by M C Rooney
“He has set a ring of fire around the front part of his house,” said Wilko, “and is challenging you to come and face him.”
“To the death?” Maurice replied with a grin on his face. Why was he looking forward to this so much?
“He didn’t say that,” Brilleaux replied, “but judging by what you did to his sons …”
“Watch for the trap, Maurice,” Veronica said, and then paused as she looked down at the water streaming down her legs. The baby was arriving.
Great timing, Maurice thought, but at least Veronica would not be there to watch what he had to do.
“Right,” snapped Freda, “us girls will be busy for a while, but you watch for those three others, Brooks, Frampton, and that other dickhead.”
“Harris,” said John.
“Yeah, that cunt Harris,” Freda replied. Freda then grabbed a distraught Veronica and was directing her back to her tent, but before she disappeared into the tent, she called out to her husband.
“John,” she said in that horrible voice of hers.
“Yes, Freda?” John replied.
“Get your arse on top of that building,” she said. “If you see those three henchmen in the crowd, feather them.”
“Yes, Freda,” John replied and came forward and gave her a kiss goodbye that went on for far too long.
Good advice again, thought Maurice as he and everybody else who were not kissing were looking at the sky. That was twice in one day she had proven useful. Was that a good sign or a bad one?
When Freda and John finally came up for air, Maurice gave a weak smile of goodbye to his scared-looking wife. As they went inside the tent, he heard Freda’s grating voice. “Right, shut up, lie on the ground, and spread your legs.”
“Geez,” Maurice muttered, “and I thought I had it bad with a fight to the death.”
As he walked off to the mansion with his four companions, he heard his wife groan with pain. The baby, it appeared, was in a hurry to enter this crazy world. It was time his Uncle Ken left it.
Ken stood and watched as Maurice stalked up to the place of battle he had prepared. He was shirtless again, and Ken could see him flexing his powerful arms in anticipation of the oncoming fistfight. His men had gathered as much wood as they could find, and six large fires were burning in a circle, with Ken standing in the middle of it, waiting. About one hundred people had gathered to watch the fight, and in among that crowd, three men were watching his back.
“Just come into the circle, you bastard,” Ken said quietly to himself. “Just a little farther and one of my boys will put an arrow in your back.”
But Maurice didn’t walk into the circle right away. He stopped outside of it and waited. And as he waited for a few minutes, Ken watched as three arrows, one by one, flew through the air and into the crowd. He heard cries of pain as the arrows hit their marks, and then he saw the glint of knives flashing in the night. Arnie and his friends had finished the job.
He knew, Ken thought in despair, the bastard had guessed Brooks’s plan and had taken precautions. Ken looked up to the roof of his home and saw John Carter give him a grin and a short wave of his hand in return. He was on his own now.
“You didn’t think I would just walk into your trap, did you, Uncle?” Maurice said as he stood on the edge of the circle. “We found them, and your friends are now dead. So it’s just you and me now.”
“Just come in and fight me!” Ken screamed.
“Oh, I will,” Maurice replied as the shadowy figure walked around the burning fires.
“Just fight me!” Ken screamed again. All this waiting was driving him closer to the edge of hysteria. He is looking for something, he thought, what is he looking for?
“Did you think this was just going to be a fistfight?” Maurice laughed. He was holding something in his hand now. Ken didn’t know what it was. The burning fire made it hard for him to see anything, let alone his nephew standing beyond it.
“Yes, it was meant to be a match of strength,” Ken said nervously. What a stupid idea that turned out to be. He had no weapons at all to defend himself with. So sure he was that Brooks’s plan would work.
“And then your boys would kill me from behind,” Maurice replied.
“Yes,” Ken spat, “just like you killed my sons.”
“Oh, I didn’t kill them from behind,” Maurice said softly. “I did surprise Scott, but I killed Warren with his own knife. He had plenty of time to see it coming.”
Ken’s body was shaking now. The way Maurice was talking so calmly was terrifying.
“So you don’t have any weapons at all?” Maurice asked. “You didn’t bring any sticks?”
“Wh...what?” Ken mumbled.
“A stick,” Maurice asked again calmly.
“What stick?” Ken asked, bewildered.
“This fucking stick!” Maurice now roared and ran straight through the fire.
Ken was so stunned by Maurice’s sudden movement that he didn’t move when his nephew swung a long, curved piece of wood at him. This object connected with his head with such power that it killed him instantly. Maurice then proceeded to smash Ken’s head in so thoroughly in order to destroy his brain that he looked like a woodchopper in one of the olden days’ sporting competitions. He then held up the bloody stick for all to see. The spattered blood of his uncle’s brain covered most of his face and bare chest as he screamed in triumph. The crowd roared their approval back and started chanting his new name. They exalted in their new boss, but at the same time, were scared of him. That’s the way it should be, Maurice thought; good leaders should be feared. He looked back at his new home and saw his mother looking fearfully through the window.
“John,” he called out to his friend.
“Yes, mate?” John called back.
He had to harden his heart against her and against all of what may come in the future. “Gather Arnie and his friends, and get that bitch out of our house.”
“Where should she go?”
