by Jim Rudnick
“Tomorrow for omelets,” Sue said, “as I’m on brekkie duty,” and that got a big grin from some at the table.
She sat back and looked at him.
“Javor—you seem to be a pretty plugged-in guy when it comes to handling yourself out in the field. So it would be no surprise for you to learn that since the Drake came down, I’ve been reporting on the ship and you—and yes, even on Bixby—to the Regime in my nightly ham radio reports,” she said, and her tone was a bit apologetic.
But he knew that, of course. Anyone like her and her cadre would be required to keep the home office informed, so this wasn’t really news.
“You might be surprised to know that we were told that if you presented problems—if you seemed like you were going to put Maxwell out of balance between our cadre and the zombies—that we were told to terminate you. No questions asked. Balance is what is important here on Bones, so that too should not be a surprise. Should it?” she said, and again her tone, he thought, was one of appeasement.
He nodded.
Would have done the same in the Regime’s place, and the Empire too would offer the same advice.
He smiled and nodded. There was no need to say more, and Sue leaned in toward him at the table.
“So, last night—before our foray today over to the Drake, we were told that in no case were we to do anything to you. Keep you up and alive and happy was the term, I believe. And we don’t know what happened to change that viewpoint—but after talk among us, we thought you should know before you speak to the Regime,” she said.
He did wonder at that—why she’d offer up this nugget of information that seemed to blow the whistle on her orders was odd. But then, there was no way to learn that here—the answer was with the Regime.
He nodded and Bixby, who’d apparently just come over for some affection, licked the hand that sat on his left hip.
He rubbed the dog’s ears and welcomed the break in the conversation, but he realized that he’d just learned a fact that might one day be important, if he could learn what happened in the Regime yesterday to change his status.
“Fine, Sue ... and thanks for that background,” he said quietly, still rubbing Bixby down, and he picked up one paw to look at the dog’s nails. Recently clipped—dew claws removed. He looked inside Bixby’s closest ear, and he saw it too was clean. He lifted the edge of Bixby’s top lip and noted too that the teeth were fully mature, unstained, and had no tartar.
“Your dog appears to have been pretty well taken care of,” Bruce drawled, “so that would explain what we found in his owner’s bag … least we think it was the owner ‘cause there was dog food in same.”
Javor had forgotten all about that but turned with a start to Bruce.
“Which is—” and he waited.
Bruce looked at Sue, who nodded, and he then got up to go down the mezzanine-wide hallway to a door that sat down the hallway a bi. He went in and came right back out a moment later, carrying that shoulder bag.
He put it on the table after Jimmy had cleared away some of the dinner dishes, and once there was room, he spilled the contents on the top of the table.
Two folded robes that looked old but had been well taken care of.
What looked like a towel was next, and as Bruce unrolled it, a pair of knives—throwing knives—clattered on the tabletop.
Three books. One looked like a journal or log or diary that looked well used. The second book was on first aid, and surprisingly, the third back was on the pack theory of dogs.
A small bag of dog kibble too.
Some kind of energy or food bars too, more than a dozen, and Bixby smelled them and sat up straighter, but nobody gave him one.
Ammo—nine millimeter, it looked like—in pistol magazines that held twelve rounds each.
Big handle on that gun, Javor thought, as his Colt mag held only nine shells.
And an electronic tablet. When touched by Bruce, the screen lit up, so it had power too.
But Javor noted it was also a secure screen that needed a password, a PIN, or thumbprint to gain access, and Bruce agreed and said, “Nope, couldn’t get in either.”
The next item was a loose stack of papers with some kind of clip holding them together, all typed in neat galactic English.
Javor pointed and Sue nodded.
“Yeah, we’ve read them all. Paperwork is signed by someone called Adamson—directing this guy to take his K9 to Maxwell to investigate the uprising. First, we know of no such person, nor of any uprising either. All a mystery, but the K9 refers, we think, to the dog—your Bixby. This guy was on some kind of a mission, in someone’s forces—but none that we know of around here,” she said.
“And you did send word back to the Regime on these items too, did you not?” Javor inquired, and everyone nodded.
He sat for a moment.
That Bixby had been trained by someone to be a K9 dog was no surprise.
He knew his stuff for sure, and Javor was glad for that.
He’d been accepted as the new master too.
But this uprising? And a lieutenant in which man’s army would be just as important to learn too.
He shrugged. “Time maybe for that call to the Regime?” he asked.
Everyone stood and they went down the mezzanine-wide hallway to the door that Bruce had left open.
Inside, there was a long table against the far wall with what looked like electronic receivers, amplifiers, and monitors. At the center, there were some tabletop microphones sitting, and above those on a white board was a calendar with notations for almost every single day.
“We change the frequency daily, to prevent any eavesdroppers; we change the filters too, and the new ones get transferred to us at the end of each month for the coming one,” Sue said as she dropped into the center chair and patted the one beside her on her left for Javor to take.
