by Craig Zerf
Sam had no fixed agenda and no place specific to go. He had allowed himself two nights and three days to sort through his feelings and prepare himself for the next chapter of his life.
That night he erected a small bivouac, stretching a length of canvas between two small trees, fashioning three walls out of packed snow and building a fire at the entrance.
Before he crawled in to his blankets for the night he sat outside of his bivouac and simply stared at the stars. Ever since he was a small boy it had been one of his favorite things to do. He would take a blanket out into the back yard, lie on his back and stare upwards into the perpetuity of space. Countless billions of suns surrounded by trillions of planets. An infinity of possibility.
He had wondered if that was where the Fair-Folk had come from. Or the Vandals, or the Annihilators. But when he had asked Gogo, she had told him that it wasn’t that simple. It was obviously true that the aliens had come from different planets, but Gogo maintained that they had also come from different times and, probably, different dimensions.
Sam struggled to get his head around the concept that the invaders may have come from the future or a parallel universe. He found it much easier to simply think of them as alien raiders and leave it at that.
What worried Sam the most was the simple question of, when would it all end? If the pulse light had opened gateways that allowed these otherworldly beings through, would humanity ever be left in peace? If they somehow managed to defeat and exterminate the Fair-Folk and the Annihilators, what would prevent another nation of would be rulers from appearing and attempting to subjugate humanity?
Sam stood up and went to his bivouac. Time to sleep, he told himself. No more worrying about the maybes and the might-have-beens. Tomorrow he would wake early, spend the day traipsing around the mountains and then head home and accept his responsibilities as the new leader of the walking people.
The next day he woke with the sun and ate a basic breakfast of bread and cheese before he mounted up and headed up the trail, heading for the near summits. After an hour of easy riding his mount started to limp, so Sam dismounted and checked the horse’s hooves. When he picked up its back right leg the horse kicked out in reaction against the pain and its hoof caught Sam in the stomach. The blow lifted the young man off the ground and sent him flying through the air and down the side of the mountain. He tried to tuck into a ball to protect himself as he rolled but then he struck a rock and all went black.
By the time that Sam came to, the sun had passed its zenith and was heading towards the horizon, ready to sign off another day. He slowly worked his way through each limb and then felt his ribs, checking for breaks. There didn’t seem to be any overt fractures, merely massive bruising and the odd cut and abrasion.
He stood up, took a deep breath and winced at the pain.
‘Oh well,’ he said to himself. ‘Let’s see if we can find that stupid horse.’
The new leader of the walking people, Papa Sam, staggered zombie-like up the side of the mountain, slipping and sliding on the snow and ice, heading for the trail. Half way up he stopped. And stared. Cut into the side of the slope was a great steel door. Ten feet high and six feet wide, a surface patina of red-brown rust. In the center a large keyhole. Above that, two capital letters stamped into the steel. WD. Sam had no idea what they stood for.
He kicked on the door a couple of times but it didn’t budge. Next he took out his dagger and tried to slide it in between the door jamb and the lock but the fit was too tight. Intrigued but defeated, he decided to get home and tell Roo about the door.
He wasn’t sure why, but it just seemed as though it may contain something that might be of interest. After all, one didn’t build a massive steel door in the side of a mountain merely to conceal someone’s holiday home in the hills.
He clambered up the rest of the slope and, to his amazement, his horse was still there.
He stared at it for a while. ‘Asshole,’ he said.
The horse whinnied and then looked away sheepishly.
Sam went over and raised its back leg again, making sure that he kept a tight hold on it. There was a small pebble trapped in the horse’s frog and he flicked it out using the point of his dagger.
‘There,’ he said to the animal. ‘No need to go around kicking me. You’re all better now.’ He swung up into the saddle. ‘Let’s go home.’
They trotted off down the trail.
He got back before nightfall and it didn’t take long to find Roo and tell him of the door.
