“Nothing in p-particular. I’m just taking stuff apart to figure out how it works. This happens to b-be one of those wind-up walkie-talkies. I’m trying to f-figure out how it recharges the device. If I c-can f-figure out how to replicate this and store the energy, we m-might find another source of power. If you hadn’t n-noticed, the smog in the air p-prevents a lot of direct sunlight, and we always have to ration our electricity.”
“I noticed, but to be fair, it’s not like we have a lot of things that use electric—” Jared paused, looking around the room. “Well, most of us don’t have a lot of electronics. I’m not even sure we have a single one up in our room. Though the girls might have something I’ve not seen. We don’t need a huge abundance of electricity—unless you are cooking up something I don’t know about?”
“No, n-not really. I mean I’ve always g-got projects going, and we c-can never have enough electronics, b-but there’s nothing special. It’s mostly for m-my work and making sure I have enough to test and keep building.”
“Good idea. As far as I know, you’re the only one of us technically inclined to understand all this stuff. I was thinking the other day about how we have so much talent with our small group. When we take the fight to the cities, we’ll need someone who knows the technology and can help us make sense of everything up there. I think you are just the man for the job.”
“B-but,” stammered Pete. “I know n-nothing about their tech!”
“Right now you don’t, but I think we’ll remedy that in time. If these phase pistols weren’t so valuable, I’d let you disassemble one. For now, though, I think I’ve got something to tide you over.” Jared slipped his pack off his shoulders and extracted one of the spent battery packs. “This one no longer has any charge, so it probably won’t help you figure out how to replenish the energy, but at least you can work with it safely and not worry about blowing the whole area up.”
Pete’s eyes grew to twice their size as he stared greedily at the object in Jared’s hand. Wanting to have fun, Jared moved the battery around in a circle and Pete followed it like an eager puppy, not caring Jared teased him. He was so eager to get his hands on the technology.
“All right, this is yours, Pete, but please reassemble it when you’re done. Once we get some kind of trade relationship going with other colonies, I’d like to exchange some of these depleted ones to see if they can get them recharged by the cities.”
“Yes! I will!” Pete snatched the battery pack from Jared’s outstretched hand.
The small man already had a stammer occasionally, but excited as he was, it escalated to a whole other level and it became hard to understand him. Jared turned around to walk out but stopped himself. He’d come here to ask Pete what he needed.
“Oh, the reason I came in here was to see what you needed from the old colony.”
The only reply was an incoherent muttering from Pete, as he’d already turned back to his makeshift workbench. He slid all the walkie-talkie components out of the way. Though Jared noticed that even in his excitement, Pete was careful not to disturb the order in which the parts lay. Jared shook his head, amused. Pete had seemed eager to get his hands on some appliances yesterday, but now he had a new object to occupy his attention, he forgot all about his original request. Jared left Pete to his project and walked to Casey’s medical station.
Touring the room, it turned out Casey was not present. Before leaving, Jared quickly checked the storage closet to check in on their supply of boosters. Surprised, he found he wasn’t able to check on them, since Casey had fashioned a door with a combination lock attached. He didn’t know where the parts came from or how whomever did it affixed it to the rock, but it made him happy to see someone had locked away the precious items for safe-keeping.
His last stop was to see Marie, their cook, to find out if there was anything she needed. Jared hiked back up to the top platform and found her tending to the stock of meat. One of the back rooms they used as a meat locker also had a door on it, and they’d fashioned rubber strips around the outside of the door that functioned as a seal. Praising their ingenuity, Jared approached Marie.
“Hey, Marie, is there anything you need from the old colony? Carla and I are heading over there. We’ll be flying, so I can’t bring too much, but I thought I’d ask, anyway.”
Marie’s response was immediate. “Salt.”
Jared chuckled. “Salt it is. Anything else?”
“We could use more seaweed if you don’t mind swimming.”
“I don’t think that’s a possibility, unfortunately. We’re bonded, and the moment we step foot in the water, we’ll absorb the nanites. If we spend too long in there it can really hurt us. I don’t entirely know what would happen if we let it continue past our pain threshold, but it could kill us.”
Marie blanched and took a step back. “I didn’t know.”
Jared held up his hand. “Don’t worry about it. Now you know. It’s not a big deal. We’ll send out a foraging group tomorrow or the day after. Right now, I want to go with Carla so we can get back quickly. The dragons should arrive tomorrow!”
From the look on Marie’s face, she didn’t share his enthusiasm. Frowning, he wondered if more people felt that way. It could be they didn’t know what to expect. After Razael and then Scarlet, they might be scared of a group of massive dragons looming over them.
They were no longer scared of Scarlet, but then she’d earned that trust and was Jared’s companion; not to mention she was only a third the size of her brothers. These other dragons were an unknown entity, and they had no loyalty to humans. What Marie and the other water folk didn’t realize was that Scarlet’s word was infallible. Her brothers could no sooner go against her wishes than stop being a dragon. He’d need to reassure everyone before they arrived to make sure there were no incidents and that everyone knew what to expect.
