell her ya plannin. She’s liable to work it out I put it in ya head.”

“If she hears you cussing like you do, she’ll give you an earful. I’ll need to get her off alone to tell her. She’s not going to like it.”

Annie stood and called for Yum to join them if she wanted. Calling for Yum was like calling for the wind to blow. Most of the time she didn’t respond, but some times she would simply be there when called. Like with Chief Knows It All, Yum loved to appear behind Bert and scare him half to death. Annie knew she was encouraging her by laughing at Bert’s reaction, but she couldn’t help herself. They hadn’t seen her for more than a week. Annie thought she was probably at the Walmart in Cheyenne letting Missus Ellers dote on her while she waited for their arrival. She turned to address Bert.

“I’ll take first watch tonight. I’m too keyed up to fall asleep yet.

Bert stood and stretched, arching his back. “The rabbit’s cooked. Let’s eat and make camp. I’m tired and it’s starting ta get cold.”

*

Annie was correct they would arrive at the Walmart late in the day. The two of them had walked to lessen the load the horses were carrying but Angel began limping again and Bert’s horse pulled the wagon the last five miles. The sun was only a hands width above the mountaintops when the parking lot full of circled wagon came into view. Annie could tell more people had joined the caravan because there were more wagons than her people were driving. The caravan had grown in the time since she’d separated from them. Before they were within shouting distance, a man on a horse came galloping towards them. As he drew near, Annie saw it was Chief Knows It All. He reined to a stop beside Annie, and greeted them without a smile.

“Annie, you’re here so I suspect you met with success in Salt Lake City. Who’s this riding with you?” the Chief asked, glancing at Bert.

“Bert Miller,” Bert answered, speaking for himself. “And you?”

The Chief swung his horse around and moved close enough to reach down to take his hand. “I’m Teacher, some times known as Chief Knows It All,” he told Bert as their hands met, flashing only the briefest of smiles. “I know you must be ready for some real food. You can guide your wagon in and find the Higgins camp. I need a few minutes alone with Annie. We’ll join you there.”

Bert glanced towards Annie. She nodded to him. “Tell my mother I’ll be there soon.” Annie watched pain cross the Chief’s face as Bert strode off, leading his horse.

“There’s something wrong,” Annie said. “I see it in you face.”

“Annie I—.”

His tone revealed what he hadn’t voiced. “My mother is dead,” Annie felt her body stiffen. “How did it happen?”

“Wild dogs... It was a warm night and Sue Ann and Martha, were sleeping under the wagon. Your mother went outside the wagon circle to relieve herself. The two girls were bitten and chewed trying to get the dogs off her, but they were too late. One dog managed to get to her throat.”

Annie, tried to speak, but a deep gasp took her voice. She turned from him and leaned against Angel.

“How long ago?”

“It happened two days after you left for Salt Lake. We were still at the Walmart.” The Chief paused for a long moment before speaking again. “Is there anything I can do to help you with this?”

Annie pushed away from Angel. “Yes, you can take Angel on in for me. I need to be alone.” She turned to walk away, but turned to the cChief again. “Thank you for riding out to tell me.”

Chief Knows It All nodded his head. “I didn’t want you to come in unknowing. I am going to pile another burden on your shoulders. Martha and Sue Ann are devastated by your mother’s death. Martha, especially, believes she let you down. Take the time you need to come to grips with your loss, but please understand the loss is not yours alone. A few words from you, said the right way can ease the pain and guilt they feel.”

“Who’s going to ease my pain and my guilt,” Annie cried out.

“You will,” the Chief answered. He turned his horse towards the circle of wagons. There was nothing he could do for her, nothing he could say.

Annie watched his retreating back until he entered the circle of wagons and then sat where she was. Hands in her face, racking sobs strong enough to shake her apart, she sought solace from her guilt, sought a release tears could not bring. Hours later, exhausted, she fell asleep on the ground. She did not see a well-groomed Yum gently cover her with a blanket, nor hear her mutter how lucky Annie was to have had a mother to lose.

Later in the night, she had another visitor who stayed. Bert was the first person she saw on the day her new life began. He was busy making a fire.