Roo scratched his head. A sure sign that he was thinking. ‘WD stands for War Department,’ he said. ‘That would be the Second World War. If my history hasn’t completely left me and my memory serves me right, I think that there was a commando training camp in the Braemar Hills during the war. Mountain training to be precise. Could be some sort of storage room. Ammo dump, supplies, that sort of thing. Might just be classified papers. Who knows? Well worth a look, though. Why don’t we get a few lads, some spades and sledgehammers and you take us back there tomorrow, young Sam. We’ll smash our way in and take a look.’
Sam nodded and headed for bed, his battered body crying out for sleep.
He woke the next day as stiff as a corpse in rigor mortis, but Roo was already banging on his door so there was no time for any luxuries like a hot bath and a long breakfast. It was simply a bite to eat, a mug of water and back in the saddle.
The small column of six men took a few hours to reach the place where Sam had been kicked down the mountain and they all dismounted and clambered down the steep slope.
Roo took a cursory look at the door and then said. ‘No chance of breaking through this,’ declared the old Australian. ‘It’s sealed up tighter than a duck’s bum. Better that we dig in to the side of it. It’ll be set in concrete but that will be at well over a hundred years old. Concrete deteriorates so we’ll have a good chance of smashing through it. That’s how we’ll get in.’
He instructed the four men that had come with them and then he and Sam stood back and watched and waited as they stripped off the turf and earth to expose the concrete. Then they set at the barrier with their sledgehammers, striking in rhythm until bits of the old gray material started to crumble and fall off.
Two hours of hard manual labor later, they had opened a hole big enough to squeeze through. Roo collected six torches from the saddle bags, distributed them, lit them and then led the way into the man made cave.
The massive door belied the size of the room behind it. It was a standard height room, about ten feet high, and large enough to just fit the three ten seater tables. The tables were covered with dust but had nothing else on them. Ten chairs were placed neatly around each of the tables.
Another room led directly off the first, cutting deeper into the mountain. This room had rows of triple bunk beds bolted to the walls. Enough beds for thirty people. The next room looked like a store room of some sort.
Sam pried open a few boxes with his dagger. Some of the contents were familiar to him, some not so much. Blankets, uniforms, binoculars, cooking utensils. There were also crates of tins. Sam vaguely remembered tinned food from when he was a small boy. Baked beans in particular. His mother used to make beans on toast for breakfast. Sometimes she would grate food on top of it. But that was then. And, try as he might, he couldn’t actually remember what she looked like.
But tinned food had run out many years ago so he had no recollection of exactly what they looked like. Or tasted like.
Roo picked out a couple of tins and smiled.
‘Spam,’ he said. ‘Steak and kidney, franks and beans.’ He laughed. ‘Good old war issue food,’ he laughed. ‘Solid enough to stick to your stomach lining and substantial enough to keep you going all day.’
‘Can you still eat that?’ Asked Sam.
‘Yep,’ answered Roo. ‘Well not ones like this.’ He picked up a tin that had swollen up, the ends as rounded as a baseball. ‘That means that it’s gone off. But the rest will be fin
e, not that I’d recommend eating them. I mean, you can live off them but they taste like crap.’
Sam laughed and the rest of the men joined in.
Roo held his torch up and looked around the room. ‘There,’ he pointed at the side of the room. A steel door was set into the wall. A large hasp and staple and padlock secured it shut.
‘Jonno,’ said the Australian. ‘Take a few swings at that padlock with your sledgehammer. Let’s see what’s inside.’
Jonno hefted his sledgehammer and smashed it into the padlock. But it was a large chunk of steel so he had to strike it a few more times before it sprung open and fell to the floor.
Sam pulled the door open and Roo stepped inside. He whistled, a long, drawn out exclamation of surprise.
‘What is it?’ Asked Sam.
‘We are going to have to get hold of Nathaniel,’ said Roo. ‘And I mean as quickly as humanly possible. He is definitely going to want to see this.’
Chapter 20
Nathaniel stood by the fireplace and stared into the flames. ‘Fire is a truly amazing thing,’ he said. ‘It’s almost like it’s alive. If you’re ever alone and you light a fire then you have company. It keeps you warm, protects you from wild animals, cooks for you, keeps insects at bay.’