Again, Jared found his thoughts wandering back to George. This man was such a pain in the neck, Jared almost wished he’d just disappear. He realized the thought didn’t make him feel guilty either. Perhaps his encounter with the Daggers jaded him against George’s type. Jared quickly dismissed the thought and cast George from his mind. He had other things to dwell on, and fretting over something he could do nothing about right now wouldn’t help anyone.
Jared ignored Marie’s obvious fear for now. “Where’s the best place to find salt? I don’t want to go ransacking every home looking for tiny amounts.”
“Check the school house cafeteria. They kept large containers of it there.”
“I don’t recall going through any schools. Where is it?”
“Do you remember where the solar panels were? And that large building you said was on top of the garage you found in the underground facility?”
“Yes, I remember.”
“It’s not huge—the school, that is—but it’s just across the street from it. We didn’t have very many children in the colony, so we used an old office building and turned a couple rooms downstairs into the cafeteria.”
Jared pulled up an image of the area and quickly found the two-story building described. It was roughly three times the size of most houses in the area, but he hadn’t had time to explore it before. Right around the time he’d wanted to head that way was when the drop ship came to destroy everything. After that, he didn’t have the will to scavenge further.
“Okay, I’ll check the cafeteria. If that fails, I’ll look in some old diners.”
“You probably won’t find too much in them old diners since we didn’t use them all that much, but you never know, it might be worth a shot.”
Thanking Marie, Jared headed back to the medical facility to see if Casey was back.
“Casey? Are you here?”
“Just a minute!” Casey appeared carrying a handful of clean pelts. He set them on a chair and turned to Jared. “What’s up?”
“I wanted to see if
you need anything from the old colony. Carla and I are making a run today and we can pick up small essentials.”
Casey looked around the room, taking stock of his equipment and items. “No, I think we’re all set here. We’ve had no serious injuries, and that crate of supplies you pulled from the military complex is more than sufficient to handle anything we need. I also recycle wraps and bandages whenever I can.”
“Excellent work. Oh, before I go, how did you get this door installed?”
“Two of the guys loaded up a smaller cart in one of their forays to that ruined city at the tip of the lake. They brought a few doors, and they also found some…what did they call them? Self-tapping nails?”
“Ah, that explains it. Okay thanks for the info. Do you know if Johan got one of these installed in the temporary armory too?”
“I’m not sure.” Casey twisted his face in thought. “I know Marie got one installed on the meat locker.”
“Yep, just came from there. No worries, I’ll ask next time I see him. It would be a good idea to make sure we get all of our valuables locked away. Eventually, it’ll be nice if everyone had a door installed to their room. It would be a good protection against any creatures that might roam around. Maybe then we wouldn’t have to set a night watch. Anyway, I’m rambling. I’ll let you get back to whatever you were doing.”
Leaving the medic, Jared rejoined Scarlet in the clearing to wait for Elle and Vanessa. Sitting next to her, they watched Attis and Carla from a few yards away. The small woman stood in front of the giant griffon, her hand resting on his beak.
“Any update on them?” Jared thought to Scarlet.
“Not yet. They are making progress. The few thoughts I heard proved the creature understands much more than before. He still seems primitive; he does not understand everything Carla says, but she is patient and using images and impressions to get her points across.”
“They have a long way to go. It might be faster if Carla just learns to communicate at an instinctual level than to teach the thing to understand the spoken word.”
“I believe you are correct. Eventually, he will come to understand words, but right now he needs an image for association. This form of speech is much slower and difficult for both.”
“What about a shared thought space?”
“I do not know if that is the answer either. What would Carla’s mind have to endure, sharing the thought space of a non-intelligent creature that only thinks in predator and prey mentality?”
Jared didn’t reply immediately as he thought about the consequences. It may cause issues for Carla, but the benefit would be faster reaction times, accurately assessing danger, and predatory instincts. All of those were valuable assets, especially if they wanted to use her as a scout. She could easily go unnoticed atop the griffon and maybe the cities wouldn’t care about it flying around.
“Scarlet, I think you’re onto something there. If Carla takes on the characteristics of the griffon while in a shared thought space, that might be beneficial for us. That bird is fast, silent, and knows how to avoid danger. If Carla becomes our scout, she might get close to the cities and gather intelligence for us.”
“That is a good point. I agree, but we also do not know how long it will take for them to share a thought space. You had to upgrade your mind a lot before we could, and even then, it was I who initiated it.”
“That’s fair, but I don’t think it’ll take them as long. Carla can already project her thoughts to me without touch. If you tried a shared space with her, would that work?”
“It might, but I am not sure having her know everything running through my head is a good idea, either. While I trust them, I do not know if I trust her that much.”
“Why don’t you trust them?” Jared looked at Scarlet in alarm. “Didn’t you root through their minds yourself?”
“Yes.”
“Then what’s the issue?”
“Jared, we have not exactly had the best experience with humans now and in the past.”
“I…you’re right, but I thought if you could trust anyone it would be these people.”