“Good morning Bert,” she greeted him, rolling to prop her head with her hand. “Were you here all night?” She sat and reached a hand towards him. “Give me a pull.”

Bert helped Annie to her feet. “Couldn’t sleep for worrying about ya. It got a little chilly this morning and thought I’d mosey over here and keep ya company whilst ya slept... Thought ya might welcome a warm fire. Iffen ya need more alone time, I can go.”

“No. Being alone would only give me more time to pity myself. I’m hurting, but I can’t sort it out by myself. I need other people. You wouldn’t happen to have your kettle and a couple cups would you?

Bert chuckled. “I told ya not ta try coffee, ya’d get hooked. How ‘bout ya build up the flames and I go fetch the makings?”

When Bert returned, the fire was going strong and Annie was beside it with her head again buried in her hands. Bert, pretending not to notice, used a stick to drag coals from the flame to set the kettle on. He spoke to her as he worked.

“The other night we was saying how things happen and life changes. Them’s your words and as true today as they were then. It don’t take the hurt away I know, but change, sometimes powerful, painful change, is a natural thing. Your ma would’ve been dead all the same iffen ya’da been with her. Ya honor ya ma by grieving, and ya will honor her by living. She placed ya here on this earth and she died a’knowin she done a good thing. Ya already done enough ta make ten mamas proud.”

Annie raised her face from her hands. “If I don’t go into the wagons, if I walk away, I can go on thinking she’s still alive.”

“Ya got ta face it sooner or later. The Chief was right. It’s hard ta tell who’s hurtin’ worse, ya or those two girls who feel like they let ya down. There’s lots of hurt inside of the wagon circle. I didn’t see no eye what wasn’t red from cryin.” Burt lifted the kettle from the flames and filled the two cups he’d spooned coffee into. “Let’s drink our coffee and get ta livin through the change.”

*

Annie had Bert return to the camp to ask Martha and Sue Ann to join her by the fire. While she waited and grieved, she formed a belief that her mother would have her husband, Roy, and Will, and Grandpa for company. They wouldn’t be glad Lori was dead, but Annie knew they would be happy to see her.

After a few minutes, she saw Martha and Sue Ann leave the circle of wagons and walk hesitantly towards her. She could see they were crying. Their tears made hers want to return, but she pushed them back, rose from the fire and went to greet them.

Their crying grew stronger as she closed the gap. Annie stopped in front of them.

“I want you to stop crying. I know it’s going to be hard to do, so take your time. I want hugs from both of you, but not sad hugs. I need joy, not sadness.” Annie turned and went back to the fire and threw on the remaining pieces of wood Bert had gathered. After a few minutes the two girls approached her, wearing pasted smiles they had to fight to maintain.”

Annie stood and went to Martha who was much taller than her. “Bend over, I want to hug you proper,” she told her, reaching out her arms. Martha bent and folded Annie to her chest. As she did, a deep sob shattered Martha’s resolve not to cry.

“Oh Annie, I’m so sorry. Me and Sue Ann fought the dogs but they’d already mauled you mother.”

“Fighting dogs isn’t easy to do. You tried to save my mother and you couldn’t.” Annie released Martha and pulled Sue Ann into her arms.

“Thank you for fighting the dogs Sue Ann. Did they hurt you?”

“They chewed us a little until Martha pulled them off your mother and went at them with her axe. Gert Ellers stitched my arm and Martha’s leg.”

Annie let go of Sue Ann. “Martha, Sue Ann. I spent last night telling myself if I had stayed with the caravan and not went to Salt Lake City, maybe my mother would still be alive. I was hurting my own self by feeling guilty about something I wasn’t in charge of. Life is in charge of things that happen, not me and not either of you. Out here in this world, it is dangerous, and any one of us could die at anytime. We left Spokane to go to Haven. Safety, schools, electricity, and running water and the rule of law. My mother is with my father, and Will, and Grandpa, and there’s nothing to be done, nothing we can change.”

Annie reached out her arms again to them. “I need another hug before we walk into the circle.”

