by Jim Rudnick
As they all went by, Jimmy said, “And where are the men?” Again, his question went unanswered.
The troop below, while only fifty feet away, walked carefully and quietly. All walked in file, following the woman in front of her, without a misstep or even a slip on the loose rocky soil along the side of the rise.
Bixby was under his hand, and he clutched the dog’s fur tightly as the dog tried to rise. He leaned right over the dog’s ears and said as quietly as possible, “Shh … quiet, boy … shh,” and the dog complied. Don’t know why, but it worked this time. Javor was glad about that as the last of the women went by, and they then slowly dipped down toward the thicket ahead of them.
They continued to crouch and watch, and in twenty more minutes, the line of women entered that encampment. They were greeted with shouts and what looked like a real welcome. They all moved their packs and extra bags into a large pile, and a few of them reached inside those packs to pull out what looked like containers of food and the like.
Kids yelled and some of the women, who’d not gone on the scavenging trip, whooped it up.
Jimmy said, “They were just looking for food, and looks like they found some. Those all look like real old-time packages too … wonder where the hell they found them?”
Food like what they could see down in that camp hadn’t been processed, produced, and put into packaging like that in more than eight years. So where did these items come from? While they couldn’t really see what kind of food it was, it obviously was dry goods and the like. Foods that perhaps might last eight years but not without some kind of special preservation like freezing. But freezers took power. And there was no power here in the valley—at least as far as any of them could see.
While they pondered that, a couple of things below happened, and one especially worried Javor.
One of the women from the group who had passed them whistled. From the container near her, an animal came out, and that was surprising. While it was true that eight years ago, the zoos on Ceti4 had been opened up and the animals set free, Javor had been told most had died. Most were used to getting their food in a bucket at dawn or dusk. Most didn’t know how to hunt or forage for food. Most ate each other, and almost all of the larger Ceti4 carnivores died.
Below was animal that Javor didn’t know, but a simple look at Jimmy got him an answer.
“Called a Taxa—cat sorta like, eats meat, kills its own food too. Run about fifty pounds like that one too,” he said as he tried to relate the information in as few whispered words as could be done.
It had small ears, close to the head, while its muzzle was narrow as was its body. Behind the head was a long dark brown line in the lighter brown fur that ran all the way around the animal. It had the same matching dark fur circling each of its feet as well. Could be the animal that had made those tracks a few hundred yards back, Javor thought.
Javor nodded as he continued to hold Bixby tight.
No sense in getting any kind of trouble started via the animals, he thought.
Sue nodded and then began to crawl farther into the big clump of sumac, and she was followed by them all, Bixby too. As they went over the top of the rise, which hid them safely, they all rose and strode away as quietly as they could down the rise to the small creek below. There, they followed the creek about a half mile away from the interstate before slowly working their way back toward the concrete pylons that still marched away into the distance.
A couple of miles ahead, they could see a set of ramps, and they were connected with a minor regional road that went down the valley floor in a north-south direction.
Javor fished out a jerky bar and took a chew as he handed the rest to Bixby, who chewed it as he trotted back to the front of their group. Just opening up the package brought Bixby at a trot, and once fed his share, he was back on point, just in front of Sue.
They made good time moving parallel to the interstate, and as they passed over the regional road on-ramp, another sign with shotgun damage appeared.
“Only gone five miles but that’s good. Don’t have our real working speed yet, and yeah, there’ll be blisters tonight. But so far, so good,” Sue said.
At the ramp, Sue looked at them and shrugged. “We’d make good time—plus I’d rather sleep up there than down here in the woods. And from what I see across the rest of the valley, ain’t a homestead to be seen.”
She looked at them, one by one, and when she reached Javor, he nodded too.
Five miles was okay, but judging by the sun and the shadows, not much of the day was left.
It was time to make time … and the on-ramp to the interstate wasn’t even a mile ahead.
#####
At the foot of the on-ramp, Sue had them all stop for a quick rest and to check their weapons and tactical approach too. She went around and looked at all their weapons and made sure that each was fully loaded and on safety but ready to go in an instant.
“Tactically, I’d like Javor to take point with Bixby—that’ll give us a real chance at an early head’s up should we run into an ambush point, I’d think. I’ll take the rear, and you other guys, couple up in the middle,” she said.
Taking point was easy—especially with Bixby and his superior senses, Javor thought, and with a nod from Sue, he turned to slowly walk up the center of the two-lane on-ramp that slowly climbed up to the interstate highway in the air.
The road was still in fair shape with a few holes, pieces of re-bar jutting out, and concrete rubble ahead. The lines that had been painted on the road surface were faded, almost gone in many places, and yet it still was easy to stay about in the middle of the road.
Ahead, Bixby led the way by about twenty yards and often looked back over his shoulder to check on the rest of them. He sometimes ambled from one side of the ramp to the other, smelling and sniffing and cocking his head at a hole or two. Javor thought he must be looking for food and tossed him another jerky bar minus a big bite, and Bixby chomped that up in a few seconds, again trotting ahead of them all. There was only one truck, lying on its side ahead a bit, and as Javor got near, he took a moment to stoop down and look inside the front windshield. All he could make out through the starred broken glass was a burned seat and a skeleton of the driver, dead now for years and devoid of any flesh.