“I trust them more than I thought I would any human, but that does not mean I want them privy to all my thoughts.”
“Understood. Just to sate my curiosity, do you think it’s possible?”
“I do.”
“Let’s keep it as a last resort if we need to go there. If Carla becomes our primary scout, then she’ll need all the advantage she can get. I totally understand not wanting her rooting around your thoughts, but maybe you can erect a mental barrier of your own and prevent her from accessing things you want hidden.”
“I...can do that. Normally, we only shield our thoughts from external influences, and I have not tried to lock anything down internally. I will think on it in the event we need it.”
“Thanks! Hopefully it doesn’t come to that, but it’s nice to have options.”
Jared slowly walked over to Carla and Attis, careful not to do anything Attis would interpret as hostile.
“Carla, are you ready to go? I overheard a little bit of your conversation and understand the frustration in communicating with Attis. Scarlet and I were just discussing it and think you should try to understand his thoughts better on an instinctual level rather than force his mind to your own. It’ll get easier the more you upgrade Mind, especially when you can share a thought space as we do, but for now this might be the best option. I won’t pretend that it’ll be easy, but you will get there, and I don’t want you to get discouraged.”
“Thanks, Jared. I’m ready to go. It’s something I must get used to, but I think we can understand each other enough for now.”
“Good. Let’s get this trip done, and you can spend more time with him. Keep trying to follow the nanites as often as possible too until you understand them. I think it’ll speed things up and you’ll adapt faster.”
Vanessa, Elle, and Kitty sat off to the side of the clearing waiting for them while they conversed with their companions.
Jared called them over. “Did anyone need anything?”
“Nope,” Elle answered in a cheery tone. “There were a couple odd requests for furniture, but we told them you be flying, and they change mind.”
“Thanks, Elle. Your speech sounds much better!”
“Vanessa work with me every day.” Elle looked at her sister with love.
It encouraged him to see the sisters together. When he watched them interact, the world’s ugliness faded into the background. There was good left in the world worth fighting for and these two reunited siblings were the constant reminder he needed.
Since leaving his colony a couple years ago, there hadn’t been much to put hope in. Everywhere he went there was death, destruction, and chaos. He’d only visited one other colony in that time, and it was much the same as his own. They were a small group of people completely isolated from the outside world. Occasionally travelers would stop by, but that had only been in the last decade since the technology existed. Other than that, only drop ships visited, and that was often an automated transaction. All the colonies he knew about were normal societies that worked for the common good of everyone and they rarely ventured outside the boundaries of the safe zones.
Jared imagined it was much the same as pre-apocalypse government. In the case with his colony, the elders voted on someone to lead, and they had security forces to help keep them safe. Though it wasn’t like the old law enforcement, they made sure no one did anything against the tenets of the colony. Because it was such a small group of people, they rarely had any issues, and everyone realized that working toward the good of their colony was of utmost importance.
That sheltered upbringing hadn’t prepared him for the hostile world in which he found himself. When he looked back at the experiences of the past few months, it was obvious he’d been unprepared for reality. He hadn’t known
there were so many violent people in the world. Even the cities hadn’t seemed bad at the time. It wasn’t how he’d grown up, and with no outside influences on his small bubble of reality, there had been nothing to prepare him, save for the rude awakening he’d experienced.
The world was harsh, but hope existed, and he planned to cling to that lifeline for all he was worth. Otherwise, his mission and vows were pointless. He needed to be a protector of humankind.
“I’m so happy for the two of you. Truly. The relationship you share gives me confidence of a future absent hardships and fear like we suffer today. Never change.”
Vanessa laid a hand on Jared’s arm and drew him into a hug. “Thanks to you. None of this would be possible otherwise. I have the same request of you. Never change. Your compassion allowed you to do these things. It drove you to protect us and help Elle. Even now you tirelessly work to increase the strength of others before yourself. You’ve selflessly offered to settle your differences with George for the others. It is something I… we admire about you.”
Jared watched her cheeks flush a slight shade of pink, and he smiled. In the months they’d been out of the water, some of their natural color had returned. Just a month ago, he wouldn’t have seen her blush, since her skin had still had a slight bluish tint to it.
“Thank you, Vanessa. Though, it’s not all selfless. I have ulterior motives to all of this. Eventually we’ll take the fight to those above. At some point I’ll ask everyone to put the good of the world above themselves, and there will be risks. When that time comes, it’ll be challenging, and people may get hurt or die.”
“I understand that, and we all agreed to take that risk. If not for you, we’d still be at the bottom of a lake, clinging to an absurd lifeline that one day we’d see the light of day. Already, every one of us has experienced more life than we ever thought we would. We all said the vow and will follow you wherever that may lead.”
Jared tightened his grip around Vanessa. This woman was amazing, and he wanted nothing more than to protect her from the harshness of the world. It pained him to think he would need to ask her to follow him into a battle one day. They needed to get stronger. Everyone needed to get stronger.
Radioactive Revolution: A Dystopian, Post-Apocalyptic Adventure Page 7