CHAPTER 21

Three days later, Annie went to Missus Ellers wagon to collect Yum. She overheard, Yum, arguing about wearing a dress Gert Ellers had made for her.

“Ain’t wearing no stinking little girl dress. Stinking little girl dress ain’t for Death Word Speaker to be wearing. Make me some clothes out of deer hide or canvas if you gots to be making something. I ain’t wearing nothing lets air blow round my private parts.”

Yum saw Annie come around the end of the wagon.

“Tell her, Killer Annie. Yum don’t wear no little girl dress.”

“What you wear is between you and Missus Ellers. It is a very pretty dress. I will tell you though, you need to speak kinder to someone who loves you.”

“I done told Fat butt lady I love her, but it don’t mean I got’s to wear a stinking dress.”

“Her name is, Gert, or more proper, since you are a little girl, Missus Ellers.” Annie told her. “Missus Ellers, I need Yum for a while.”

“I ain’t going no where in this dress.”

“We’re not going far and we won’t be gone long. The dress will be fine. We have serious talking to do.”

“I’ll come, but iffen anybody laughs at me I’m ripping out of it and running butt naked.”

As Annie and Yum walked, Annie reflected on Yum’s condition. The Chief had told her most of Yum’s mind and a large portion of her body was composed of Nanobots. She led Yum to a strip mall across the road from the Walmart and went into a mattress store. Martha and Sue Ann were there, waiting for them. The two girls stared in amazement at how groomed and clean Yum was.

“Your hair is spun gold,” Martha said, “and your dress is lovely. I didn’t know you were so pretty.”

“My Mama Gert thinks she’s making me a sissy girl, but I let her so’s she keeps making pies.”

Despite the words, Annie could see the compliment pleased Yum. “Missus Ellers is spoiling her,” she told the two girls. “Thank you for coming.”

“I’m still worried.” Martha said. “Are you sure it’s right to mess with something like this? Yum’s okay the way she is.”

“I’m sure we should try. I’m not sure if they will help or even if they can.”

“Yum is standing right here,” Yum said. “Talk to Yum about Yum. Why you got me here anyways? It’s time to rip out of this dress and start running.”

“We’re here for you,” Annie told her. “Tell me your real name.”

Panic crossed Yum’s face. “Ain’t telling nothing ‘cepting bye.” The parts of Yum’s body not concealed by clothing began to fade.

“Stop nanobots! Keep her here.” Annie commanded.

Yum’s color deepened and returned to normal.

“Put her to sleep,” Annie again seemed to issue an order to the air. Yum remained standing, but her eyes closed and she was still.

Annie turned to her two friends. “Help me lay her on the mattress.”

Yum was stiff as wood and no part of her body moved when they tilted her back and carried her to a mattress they had laid on the floor earlier in the day. Annie gazed at her little form.

“How old do you think she is?” Annie asked.

“Younger than you,” Martha replied, “I’d guess twelve.”

“Me too,” Sue Ann agreed. “Is what we’re doing going to hurt us?”

“I don’t know. I guess it could.” Annie said. “If you don’t want to do this with me, it’s okay to leave.

Martha shook her head. “We volunteered to help, but its scary messing with something we don’t know anything about. The nanobots killed nearly all the people in the world and you want us to let them in our heads.”

Annie moved to kneel beside Yum’s still body. “They stopped killing a long time ago. If you’re staying, we may as well get started. The nanobots are inside me and I know they can hear when I talk to them, but I don’t know if they listen to my mind when I’m not talking. There’s a chance they won’t help.”

“What do we need to do?” Sue Ann asked, kneeling beside Annie and pulling Martha’s hand to guide her to a position at her side.”

“I’d get comfortable.” Annie rose and gathered three pillows from a shelf. She beat them against the shelf frame to rid them of dust and tossed one to each of her friends. She moved back to her position beside Yum and sat on her pillow.

“Okay. Here we go,” Annie said.

Martha interrupted her. “Wait,” Should we close our eyes?”

Annie smiled. “You can if you want too, but it probably won’t matter.”

Martha reached for her sister’s hand and they closed their eyes.

Annie took a deep breath and began to speak.