“Oh, I know a perfect tent for her,” he replied with a harsh grin.
An hour later, he walked into that perfect tent to see his wife and her newborn baby.
“His name is Rod,” she said with a fearful glance at the huge man covered in blood. “He is named after my father.”
“And I am Hockey,” the bloody man replied. “I am named after my uncle.”
Year 2091, West Coast Tasmania, Three weeks after the battle of the Tower
Dave Hussein rode his horse westward in the search of another community of Tasmanians. He was thirty years of age, had been a ranger for fourteen years, and considered himself to be a friendly sort of person. People, however, were always a bit standoffish with him, as his face tended to be, what his friend Cazaly called, ‘a bit aggro’. Hussein was happy training the new recruits outside of Hobart, but new orders had come from the mayor that he was to find a tribe to the west led by a young man named Buzz. He was to offer whatever support he could and assure the new chief that the people in the south meant no harm and wished to help him in the construction of his electrical tower in any way they possibly could. He was also to avoid a possible hostile tribe to the west, and maybe even an army of two thousand to the east.
Easy as pie, he thought sarcastically. Tassie looked like it was going to hell again, and Hussein could understand any efforts to broker peace between neighbouring communities on this small island. What he couldn’t understand was the partner that the mayor had provided him with in this mission.
“Milly. Wilson,” she had called out, and soon two huge black dogs came crashing through the undergrowth in search of their mistress. “Jedda, Bess,” she called out again, and another two black dogs came running to her side. “Where have you been? You naughty doggies,” she admonished them with a smile as she rode her grey mare westward along the former highway.
Kirstin Bartel, Hussein thought in amazement.
Why did the mayor send this young girl? Hussein would have felt much more at ease with Townshe
nd or Daltrey watching his back, but instead she had sent a pretty, long-haired, oval-faced girl of nineteen, who had only just finished her training. The mayor must have her reasons, he kept telling himself. The Infinite knows how smart the mayor was, but for the life of him, he couldn’t understand why she had made this particular choice.
Kirstin swung around and smiled at him. “Phew, it’s a hot one today, Dave.”
“Yes, it is,” Hussein replied. He didn’t smile back; people tended to give a twitch of fright when he smiled at them. He must admit, it did come in handy sometimes. Many a fight had been avoided by his smile and he did inherit it from his tough old grandfather Razan who he adored.
“Do you think we have far to go?” Kirstin asked as she swept her brown hair out of her face and adjusted her green jacket that she had spent hours embroidering so it would look extra pretty.
“Not sure,” Hussein replied as he looked at the sky. “We should be pretty close.”
“Well, we may have to stop soon and do some hunting. My poor doggies are so hungry. Aren’t you, my little sweethearts?” Kirstin began to make baby noises at her dogs, who gazed back at her with adoration.
“Are they related to the mayor’s dog?” Hussein asked.
“Distant cousins, I think, and these ones are not brother and sisters,” Kirstin replied and then continued to coo at her beloved pooches.
Strange answer. And why is she here? Hussein thought once more. If we get attacked, I am a bloody dead man.
He contemplated being a dead man for another fifteen minutes, until the thought became closer to reality when four men walked out of the nearby tree line. The mayor had advised him that there were two tribes to the west. The ones to be avoided were said to most likely not be wearing shirts and would have their bodies painted and may be aligned to a man called Martin. These men in front of them had no shirts and had their bodies painted, but he didn’t get to ask whether they knew Martin or not, as the leader with thick black hair began to look Kirstin’s horse up and down.
“So that is the beast we heard about.”
“It’s not a beast,” Kirstin said indignantly. “It’s a horse.”
The leader now began looking Kirstin up and down.
“My, my, my, I’d love to see what is in your pants,” he said with an evil grin.
“Really?” she said with a smile. “How do you know what I have in my pants?”
Sweet Infinite, girl, Hussein thought. You can’t be that naïve, surely? He then looked around for the dogs and saw they had disappeared. Where did they go? Well, so much for being man or woman’s best friend.
Three of the men were now looking at Kirstin with hungry eyes, but one man had his bow trained on Hussein. Bloody hell, there is nothing I can do, he thought in panic.
“I know what you have in your pants,” the leader replied. “A yummy cunny, that’s what.”
“Oh,” Kirstin replied with a lovely smile, “you’re talking about my underpants, you stupid motherfucker.”
Everybody paused, including Hussein. Did she just say what I think she said?
“What?” the leader replied, stunned. He looked like a young man who was used to everybody bowing and scraping before him. Kirstin’s reply had thrown him off guard a little, to put it mildly.
“Oh, I will explain it slowly because you are so dense. You see, in my trouser pants,” Kirstin continued, smiling, “I have two knives. And one is going in your eye,” she said, as she pointed at the leader, “and one is going in that dumb cunt with the bow. Maybe his eye or maybe his balls, I haven’t decided yet,” she finished with a thoughtful frown.
The guy with the bow was now looking sideways at the girl and wondering whether his manhood was under any immediate threat.
“You fucking bitch,” the leader spat, “you’re really going to get it now!”