He took the chair and noted that she read and then re-read the settings on the calendar before plugging those new numbers into the big black-faced receiver in front of her, again checking twice. Filters were done the same way, and she clicked three times in rapid order with the button on the side of the tabletop microphone in front of her.
As she did so, the receiver beeped at her, and she made one more adjustment. There were three answering clicks on the small set of speakers at either end of the equipment lineup, and she spoke as she depressed her mic button.
“Cadre nineteen, calling. Cadre nineteen,” she said and then let the button go.
Moments later, a voice came back to them over those speakers.
“Hey there, Sue … how’s the big town of Maxwell doing today?” The voice was almost playful and sounded young, which was a nice surprise to Javor as he figured the Regime would be full of old guys like him.
“Fine, Trevor, just fine. I’ve got the space pilot sitting right here beside me and wanted to talk—if we can—but it was all arranged with Vera, can do?” she asked, and that got a positive reply from Trevor.
“And”—there was a click or two—“Vera is on the air, signing off,” Trevor said as control of the call went to Vera.
Sue smiled. “Vera, good to speak to you again. I have Javor here with me—he’s the fellow who came down on the ship a few days back, and yes, we have news on same—but I’d like to let him tell you,” she said.
There was silence at the other end for a bit and then a simple “Go ahead, Javor.”
He took the mic, and pressing the send button, he told his tale of being ambushed by the Boathi twenty lights away and of their flight to Bones, all hands dead except himself being tucked into the robo-doc. He told of finding Maxwell and his last few days learning about Bones, and he was careful to include that Sue and the local cadre had been very helpful. And lastly, he shared about the trip back to the Drake just hours ago and the bad news about her future. She’d be a great house on Bones, but she’d never fly again.
He tried to make that sound like a positive thing. That being on Bones was not a sentence
of life without hope.
About the Boathi, he did point out, as he was sure that Sue had already done so, that he had no idea if the enemy could track the Drake to Bones, nor for that matter if they did find the ship that they could do more than simply blow it up. That was something he didn’t want to even think of—but he had to point that out at least.
He pointed out that the Drake was an explorer ship and had a huge database of Gallipedia content that was at least eight years newer than whatever Bones had. He shared that the AI on the Drake was leading edge too, which was a real bonus for whomever controlled her at least.
And finally, he spoke about himself, providing his age as well as a bio of a few sentences.
He told Vera that he thought as he was a castaway, he could be happy here on Bones.
Silence from the other end.
The woman named Vera was considering all of this, and after a full two minutes, she finally spoke.
“I’d, or rather we’d, like to meet with you, Javor. More to learn, I suspect, and we’d like that to be done in person. You, however, are two hundred miles away. Which is a problem—not so much the distance, but the time it’d take for us to mount a complete foray through the Badlands to the power station at the Adair Dam and then via the old interstate to Maxwell. We feel—and I’m sure that Sue would agree that if it’s speed—that a small group could cut corners and evade the kind of response a huge party like our own would receive.
“Sue, I’m going to talk to those here about this more fully—but what I think we’d want you to do would be to button up the cadre house. All five of you would then take on the job of getting Javor to Arlington, soonest. You’d need to avoid as much as you can, time line-wise,” she said.
Sue nodded and leaned on her speak button. “So, I’d hear back, say, tomorrow—when do you think you’d like us to depart?” she asked.
“Tomorrow at the latest,” Vera said.
Sue nodded and then she looked sideways at Javor and her lips pursed. “Vera—as the AI on the ship is leading edge. One thought is that should we not all get to Arlington—and yes, I mean Javor—should we not at least have some kind of access to the ship put on hold? Just as sort of an insurance policy sort of,” she said.
As he leaned forward to speak at once, she held him back.
Vera thought about that for a moment and then it was almost as if you could see her head nodding at the other mic.
“Good idea. Have him input the controls and overrides into the cadre AI at the courthouse, to be used only after, say, in four months. Access to cadre team only, and if he’s not back in those 120 days, we will get access to the Drake. If he is back, he can kill the order on our own AI himself. Work for you, Javor?” she asked.
He nodded. Four months would be more than enough time to get to Arlington and back, and yes, it was insurance too.
He said, “Done,” and that was that as Sue signed off and the link to the Regime was ended.
CHAPTER FOUR
Taking the same route back to the Drake to get supplies for the trip to Arlington was an easy task, unless, of course ,one counted on the zombies that somehow were now standing on the bridge that separated the ridgeline and the Drake from the town.
Bruce said it first.
“We can just kill a few, which’d get them to feed, and slip by when they’re otherwise engaged,” he said.
“Except,” Sue said, “the dang bridge isn’t wide enough. We’ve gotta lure them back onto the town side, and then you can pick off a few.”
Everyone nodded. Javor left this part of the tactics to the cadre as he learned how to handle larger crowds of the dumb brand of zombies.
Jimmy nodded and taking off his backpack and leaving it and his rifle with Rick, he quickly marched up the street toward the bridge that lay on the left-hand side. He was quiet at first, but as he drew even with the twenty or so zombies who were milling about on the bridge, he began to sing and clap his hands loudly.