As he straightened up and turned, Bixby suddenly ran off ahead and then turned to the right, onto the merging interstate lanes as they came in from the left to go straight. Javor quickly followed and it took him almost a minute to catch up and access the four-lane interstate that headed east.
Instead of continuing to run ahead after Bixby, he slowed down to look back at the interstate behind them, and he froze in his tracks. There was a fort there.
Behind him, to the west on top of the interstate about a hundred yards back from where the on-ramp joined up, was a set of defensive logs and pointed spears and lances all fixed ahead. Trying to rush that position, Javor knew, would mean impalement, and he was glad to see there were no people so impaled now.
Behind that guardrail-to-guardrail row of fixed spears and lances was a higher row of old pallets once used to ship goods on, which were now vertical and nailed together to form a wall that could be defended. There was a hole in that wall in three spots, but no one stood there. No people, just the fort itself, and Javor looked from side to side. A larger two-story tower had the same pallet walls and an overhang of a cloth cover.
The fort stretched from side to side. There was no way around the thing, unless you could fly, he realized. And not a single pair of eyes that he could see stared back at him.
He turned back to face east and down the interstate ahead, and he saw that Bixby had moved over to sit against the far guardrail, his big tongue hanging out as he panted in the late afternoon sunlight.
Sue was at his side in less than a few seconds as the other four spread out to take a defensive position around him.
She looked at the fort and then shrugged.
“So, abandoned, right?”
she asked.
He nodded. “Or at least empty while the owners are out hunting for their dinners, maybe,” he replied and began to walk closer.
He hadn’t taken more than a few steps when Bixby bounded right by him. He went right up to a set of spears in the right-hand third, stepped on something they couldn’t see, went up and over the spears just behind, and then dove through one of the three open gates in the pallet wall. Moments later, they heard him barking as they broke into a trot to join him.
Up and over the spears was easy as there was a set of three steps. The steps had been built in at such an angle one couldn’t even see it from out front. They went through the open doorway into the fort’s interior.
Inside were normal items that anyone would have in their living space—a couple of wooden benches and a church pew; a set of dusty mattresses off to one side; three tables with a couple of broken chairs; and a cooking fire pit that had a large hood over it that went straight up and out the roof. Behind all of that were a couple of trucks positioned to form an inner and secure spot to use in case of attack. There were a few bored-out gun ports on each solid metal wall. The side windows were boarded over but had slots carved out so you could still see the enemy. ”When there was one, that is,” Sue said.
On the north side of the fort’s interior was a narrow walkway that went behind the truck, along the guardrail, and then along the open four-lane interstate. From here, they could all see that the interstate only continued for about a few hundred yards. It had been broken up and it stopped a hundred feet from the ground with no way up or down.
“Fort lies in a pretty good location,” Jimmy said. “Dead end’s over there so nothing can come from behind. Front is protected by the defenses and further ahead are both an on-ramp and off-ramp for access. I’d like to say thanks—‘cause this is where we should stay the night, right, Sue?” he asked, but he was already putting down his pack and massaging his shoulder.
She looked around one more time and then nodded. “Sure, we’ll camp here. I’ll take the first three-hour watch, then Wayne, and then Rick. Bixby will be a big help too, but whoever is on watch, no snoozing!” she said politely, but everyone heard her implied tone behind it.
As they all doffed their packs and set up to make some kind of dinner, Rick found a cache behind one of the mattresses that was partially leaning on a stack of pallets.
“Hey, bingo, folks!” he said as he dragged out a suitcase—an old, dented, and discolored one, true, but still he forced the lock on same and grinned at them all.
Inside were many cans of soup with red and white labels. Everyone reached in about the same time. Javor was a bit slow, but he got two cans of something called Scotch Broth and he smiled. Lamb and veggies, as he remembered, and then he and the others dug down in the suitcase and found a package of crackers too.
The crackers were still in their original consumer packaging like what you’d find at your local bodega.
There was no discoloration, no dents, and no breaks in the package at all.
He opened up one end, took a bite of a square cracker, and noted that it was still crisp and slightly salted.
“How’n the hell did this last eight years,” he wondered out loud.
Nobody answered as everyone was chomping on their own crackers or biscuits.
Bruce lit the fire and got that going, while Rick used a can opener to open up each of the soups. He arranged them on a steel shelf he’d found over in the corner, and with some careful balancing, he got the soup heating up.
In an hour, the soup was gone, Bixby had been fed, and the sound of munching crackers was all that was happening in the fort.
Outside, the sun was setting on the horizon, and the golden and amber light poured in from the slots and holes in the trucks and pallets behind them. Both moons had risen earlier, and now both were on their last quarter portions, shining but not as much as when they were full. Still the light gold tones added to the scenery. Dusk on Bones was always pretty, Javor had noted, and tonight was no different. He leaned against the guardrail and glanced over and down the hundred or so feet to the ground below.