‘Yeah,’ agreed Tad. ‘And if it irritates you, you can pee on it and it goes away.’
The side of Nathaniel’s mouth twitched up in what might have been the beginnings of a smile. ‘Sick, dude.’
‘Sorry,’ apologized Tad. ‘It’s just that you were starting to come over all maudlin. I was just trying to snap you out of it.’
‘Not much chance of that,’ said Nathaniel. ‘Tad,’ he continued. ‘The reason that I have asked you to come here and talk, without any of The Ten or the officers, is that I need to lay things on the line.’
‘Go ahead.’
‘Look, I’m not going to pull any punches. The Vandals are out on their feet. Or wings, I suppose would be more accurate. The thing is, with the constant air patrols they aren’t getting time to rotate out and get rest. Chief Cha-rek has told me that they simply can’t keep it up. Some of them are literally collapsing from exhaustion. I don’t think that we have fully appreciated the strain that they are under. Mental as well as physical.’
The marine took a swig from the mug in his hand. It was brandy, rough and strong and he had to swallow hard to stop himself coughing.
‘The same can be said of our troops,’ he continued. ‘Constant vigilance on the wall is taking its toll. The waiting eats away at their determination and the constant attacks eat away at their numbers. We simply can’t keep taking the sort of casualties that we are. It is unsustainable.’
‘So what do you recommend that we do?’ Asked Tad, confident that his king would have formulated a plan of some sort.
Nathaniel didn’t answer and when Tad looked at him he noticed the dark rings under his friend’s eyes. The hollowness of his cheeks. The general raggedness of his appearance. He was a man wracked by exhaustion. A man who had pushed himself to his physical limits and beyond.
And the Little Big Man cursed himself for being so selfish. For wallowing so deeply in his own self pity that he had not even noticed that his best friend and the leader of his people was literally working himself to death.
‘I don’t know,’ whispered Nathaniel. ‘If the fair-Folk had kept their side of the bargain and had entered the fray with at least some vigor then we might have been in a better position. As it is, they do the bare minimum to ensure their own survival and we take the brunt of the Annihilator’s attacks. We are running low on weapons and food. Even stone to repair the wall.’
The marine sat down and his head sank to his chest. ‘I do not know what to do,’ he said. His voice raw with emotion. ‘I have failed.’
There was a frantic banging on the front door.
‘Tell them to go away,’ said Nathaniel.
Tad walked over to the front door and opened it. Roo barreled into the room, his face wreathed in smiles, his demeanor that of a child before Christmas.
‘Look, Roo,’ said Tad. ‘It’s not the best time. I think that you should come back later.’
The Australian shook his head. ‘No way, my little mukka. Now is the time and here is the place. This is important and the king man is going to be chuffed to bits, I promise.’
‘It’s okay,’ said Nathaniel. ‘Let him in, it looks like there’s no way that he’s going to take no for an answer anyway.’
‘Too darn right, king,’ said Roo.
‘So, what is it?’ Asked Nathaniel.
Roo shook his head. ‘Can’t tell you,’ he said, the same pleased expression plastered all over his face. ‘You gotta see it yourself. Trust me, this is good news.’
Nathaniel, who had known the Australian for many years now, knew that he was as stubborn as a pile of rocks and if this was the way that he wanted to play things, then this was the way that it would go. He could outright command him using his rank, but even that would probably take almost as long and end up being endlessly more unpleasant. Instead he simply grabbed his axe and his cloak and followed him outside.
His horse was already saddled and was being held by Sam, the new leader of the walking people. A group of fully armed warriors were arrayed behind Sam. The king’s escort.
‘If we ride at a fast trot and keep going into the night we can get there by midday tomorrow,’ said Roo. ‘I have already organized supplies. I have told General Parkinson and he will ensure that the wall is covered. Tad can take over all tactical necessities while you are gone, sire,’ finished the Australian as he actually allowed a little respect to color his delivery.
‘Lead on, Roo,’ commanded the Marine. ‘Let’s get this party started. Tad, I’ll see you in few days. Try to keep us all alive while I’m gone.’