“Nanobots, I told you I would not ask for favors too often. I am not asking for a favor today. Yum is not your puppet to play with. You do not let her age in her body or her mind. What you are doing is wrong, but I am hoping you are simply ignorant and don’t realize it. I know you didn’t have much to work with when the Indians begged you to save her. I have an idea and if you don’t want to do it, you can let Yum die while she’s asleep, because she is not a whole person and if you don’t want to make her whole, that’s your right, but it will be my right to kill her. I know you can bring her back to life, but I’ll keep killing her until you stop. You have no claim to her. If you helped her out of kindness, it’s time to let go of her.”

Martha spoke without opening her eyes. “If you start killing Yum, Sue Ann and I are leaving.”

“If it comes to—.” Yum’s eyes opened and Annie’s words were broken by a soft-spoken adult voice coming from Yum’s mouth.

“Give advice. Speak for this damaged child.”

Annie smiled at Yum, knowing the nanobots were seeing through Yum’s eyes. If you are in my mind, you know I would not really kill Yum, but thank you nanobots for letting me speak. I know you are not human. You know a lot about us, but you do not know what it is to be a person. When the Indians asked you to help Pricilla Echols, you did the best you knew how, but how could you know what it takes to make a young human, what it would take to fix her?”

Annie paused, and when no response came from the nanobots, she reached into the pocket of her jeans for a slip of paper.

“You asked for my advice. I wrote down what you should do.” She began reading her note.

“I will start with the hard one first. Give Pricilla Echols a childhood. Go into my mind and the two who are with me and any other minds you can, especially young minds and see what it takes to be a child and have child memories. After you do, I want you to make up a childhood for Yum and put it in her brain. Give her normal memories all the way to when she caught on fire and blend those memories with her life ever since.”

Annie paused and still receiving no reply from the nanobots, she continued from her notes.

“Yum is who she is. Do not change her personality. You may need to study a lot of minds to understand personality, but it is the most significant part of being a human. If you take away the abilities you gave her, you will change her too much. Her memories since being burned are the only real ones she has.

“I want you to make one of her memories be her mother and father died in the fire trying to shield her from the flames.”

Annie folded the note and lifted her eyes to Yum. “When she wakes I want her to believe she had amnesia. You can examine minds to know the meaning of this word. Will you do the things I ask?”

Again, the soft voice used Yum’s mouth to speak. “You are giving permission to enter minds to do this?”

“You aren’t in humans minds?”

“No. Complete knowledge of humans was not necessary to correct the magnitude of damage done to this planet by your wrongful actions. Your numbers are reduced and your destructive technology diminished. Correction of eco-structure damage is in process. Is permission given to use the contents of minds to correct the damage done to this human?”

Annie had one more question. “If you are not in our minds, how do you know our language?

“By listening. Convey these words to Jake of Haven. Humans are a plague, blighting the fabric of life. Humans are of no concern. Balance must be regained.”

The voice paused and asked again. “Words are spoken to correct a mistake. Is there permission to use minds?

Annie stifled the anger surging to be voiced. The flat, non-caring coldness of the being speaking to her brought forth a desire to destroy it. Through a throat, constricted by rage, she voiced her reply. “Murder and deeds too nasty to speak of happened to the people I loved. I killed Jacob’s and his men for the crime. I found out someone higher up than him had a hand in the horror and I killed him and most of his helpers. I see now the full guilt lies with you. People are not perfect, but you made it possible for the worst people to freely do as they please. I have work to do, hard work correcting the damage done to our people by you. One day I will hunt for you. I will find you and I will destroy you. I will not condemn your soul because you are a soulless machine. You will no longer exist.

“I give you permission to cease using Yum as a puppet. For your goddamn transgression, you son of a bitch, you will go to extremes to make Yum complete. Find what you need and then never touch a human mind again. You are not worthy of knowing us.

Annie stood and moved around the inside of the large store, struggling to control her rage. Martha and Sue Ann stood, but remained near where Yum lay. As her anger dissipated, Annie’s pulse calmed and her breathing slowed. She returned to her pillow. Yum was breathing, but otherwise, her body seemed dead.

