The Horse Soldier: Beginnings Series Book 10

by Jacqueline Druga

  Wiping the chill up and down from her arms she saw what she and Hal were looking at the night before. It sat on the coffee table, the small oak box, still open, still exposing the pictures inside. Ellen moved to the sofa and sat down. She pulled the box closer to her and picked up a handful of pictures. She smiled as she shuffled through the Slagel memories and her smile stopped and fell when she reached a picture of Frank. She hadn’t seen it in there when she and Hal viewed them There were so many pictures. Setting down the stack of photos, Ellen held on to the one picture, leaning back on the sofa, and propping her legs on the coffee table.

  Frank.

  His eyes stared back in that picture as if he were actually looking at her. Her heart pounded looking at him and an ache filled her throat. “Oh God, Frank.” The emptiness and hurt she tried to keep buried came flooding back to her. Worry. Sadness. Missing.

  She breathed slowly out through her slightly parted lips, wanting so badly for the picture she held in her hands to be Frank in her arms. Her life’s best friend was so far away from her, yet a part of her felt him calling her every minute of the day. And there wasn’t a minute of the day that Ellen’s mind didn’t drift to Frank. If wishing him back would do it, Frank would have returned long before. Wishing for him back so badly that she still found herself--though she let no one see her--staring out the window while she worked in the clinic, looking for him, waiting for him to walk over that grade.

  She hid her feelings well. She had to. That was the only way to bring him back and she would do anything, no matter what, to help bring him back to her. But the truth was, no matter how much Ellen pretended to move on, acted the part for the big ‘plan’, she would never move on until Frank came home. She would never be the same.

  She slowly brought the close up shot to her lips, kissed the picture gently, and stared at it again, letting her mind imagine, letting her mind feel, that somewhere, wherever Frank was, at that exact moment he was thinking and missing her.

  ^^^^

  Binghamton, Alabama

  Frank’s frustration and hurt carried in his breath vocally from his throat as he snapped forward in his chair, ran his fingers through his hair, and stood up. “Ellen.” He closed his eyes. His face held pain. “I can’t keep doing this.” Harshly he rubbed his hands over his face as if he were trying to rub his thoughts away. His mind had to be elsewhere, focused, but at that moment, it wasn’t. Too many moments were spent with his mind in places it shouldn’t be, searching for Ellen, imagining her, hearing her voice. His inner soul told him that wherever she was, she was fine. Frank believed that. He had to. She was too much a part of him that even the distance of many miles could not hinder him from being able to feel her. And Frank swore he did.

  He was so tired of waiting. He just wanted to walk out the door of his office and straight off that base. He could make it home. He knew he could and then he would find Ellen. But his gut told him that his every action, every move with the Society somehow effected Ellen. She and his children were top on his list of priorities, protecting them. Frank now was in a position where he could do his best to help his family. Like John Matoose was for George. Frank was now the unsuspected insider. He could gain the knowledge needed to start bringing down the insurmountable force that everyday seemed to beat against his people, his home, his family. Frank’s family was his top priority. Ellen was a top priority. Frank knew what he had to do. In order to do so correctly, he would use the thoughts of his family to make him stay put, to stay in the control. He had to be. Frank would use those same thoughts of his family to go on and make each day he was away from them, though painful, more tolerable.

  ^^^^

  Bowman, North Dakota

  “I’m exhausted.” Sgt. Ryder answered the question Hal posed to him as they stood side by side on a street corner in Bowman, looking up.

  “Me too.” Hal said. “Do you suppose it’s him?”

  “Most definitely. You saw him at that switch station.”

  Hal nodded slightly still peering his views upward. “It doesn’t seem quite fair though. We should have him here. In Bowman.”

  “I don’t know about that, but then again, we don’t have anyone like him. Beginnings has a carbon copy.”

  “True. But . . . what do you think about training him?” Hal asked.

  “If I wish to keep any sanity, I refuse, absolutely refuse to place that eccentric man on a horse with a long, lethal, sharp object.”

  “I uh . . . I see your point.” Hal lifted his hand up in a wave. “Danny! How’s it going?”