Tad threw a loose salute and gave a sardonic grin. ‘I’ll do my best, king,’ he said. ‘Don’t you worry about me. I’ll just wait here, not knowing what the hell is going on. Not curious at all, that’s me.’
Nathaniel, Roo and Sam mounted and the small column trotted off in the direction of the Braemar Hills.
As Roo had suggested, they moved at a fast trot, riding into the night, fortunate for the half moon that provided just enough light it reflected off the snow.
They grabbed a few hours sleep, wrapped in their furs next to a small camp fire, and rose the next day to cheese and bread and water, climbing into their saddles as soon as they had eaten.
Nathaniel knew better than to ask Roo where or even why they were going. The Australian’s sense of theater would keep him mute and, as well as that, Nathaniel knew that it would frustrate Roo even more if he didn’t ask and instead assumed a bored and uninterested demeanor.
‘So,’ said Roo. ‘I suppose that you’re wondering where we’re going?’
Nathaniel shrugged as if it were the last thing that he was wondering.
‘Can’t tell you,’ said Roo. ‘But it’ll be worth the wait.’
‘Whatever,’ mumbled Nathaniel as he pretended to be thinking of something else.
‘It’s a huge surprise,’ continued Roo. ‘Come on, why don’t you try and guess?’
‘Maybe later,’ answered Nathaniel, as he tried to hide his grin.
‘No,’ said Roo. ‘We’ll be there later. Guess now. You’ll never get it. Never ever.’
‘Alright,’ sighed the marine. ‘You’ve discovered a Push-me-pull-you.’
‘What?’
‘A Push-me-pull-you.’
‘What the hell is that?’ Asked Roo irritably.
‘It’s a mythical animal with a head on both side of its body,’ answered Nathaniel. ‘So when it needs to go anywhere the one head has to agree with the other whether it should push or pull. If they can’t agree then it can’t go anywhere. Push-me-pull-you.’
Roo thought for a while and then he shook his head. ‘No. Not possible.’
‘Why?’ Asked Nathaniel.
‘If it had a h
ead on each side of its body then how would it take a crap? Not possible.’
For the first time in a while Nathaniel laughed out loud.
‘So,’ continued Roo. ‘Guess again.’
Nathaniel shook his head. ‘I’ll wait, Roo.’
They continued trotting towards their destination, everyone silent except for Roo who mumbled under his breath about spoilsports and kings and killjoys.
Nathaniel grinned to himself. Roo had the mind of a genius wrapped inside the social graces of a ten year old.
And then The Forever Man simply concentrated on riding his horse, allowing himself a few moments of inner peace. A few moments of escape from the grind and stress of leadership.
A few hours later, just before midday, Sam called a halt to the column and dismounted. Everyone followed him as he grabbed a torch from his saddlebag and started to clamber down the mountain.
They got to the door and Sam stood back and ushered Nathaniel in.
Before they had left to fetch the king, Roo and Sam and his men had unpacked a few of the contents from the boxes in the back room and laid them out on the dining tables. Then they had stacked the rest of the cases on the side, against the walls.
Nathaniel stopped dead in his tracks, his mouth hanging open like an industrial fly catcher. Then he strode up to the table and picked one of the items up.
It still smelled of oil and the torchlight reflected off the curved magazine and the length of the blue-black barrel. The marine racked the receiver back to check. Inside gleamed the gold of a cartridge. It was fully loaded.
It was a Bren light machine gun, circa 1942. A curved magazine carrying twenty rounds of .303 military hardball ammunition.
The marine looked up at Roo. His astonishment had changed to pure delight.
‘There’s more,’ said Roo as he pulled a sheet of canvas off an item that had been mounted on the floor next to the table.
It was a Vickers heavy machine gun with a two hundred and fifty round canvas belt feed. Also .303 hardball and capable of spitting out five rounds a second and doing so all day without jamming, provided the water cooled jacket was kept full. In the Second World War two British soldiers with one Vickers had fought off an entire Japanese attack, killing over two hundred men. It was old and the ammunition not as high velocity as more modern weapons had been, but it was still death incarnate.’