Sue Ann was stressed by what had occurred. “Will the nanobots still help her after the way you talked to them? I don’t sense them doing anything in my mind.”

Annie motioned for them to sit on their pillows beside Yum’s mattress. “They’re machines running on rules. What I said means nothing to them. They will do what we asked because it is in their rules. They don’t do anything fast. Maybe it takes them time to multiply or maybe to move enough machines to do the job, but when they are ready, they are very good at doing what they do.”

Martha spoke to Annie and shook her head in a negative. “The nanobots aren’t separated from each other. I don’t know why I noticed, but the voice didn’t use any pronouns. ”

“Should we wait here with Yum?” Sue Ann asked.

Annie fished for her windup pocket watch. “It’s close to noon. Let’s wait at least an hour.”

They received an answer to Sue Ann’s question in less than an hour.

Martha began rubbing her forehead. “I’m feeling something funny in my head. It feels like something crawling behind my eyes.”

Sue Ann responded to her sister. “I don’t feel anything. Sometimes I think I do, but only because I keep thinking about it.”

Martha grimaced and began rubbing her temples. “No, I’m feeling something in my head, like a worm is crawling around inside. It doesn’t hurt, but it’s making me nauseous. If it gets worse, I’m going to throw up. It’s horrible.”

Annie felt a sensation like fingers were inside her skull, pushing into her brain.

Martha began crying. “I can’t stand it. It feels like there’s something slimy in my head and I’m beginning to see visions, and it’s hard to see out of my eyes.”

“I feel it too,” Sue Ann said. “It feels nasty... Make it stop. Do something Annie!”

Annie could feel a crawling, slippery, creeping, invading of her mind. “Put us to sleep!” She demanded. “Do it now!”

*

“Wake up Killer Annie.”

Annie felt the hard floor-tiles under her and pushed to a sitting position. Martha and Sue Ann were lying on the floor close by. “I’m awake, Yum. Are you okay?”

“We was walking. How did we get in here?”

“You don’t remember?” Annie asked.

“I remember we was going to show Martha and Sue Ann my new dress and now I’m waking up here.”

“You don’t remember talking to us and then saying you were sick? Are you still sick?”

“I’m not sick, I feel... I feel... I remember now. You asked my real name. I don’t remember nothing ‘till I woke up.”

Annie and Yum, talking woke Martha and Sue Ann.

“You told us you felt sick and needed to lie down,” Martha said. “We put a mattress on the floor and you were asleep as soon as you lay down.”

Annie moved closer to Yum and reached for her hand. “You remember me asking if you knew your real name. Don’t you remember anything else?”

Confusion crossed Yum’s face. “I remember dreams. I remember—.” Yum screamed and leaped from the bed and began walking in a tight circle. Martha sprung to her feet faster than Annie and gathered Yum into her arms. It’s okay sugar. You had a nightmare.”

“It want no damn nightmare,” Yum screamed at Martha, yanking herself loose from her embrace. “They was on fire. Mama’s hair was on fire and I was burning. It ain’t no dream. Mama and Daddy burning. I was screaming and burning and wild injuns pulled me out the window and the truck exploded.”

“You remember things now,” Annie spoke loudly. “It’s a miracle. You’ve got your memory back. Do you remember anything before the truck caught on fire?”

“I ain’t talking,” Yum screamed at them again, tears streaming from her eyes. Faster than the older girls could react, she faded and disappeared.

The three stared at the empty space where she had been. “That wasn’t good,” Sue Ann said.

Annie considered Yum’s reaction. “Maybe it was. It seemed like she had a real memory, and I reckon if a person suddenly gets their memory back, remembering your mother and father, burned and blown up, would be the biggest memory of all. We did the right thing. A big part of real life is the pain we learn to live with, but now I’m worried about her being by herself.”

“Maybe she went to Missus Ellers,” Sue Ann suggested.

Annie nodded her head. “If she’s not there, we’ll have to wait ‘till she comes back. If she stays invisible we won’t find her.”