  Danny, strapped to the top of a telephone pole, looked down, grinned, and gave thumbs up to Hal and Sgt. Ryder who watched him.

  ^^^^

  “O.K., what’s going on?” Joe asked out as he walked into a noisy tracking. He saw both Henry and Mark looking at the monitors. “Sector thirty-two again?”

  Henry tossed his hands up. “Joe, I’m lost. I can’t figure it out.”

  “Yes, you can, Henry,” Joe told him. “Keep trying.” Joe stepped closer to the monitor. “Christ.” He watched the tracking and the flash of light seemingly go crazy. Flashing, beeping and dots of light flew across the screen. “Looks like whatever it is isn’t taking in the whole area.”

  Mark shook his head. “Instead of the one mile radius, it’s pretty much stuck to twenty square feet. That’s why it’s going nuts. Too many rabbits.”

  “Or one kid.” Joe looked at Mark. “Call you wife and find out where Marcus is. Got it?”

  “Joe.” Mark laughed in ridicule. “That is not my son up there. I know he’s the Bam-Bam of Beginnings, but he would definitely show a much larger life signal.”

  “You have a point.” Joe patted Mark on the back. “But still, call her. Humor me. Thanks.” Joe shifted his eyes to Henry who watched the tracking signal. There was a look upon Henry’s face that Joe seldom saw, a look of confusion on what to do.

  Henry saw Joe staring and he didn’t know why Joe had such a huge grin on his face. “Joe?”

  “Huh.” Joe shook his head and removed the smile. He had gotten lost momentarily in the enjoyment of Henry’s confusion.

  ^^^^

  Painfully, with one eye closed, Dean shut off his ear with his finger. “God.” He cringed at the high squeal that came from his daughter as she dove onto Josh while they had a free for all wrestling match in the living room. “Quiet!” Dean commanded as he neared the ringing phone. “Josh! Keep them quiet.”

  Was Dean actually in his home? He thought he was. He felt like he was yet not one person heard him. Hoping that the noise would stop, he picked up the phone. “Hello.”

  “Hey Dean!” Danny excitedly said.

  “Danny?” Dean chuckled.

  “Yeah, guess where I’m calling from?”

  “Uh . . . Bowman. Hold on . . . .” Dean covered the mouth piece of the phone. “Knock it off!” he yelled to the screaming maniacs. “Now!” Finally silence, less a few agitating giggles from the crew. “Sorry, Danny, go on.”

  “Dean, you really shouldn’t do that. Not when I’m like fifty feet from the ground on a telephone pole. You could have startled me down to my death.”

  “Why are you on a telephone pole?”

  “That’s where the first working phone is. Guess why I called you? Your number was the only one I remembered and I wanted to tell you Ellen’s doing great, aside from that little physical confrontation with Gergerace. I got the phones up and running here, sort of. I’m getting there, but we have a problem. No one knows their telephone numbers.” Danny started to laugh. “I have this great game planned for tonight. Imagine. A silent town. A single phone ringing out.”

  “Sounds like the a scene from the Omega man.”

  “Oh! Dean!” Danny shrieked with excitement. “You’re the man. Thanks. I bet I get Neville points for that.”

  “Under what category?”

  “Recreation of Neville moments.”

  Dean laughed. “Well you may want to recreate Neville’s coming
to the rescue. Call Henry on his phone. Tracking is all out of whack.”

  “No way.”

  “Yes way.”

  “No Dean, I’m not saying that as ‘boy am I surprised’,” Danny said. “I’m saying that because I invented that and there’s no way it’s out of whack.”

  “Call them.”

  “I will.” Danny paused. “Uh . . . Dean. What’s the number.”

  Just as Dean started to tell him he was told by Danny to hold. Dean pulled the phone away at Danny’s loud yell.

  “Hey Sarge!” Danny yelled out. “Write this number down! Go on, Dean.”

  Dean took a second to snicker in amusement and then gave Danny the number.

  ^^^^

  “It’s gonna have to be done,” Joe told Henry while in tracking.

  “No Joe, I can’t.”

  “Well, we can’t wait until Danny gets here.”