“She loved me and I loved her back … again and again and again,” he bellowed out over and over, in what shouldn’t have been called a tune.
The zombies paid attention immediately, and the murmurs and soft screechings they made followed them as they began to move off the bridge toward Jimmy. He paused to let them get a bit closer and then went up the street straight ahead to draw them away from the bridge, which was emptying fast.
Sue nodded and the rest hustled up to the bridge, turned to their left to go about halfway across, and then stopped. Bruce jumped up on one of the abutments and carefully took aim at the lead zombies who were trudging after Jimmy.
Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang!
Four shots rang out and four zombies fell as their heads exploded into bloody clouds.
Around them, other zombies noticed, and they slowed their chasing of Jimmy to fall on the new meat that now lay at their feet. The feeding frenzy began as they clambered over one another to get to their downed compatriots.
Jimmy nonchalantly moved away from the mass of same in the middle of the road, took a close path along the building fronts on the one side of the street, and quietly moved back toward the bridge. Not a zombie paid any attention and soon he stood beside them once more, donning his backpack.
Picking up his rifle he said, “Four?”
Bruce nodded. “Four today—wanted to finish off that old ammo.”
Sue waved an arm and said, “Let’s get going, lads,” and she and the group walked across the bridge stepping over the now stripped carcass of some kind of a small animal. Bixby stopped to smell the body but didn’t go very close, Javor noted.
They turned left once more toward the Drake sitting above them on the ridge line.
“Why were those ones just standing around the bridge,” Javor asked.
“They don’t eat—well, as far as I know, that kind of animal—a coon I think it’s called. But the smell of its blood must have attracted them, and once they got on the bridge, there was nothing to eat—but the smell must have kept them there,” Sue said and that got nods from the rest of the cadre group.
“So what did eat that coon?” Javor asked, but nobody knew and they all shook their heads.
At the Drake, once again, Javor controlled the AI to open the front airlock and drop the ladder and the lift, and he and the rest went up same to enter the Drake.
Javor noted that the final diagnostics report had come in, and it was no different from the smaller pieces he’d looked at yesterday. The Drake would never get out into space again. And flying her in the atmosphere was a risky—very risky—one-time thing as she could come down in an instant.
He thought for a moment about the upcoming hike of more than two hundred miles through all sorts of country, and he went back to his bunk area to find clothes and more importantly, some kind of hiking boots. He had none, but he knew that the Empire marines were issued with same, so he searched under Fawcett’s bunk for a pair. They shared the same boot size. He found the boots, which were brand new, with high-top clasps and a tread that’d never wear out. He grinned as he also found two pairs of military-grade compression socks stuffed into them too, and he quickly changed his footwear.
Back on the bridge, he looked for a moment at the group of the five cadre members and their firepower.
“Come with me,” he said, and he led the way back to the crew area where he faced an unmarked door.
He asked AI to open the door and had to provide his birth date, just like always, to get it to open.
“Six, thirteen, twenty-two forty-nine,” he said, and the pocket door slid open to the Drake’s armory.
“You are armed, but the Drake, I’d think, has better firepower. If you want to trade up, just take what you think you can handle,” he said and moved aside so they could all cram in.
The cadre looked at the rifles, carbines, and shotguns on the far wall, the handguns on the left and right, and the bows and arrows on the third wall.
“No need to look there,” Bruce said as he pointed at
the bows and moved toward the rifles. There were a couple of long-barreled sniper rifles, which he was quick to take down. He unassembled each and then re-assembled them. He hefted one and then the other, and he snapped the magazines out to check on its load and number of shells.
He smiled. “I’d like to shoot this one,” he said as he hefted one he’d liked, and Javor nodded and pointed up front to the airlock doorway.
Sue found nothing as she said she knew her own and would stay with that. Jimmy liked the combat shotgun that Javor also favored, so he took that one. Rick and Wayne chose to stick with their weapons. Javor understood that entirely, knowing that the trust between a shooter and his weapon happened over thousands of rounds in all kinds of conditions. Only sometimes would a new choice come along, he knew.
Up front, Bruce had taken the ladder down to the pile of undergrowth below the Drake and had taken a stance standing beside a tree, using the sapling as a prop for his elbow. He squeezed off three shots, then made a change to the sights, and then took three more shots. Javor looked at the target that he must be aiming at. Across the river and down the side street was a big clock that jutted out from the building front over the sidewalk. The first three had hit as the sound of the breaking porcelain sign could be heard all the way back here, but the second three were aimed much better as the sign now hung from its bottom stanchions only. Bruce had cut the top one with his last salvo. That was more than two hundred yards away, Javor noted, which got Bruce a big check box from him. This guy could shoot!
He smiled back up at Javor. “Nice gun—I’ll take it,” he said.
Back on the Drake, Javor sat in the co-pilot’s seat, instructing the AI to recognize anyone else who had the security code he was now giving it, and he asked for 128-degree encryption on same. Best of the best, he knew.