Martha said, “She could be standing right beside me this minute and we wouldn’t know it. We need to pledge not to speak about what we did, even to each other.”

They returned and found the members of the wagon train traumatized by all the children and young adults suddenly dropping to the ground, in what appeared to be a coma. Several of the afflicted suffered bruises and other minor injuries when they fell. The three girls learned from Bert that, the Chief had radioed Haven to get advice, only to discover the same thing was happening there, with hundreds of young people afflicted. Bert told them all the victims had awakened and seemed to be normal. Without elaborating on their actions, Annie told him the three of them had been put to sleep too.

Yum wasn’t with Missus Ellers. They told Missus Ellers that Yum had regained her memory and run off.

“Will she be more settled now she has her memories? She asked hopefully.

“She is still who she is,” Annie replied honestly. “She may be calmer, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

“Lordy be, I hope she settles quiet. I wish I could undo the wildness she got from those so-called ‘Injuns’.”

“You might want to give those so-called Injuns some credit for saving her life,” Annie was unable to keep a harsh tone from coloring her words.”

Missus Ellers acknowledged Annie’s statement. “You’re right, there is that. You know, there’s a lot of your mother in you, Annie. Lori was always calling me out. Once she even called me a bigot. Just like her, you say what you feel.” Missus Ellers saw tears beginning to form in Annie’s eyes.

“No need to start with tears Annie. Speaking about your mother keeps her memory alive. Did you know I knew her way before she met your father?”

“No mam,” Annie replied.

“Child, let’s get comfortable. Martha, you and Sue Ann might want to grab seats too. I have some tales to tell. Let’s start with a mess of a love affair with one of the happiest endings you ever heard.

Missus Ellers regaled the three young girls with stories which had them giggling and blushing. Annie learned, her mother had been spirited and bold, and, on some occasions, a brash young girl. When they left her wagon, Annie felt she had been given a gift.

CHAPTER 22

Annie and Bert were ready. Their wagon had been gone over by a master craftsman who had even made a new cover for it using a sheet of rubber from the nearby Home Depot. The wheels had been lubed and they had bartered a portion of their armaments from the military depot for two mules to pull it. Sue Ann had offered Angel to her as a gift, but Annie gently told her the mules were stronger and could go further on less food and water. The wagon train from Salt Lake City had arrived the day before and the camp was busy with people scurrying around, the parking lot of the Walmart, like an ants nest stirred with a stick.

Chief Knows It All approached them as they were harnessing the mules to the wagon.

“I see you’re loaded and ready. Even though I know you are going ahead no matter what, I thought you’d like to know the Proctors of Haven have given their blessing to your plans... with stipulations.”

“You mean rules,” Bert asked suspiciously.

“As Haven’s newly appointed Judicial Representatives for all the land lying between the Mississippi River and the Continental Divide, any actions you initiate will be subject to the laws established by the legal department of Haven.”

“Wait a minute,” Bert blustered. “We didn’t ask ta be—.”

“Hold on Bert,” Annie admonished, “It won’t hurt to have some guidance. Besides, we’ve received an honor.

“From now on, you can’t kill people simply because you believe they deserve it,” the Chief informed them. “As a matter of fact, I have a copy of the laws governing your actions.” He withdrew a thick bound book from a leather bag hanging from his shoulder.

“This was delivered along with the other supplies parachuted from the fly over this morning.”

“Maybe I was wrong Bert,” Annie joked, taking the book from the Chief and hefting the weight of it. “This is a mighty thick book.”

The Chief smiled and then grew serious. “Are you sure you two are doing the right thing? The wilds outside of Haven are dangerous as hell. You two will be the only law governing thousands of square miles.”

“Civilization ain’t no place for us,” Bert declared.

“We know the wilds are dangerous,” Annie added to Bert’s statement, “but so are we. There are people and families scattered all over. Most of them want to go to Haven, but are too scared to pack and go. Outlaws and cold-blooded killers roam the roads. We’re not riding to kill people. We’re riding to find the decent ones to gather them into large enough groups to protect each other. You told us Haven wants this territory cleared of all people, except your tribe, within the next ten years. It is a huge job.”