  “Joe please . . .”

  “Henry, I’ll send Robbie up there with you. O.K.?” He saw the hesitation on Henry’s face. “They’re rabbits for Christ sake.”

  “Killer rabbits, Joe.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Joe heard Henry’s phone ring. “Answer that.”

  “It just rang!” Henry pulled out the phone. “Hello.” Henry’s eyes smiled. “Danny.” He looked at Joe. “It’s Danny. Danny, man, am I glad to hear from you. How’s it going? I see you have the phones up.”

  “I’m having some problems, Henry but don’t spread that around.” Danny told him. “We can talk about it later. Anyhow, I hear you have problems.”

  Henry let out a breath. “Boy, do I ever. Tracking is picking up these killer rabbits that are huge and move really fast in the field. There has to be a lot. You should see this screen Danny. It looks like . . . remember the old, old, old video game space invaders. That’s it.”

  “Shit. What’s the computer reading?” Danny asked

  “One object. Well now it’s saying ten, each moving at sixty-four miles an hour across a twenty-some square foot radius.”

  “That’s absurd.”

  “I know,” Henry said and nodded his head, listening to Danny. “I did that. A-ha, did that too. That too. That too. Yeah.” Henry started to laugh. “I can check . . . you think? Danny if this works, I owe you.” There was a cringe on Henry’s face that quickly turned to a thinking smile. “You know what. That might not be a bad idea. Tonight? I’ll speak to Robbie. I’ll get back to you on this first.” Henry hung up the phone.

  “Well?” Joe asked. “What did he say?”

  “He has a theory.”

  “Christ.” Joe rolled his eyes.

  “It’s a good one.” Henry looked down at Mark. “Mark, pull a history. Danny thinks there may be something shiny in the field that might be reflecting the sun since it’s only happening at daylight hours. Trees below, the flash of light reflects, hits the tracking. Bam.”

  Joe nodded impressed. “Pretty good. That could explain why your adjustment didn’t work from this morning.”

  “It could,” Henry said. “But . . . it still doesn’t explain what chased me in that field.”

  Joe wanted to bark, yell at Henry, but he didn’t. He just waited for the history results. If Danny’s theory proved plausible, Joe wanted to send two men up that field to solve the problem and he knew definitely one of them would be Henry.

  ^^^^

  Trish always prided herself on someone that kept their word and when she promised to help someone out, she did. So on her walk home, when she saw Robbie, she decided to seize the opportunity. “Robbie,” she called to him, catching up to him as he checked security keypads.

  “Hey Trish.” Robbie punched in a code. It buzzed. He opened the door, shut it, and then looked at her. “What’s up? How’s that kid of yours?”

  “He’s fine, looking more and more like his dad.”

  Robbie snickered.

  “Not funny, Anyway, may I speak to you about something?”

  “Can you walk while we do?”

  “Sure.” Trish followed him to the next building. “It’s about Jess.”

  “What about him?”

  “Well, he and I were talking this morning and he said something.”

  “What?” Robbie began to check the bakery’s keypad.

  “He needs a friend, Robbie.”

  “I am his friend.”

  “Not like what he needs.”

  After the buzz and checking, Robbie wrote results and moved on. “What do you mean?”

  “He wasn’t much of a crowd guy in the old world. He was a one on one guy. You know, the type that always had that best friend, like Henry and Frank were. He needs that male bonding friendship thing, Robbie. I guess, you know, without any women to turn to, who are you gonna discuss your problems with if you don’t have that one close friend?”

  “I see.” Robbie walked to the next building. “Is he having problems?”

  “No, but does he need to have a problem to have that friend?” Trish asked. “Someone to go to the social hall with so he doesn’t just become one of the numbers there. Most of the men pair off and you know it. Most men have a best friend. Jeff is Mark’ best friend. Joe always hangs out with Jason. Hap has Forrest.”

  “Me and . . . no one. Huh?”

  Trish smiled. “Maybe it’s a sign. Maybe it’s time you, Robbie Slagel, started bugging one person in this community when you’re bored instead of all of us at the same time.”