Bathed in that same golden light, the overgrowth and underbrush looked like an award-winning gardener’s best work, and he realized he was happy on Bones—at least so far. He ran his hand along the round polished guardrail and noted that except for a stanchion every twenty yards, the round pipe stretched out back to the on-ramp area and then ahead for hundreds and hundreds of yards. And in the dusky sunlight, it looked like it was made of gold, sparkling and glistening into the distance for miles ahead.
He wandered back into the fort interior. After what was probably only an eight-mile hike, most of the group was tired and had already taken a mattress and begun to get ready for sleep.
Sue got up and stretched. “Looked up at that tower earlier, and yes, she’ll do. I’ll take early watch as of now and will come and wake up Wayne in three hours. After his three-hour watch, he’ll wake up Rick, and we get up when Rick’s time is done. Should be just after dawn by then, so night, all—but do keep your guns close by, eh?” she reminded them, got her own rifle, and went over to the left to climb the stairs up to the tower.
Javor noted that one of the mattresses was not claimed, so he dragged it over to the far right side behind the pallet wall. He put his sleeping bag on top, took his boots off, and then climbed in the sleeping bag.
His shotgun he lay on the floor, just beside the edge of his mattress, and he whistled quietly for Bixby, who came over from out front and climbed over him to lie on the unused part of the mattress. He curled up and was snoring inside five minutes. Javor shook his head. A dog’s life was something to have.
He slowly drifted off, one arm under his head and the other on top of his shotgun, and the dreams came once again.
He was racing in the decathlon once more, but this time, he was still chasing the leader in the fifteen-hundred-meter dash, and he was behind by about three steps.
Behind but gaining.
Inch by inch, he pushed his toes even farther into the tips of his spikes, asking for the most spring he could from his thighs.
Yard by yard, he gained until he was even … until the race could be his.
His thighs were screaming at him while the balls of his feet were being rubbed raw inside his spikes as he stretched and reached down for every single ounce of effort.
Something changed, and the hail now worried him. The sound of large balls of hail hitting the track and the world around him was suddenly in his consciousness, which was so odd, so different.
Almost before Bixby began barking, he was up and kneeling with his gun in hand.
It wasn’t hail at all.
The sound of rifle fire and dozens of arrows banging into the pallet wall in front of him that had woken him. He heard Sue’s rifle up top begin to bark as she fired back.
He rolled to his left, took up an edge position in the right-hand doorway of the front pallet wall, and took a quick peer out at the starlit night and the interstate ahead of him.
Shots rang back at them, and Jimmy and Bruce found slot holes to accept their rifle muzzles and fired back too. Rick was up in the tower and firing. He couldn’t see Wayne, but he heard moaning from behind him, but that would need to wait until the threat was over.
From his vantage point, he could see only shapes, but shapes of people who obviously wanted them dead, so he hefted the shotgun, threw off the safety, and emptied three shells into whomever was out there.
CHAPTER FIVE
As the Sophon came out of FTL and slowly moved toward low orbit over the planet, the sub-alternate was anxious as his captain stood for no mistakes. He guided the raider ship gently—no sudden pushes of acceleration or nudges—as the ship slowly rotated to sit with the bridge looking up at the planet.
The view, if he’d been allowed to comment about it, was spectacular as this was a system with two stars—a G-class yellow star and a small red dwarf star, and the light from the tw
o of them bathed the world above with glows of red and yellow making the shadows a dark orange. Under such lighting, the seas and oceans looked like dark masses of swirling red and orange waters. The continents too had an odd coloration as well. In the northern latitudes, the snow and ice around the polar cap looked bright red in color, while the more temperate landmasses were the traditional browns and yellows.
He shrugged and sped up the ship to get around and below the terminator, the line where the lack of sunlight made it nighttime. But here in this system, with the two stars instead of one, the area that was dark was very narrow.
Normally, it would be half a planet wide as the darkness faced away from a single sun. But here, because the two stars were together, the red dwarf rotating, the records showed, around its yellow mate, the darkness was a wedge above them, barely six hours each night.
He nodded and then used the scanners to look for power, for lights, or for any technology that could be seen to indicate that the planet had been rejuvenated from its bombing eight years ago. And there was none.
He checked for nuclear power and got nothing indicating that any kind of fusion or fission was occurring on the planet at all.
He checked for electromagnetic lines and found none; no power was being moved across the planet via lines or networks.
He checked for lights even closer, drilling down onto regional and then specific areas of scanning too and nothing.
He looked at major rivers where they met the oceans, seas, and even large lakes, and he found only desolation and ruins.
And finally, he checked for the Drake, the ship they were hunting for, and its FTL and Ansible trail.
No trail at all. He checked, then double-checked, and made the decision that wherever the Drake had gone, it had not come to this planet.
No civilization at all was his summary.
Time to call the captain and report.
He shuddered but still he knew his report was correct…
#####
In the thicket that lay a mile away, the sound of gunshots—many, many gunshots—was awakening the whole camp. Three of the women in one of the smaller tents burst out and were in the process of getting others up at the same time. One woman came out of the container to the far side of the center of the camp, her cat the Taxa at her side, and waved to them all.