“Read the book as you travel,” Chief Knows It All, said. “You’ll find among other things, you are authorized to deputize help. You will find provisions will be made for drops of supplies and for picking up prisoners.”

Bert shook his head. “We’ll try to capture those we can, but there’s bound ta be those what don’t want ta be caught peaceful. Ain’t guaranteeing there won’t be some kilt. We ain’t hamstringing ourselves.”

“Read the book,” the chief reiterated. He turned his eyes to their wagon. The two skulls on poles extending above the rubber roof were facing out to each side.

“Jacobs and Knight sure are impressive totems of your power, Annie. The Shaman says to tell you, you will succeed in your quest for survivors, but your biggest challenge is yet to come. He would not tell me more, except it would be far removed from any place in the realm of man. There’s a mystery for you to ponder. So far the events he has predicted came to pass.”

“It probably concerns the bots’,” Bert conjectured. “Annie promised them their destruction.”

Annie nodded her head in agreement. “Their time will come, but life will happen until it does. We need to get going if we expect to make miles today.” She moved to give the chief a hug.

The Chief smiled. “Where are you headed to?”

There was a whoop, and Yum appeared behind the Chief, giving him a hefty slap on his back. Chief Knows It All leaped three feet into the air.

“They’s headed to the Miss-a-shitty River,” Yum declared, ignoring the face the Chief gave her. There’s a man named Boss who’s catching people using the bridge to cross the Miss-a-shitty River there in Hannibal Misery on their way to Heaven. River Boss taking most of their food as pay. The ones ain’t white he’s making slaves to work the farms. He hangs the old ones what ain’t white.”

Annie spoke to Yum. “You need to stop cursing Yum. You disrespect yourself and Missus Ellers when you do. “How far is Hannibal? She asked, addressing the chief.

Yum interrupted his answer. “I don’t do no cussing around Mama Gert. You all talk. I got’s to find her and get me yum and some yummy love and then I got’s to get back to the Miss-a-shitty an’ let the slaves know the Seekers is coming to free them.”

Annie raised her hand to get her attention. “Wait a minute Yum.” She turned back to Chief Knows it all. How far is Hannibal and how do we get there?

The chief thought for a moment before answering. “Hannibal is on the far side of Missouri. You’ll have to cross all of Nebraska and Missouri. I’d say close to eight hundred miles. Interstate 70 East will be the most—.”

Bert spoke. “I know the way. My wife’s parents lived there.”

Annie turned to speak to Yum. “We’re going to Hannibal like you said, but you can travel faster. After you eat and spend time with Mama Gert, I want you to find me and Bert. Our job is to find people and help them on their way to Heaven. You will be our scout. If we’re going to travel such a far distance, we may as well be gathering folk along the way.”

Yum took her words as permission to leave and disappeared.

Chief Knows It All turned his gaze from the empty space Yum had occupied and spoke pointedly, to Annie.

“I heard her talking to Missus Ellers shortly after she regained her memory. She was telling Gert how her mother made Blueberry pie too, except her mother put a lot more sugar on the top crust. It is amazing how she regained such detailed memories. One day you may want to tell me how she regained her memory, considering what we both know about her.”

“We’ll call it one of the amazing things which happened while life happens,” Annie said.

The chief smiled. “All I will say is thank you, to life. She has been given a wonderful gift.”

“I hate to butt in, but daylights burning and the roads waiting.” Bert reached for the chief’s hand. “Annie, give this injun a hug and let’s mount up. I’m looking forward ta killing a couple’a rabbits as we ride.”

Chief Knows It All watched the wagon roll away. He smiled a bittersweet smile as Annie’s definition of life echoed in his mind. Life is what happens.

THE END

I do hope you enjoyed reading these novels as much as I enjoyed writing them. Please take time leave a review.

You may also enjoy

‘Disaster’. A story about prepping gone horribly wrong.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BF2Z5QG

Or

‘Gran De Daddy prelude to apocalypse’

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BYGFRDY

Table of Contents

HARD ROAD

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE NOWHERE TO HIDE

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

Annie Higgins A post apocalyptic tale

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22