  Robbie snickered as he worked. “Maybe you’re right. I like Jess. Maybe I need to start hanging out with him more often. I mean, I hang with the band but . . .”

  “But . . .” Trish finished his sentence. “After practice who does Denny hang with? Josh. Paul? He hangs with James. You . . .”

  “I bother everyone.” Robbie tucked his clipboard under his arm. “Perhaps I’ll start bothering Jess. I just assumed, you know, since we live together, we were friends.” Robbie shrugged.

  “Well you know he’s from Canada.”

  Robbie hesitated in his walk. “What does that have to do with it?”

  “I don’t know exactly, but I bet it does have something to do with it. Anyway, he would like to assume you guys are friends, but he just didn’t want to cross that line. Robbie, you are an original. All of you originals, whether you mean it or not, project yourselves up here.” Trish raised her hand above her head. “When you’re new here, you guys seem untouchable.”

  “Well that may be true in Henry’s case, but not mine. I always am down to earth with all the new people. But just in case you’re right on this, I’ll talk to him. At the very least I want him to see we are friends . . . hold on Trish.” Robbie adjusted his headset radio. “Yea, Dad? Shit. O.K., I’ll be right there.” Robbie looked at Trish. “I got to go. Thanks for letting me know this.”

  “No problem.” Trish watched Robbie walk away. “Oh Robbie!” She called him again and waited until he stopped. “If things work out, I want the credit.” She waited for his signal of agreement then, happily and very pleased with herself, Trish moved along and headed home.

  ^^^^

  Kramer, Kansas

  Kyle and the two other UWA soldiers plopped down to the ground to rest.

  Link couldn’t move. He looked at the bottom of his boots. “What the hell? Walk?”

  Kyle shrugged. “He said we can do it.”

  “We’re in fuckin Kansas, man. Walk to North Dakota? What the hell were we thinking and what the hell was Mr. Slagel thinking, telling us we can walk?”

  “We made it to Kansas.” Ted added.

  “Barely to Kansas,” Link said. “We need to find some transportation. We’re gonna die before we reach home. You men know this, don’t you?”

  “Yeah.” Kyle stood back up. “But we got to try, now don’t we?”

  Link stood up as well. “I guess you’re right. How long do you suppose it will take us?”

  Kyle shook his head. “Frank said a few days, a week tops.”

  “Man.” Link twitched his head in
disbelief. “We must be moving slow. All right, let’s pick up the pace. I can do this for a few more days.”

  Onward they trudged again, not taking many breaks until night fall. They walked in the direction they were supposed to and as they walked, they heard Frank tell them it wouldn’t take them long to get home. It was a good thing they didn’t know Frank’s calculations were way off or maybe they wouldn’t have had so much determination.

  ^^^^

  Beginnings, Montana

  “Quit being such a baby,” Robbie griped at Henry as they headed out to the sector where the signals originated.

  “Me a baby? Why are you driving all the way here? Huh? If you’re not scared then why didn’t you park the Jeep at the end of the road back there?”

  “Because I’m lazy and I want to finish my work day.” Robbie brought the Jeep to the end of the field and shut it off. “All right. What exactly are we looking for?”

  Henry stepped from the jeep. “Danny says it has to be a piece of metal or glass, probably is no smaller than a fist.”

  “Easy enough.” Robbie started to the field. “Let’s find a needle in a hay stack.”

  “And killer rabbits.” Henry followed, pulling out his gun.

  “There are no killer rabbits, Henry. Hey . . .” Robbie snapped his finger. “Do you suppose we get Neville points for this?”

  “I would think. We are taking our lives into our own hands.”

  “Where exactly are we supposed to be looking?” Robbie asked.

  “This field.”

  “Shit.” Robbie looked at the high grass that came to his thigh. “There is no way something buried in this is reflecting the sun.”

  “Come to think of it, you’re right.”

  “I am. It has to be . . .”

  Henry saw Robbie stop walking. “What?”

  “Shh.” Robbie held out his hand. “Do you hear that?”

  “Robbie, I swear to God if you’re teasing me just to scare me, I’m gonna kill you.”

  “No listen.” Robbie looked around. “And smell.”