“Ooohh, I’m so frightened,” Kirstin replied, leaning down from her horse and smiling for all it was worth.
The three other shirtless men were looking a tiny bit uncomfortable now. Kirstin was freaking them out, as the old saying went.
“Anyway, bitch,” the leader continued, “there are four of us, and you only have two knives.”
“Well, I am going to kill only two of you.”
“So your angry-faced mate is going to kill the rest?” the leader asked with a contemptuous smile.
“Oh, no, of course not, silly,” Kirstin replied. “Dumb cunt has a bow trained on him. My dogs are going to rip their throats out.”
“A dog?” The leader frowned. “What’s a dog?”
Kirstin whistled.
“Well, you don’t see that every day,” the young man with dark hair and a cheeky face said as he walked out of the bush and watched two rangers, two beasts called horses, and four black furry things called dogs trot away northwards.
“No, you don’t,” the young woman with thick black hair replied as she looked at the four dead bodies lying at different angles on the ground. “But I want one of those dogs,” she added excitedly.
“Really?” the young man asked.
“They were just so cute,” she said in a baby voice.
The young man and woman had been out hunting, but, of course, time on their own held such value that little of it was actually spent looking for game.
“Even when they bit those men’s legs?” he enquired.
“Yes, even then,” the young woman replied. “They were Martin’s men after all.”
“And the way they talked and looked at that young girl,” the young man said in disgust.
“Evil,” she replied.
“They were more than Martin’s men, though.” The young man grimaced. “The leader was Glen Martin, Brett Martin’s eldest son.”
“Oh dear,” the young woman said. “Brett Martin will be looking for the murderer.”
“And payback,” the young man replied.
“Doesn’t matter who,” the young woman said with a frown, “that horrible man will send his sons on a rampage, and anybody who looks sideways at him now will be killed.”
“Crazy days,” the young man mused. “First we hear that Buzz has gone back to our hometown, then stories of a battle at the lightning tower.”
“He visited us on his way,” she replied with a smile.
“That’s quite a detour,” the young man said, surprised.
“He wanted to see his mother, I think.”
“That’s nice,” he replied, smiling. “It’s been a long time.”
“Too long,” she replied.
“My mum has been gone for years,” he said softly.
“I know,” the young woman replied and gave a shiver. His mother had been a very harsh lady at times.
The young man smiled at the young woman’s response. He knew what people thought of his mother. But he had loved her nonetheless.
“Do you think our fathers have survived?” she asked sadly.
“I hope so,” the young man replied “I really do. I know the death of my brothers will hurt my father badly.”
“I’m sorry about the Circle deaths.”
“They knew the price of failure,” the young man said with a shrug. He really didn’t care that much about their passing. They weren’t very nice men, and the broken bones they had given him over the years left very little love for them in his heart.
“I better get back to the village and warn Mother,” the young woman said as she wrapped a scarf around her head.
“Yes, and I’d better get back and warn the Bean Pole and the Accountant,” the young man said as he took off his jacket and scarf and showed his bare chest to the world.
“Do you think the Martins know how dangerous the two of them are?” she asked.
“I hope not,” the young man replied. “If we are to see peace in the west with Buzz returning, we need to let them do their thing.”
“I guess so.” She sighed.
“We will get through this,” he assured her even though he wasn’t absolutely sure that t
hey would.
“I hope so.”
“We will,” he said confidently.
She smiled at him. “I love you, Flynn Carter,” the young woman said as she kissed him goodbye.
“I love you, Danni Roberts,” the young man replied.
The Martin Mansion
Eighty-seven-year-old Rebecca Roberts lounged on her special couch in her special room. Sure, the furniture was now dated, but that just added to the character of this wonderful house.
“It’s so good to be back,” she mumbled through her toothless mouth for the thousandth time. Nearly forty years she had been forced to endure living in a tent, then upgrading to various huts that were now used in this area. All the while, her horrible son was living in the beautiful house and his own mother lived in squalor.
When her son, Maurice, or Hockey as he liked to be called, went away in the search of new lands, the Martin family had gone with him. Rebecca was furious that she had to endure more years living in a tent, as she had gotten used to living in her own hut by then. But after a year of warriors being defeated by someone called ‘Feral’ they had begun to move back to their homes in the west. After much nagging from Rebecca, Brett Martin had decided to move his family back home as well. He was worried that if he left, Hockey would see that as a betrayal and renewal of old rivalries and hunt him down. But he needn’t have worried, as Maurice didn’t care. He had decided to stay and had been there ever since. In fact, to her delight, she had heard through the grapevine that a fever had swept through most of his clan, and the big idiot had caught it. She gave a loud chuckle at the thought. Soon afterward, the youngest boy, Buzz, had been challenged by that scowling moron Frank Carter. Buzz killed him, then left his father to die on his own in the sick camp. And then—she stifled another fit of laughter at the thought—some army had come in from the east and killed all of the survivors. Maurice was finally dead. She had laughed with joy when she heard the news. How funny it was that he had been killed in such a way. Karma, the elders called it.
“You seem very happy there, Rebecca,” Grant Hamill said as he walked into the room. “Good news, I hope.”
