Pickers 2: The Trip

by Garth Owen

  The downhill run was just as steep, and the bends as sharp. The regenerative braking in the wagons put back a lot of the charge taken out of the batteries on the way up, but the components were running hot by the time they reached the bottom. A short way past the end of the switch backs, they were, once more, on a straight, but still steep track down the new valley. This one was just as rough as its sister on the other side of the mountain had been.

  More worrying than the rough road, however, was the roadblock they encountered a couple of kilometres down it. They rounded a bend to see three trucks ahead, parked side by side so they covered the width of the road. Two were obvious fuel burners, old, patched together and carrying the patina of several years of service. The other, sat between them, was larger, newer, similar in shape and size to their own wagons. Behind the trucks, the rock face of the hillside reached over the road. A dark arch had been blasted and carved into the stone. There was no other way on than through the roadblock and the tunnel it blocked.

  Remy had taken the driving seat of wagon one again. As he slowed the wagon, Maxine slipped out of her seat, back to the gun rack by the ladder up to the roof hatch. She slipped the lanyard for the big pistol over her shoulders, cradling its new stock under her right armpit, and slipped smaller pistols into the back of her trousers and under the other arm. For good luck, she stuck the cast metal catapult Chloe had given her into the front pocket of her trousers, and hooked the bag full of nail darts over her belt. She returned to her seat with two hunting rifles, a shotgun and bags of ammunition. Stowing these weapons behind her father, she took her seat again, sitting further forward because of the armoury she now carried.

  They pulled to a halt several lengths away from the block, and waited. Behind them, wagon two stopped to the side, so that Veronique and Tony could shoot around wagon one if they had to. So far, they had seen no people on the block, no movement. Maxine studied the ridge line of the rock arch over the road, looking for any heads poking over it and exposed against the sky. Seeing none, she went back to studying the trucks, waiting for a sign of life.

  It came as a single figure walked between two of the trucks and strode a short distance forward. Remy stood and went for the side door. "I do not recognise this crew." he said, "Get onto the roof, in case. But don't point any guns at them." He waited until Maxine had unlatched the roof hatch before opening the door.

  Remy felt a twinge of pain from his knee as he stepped down harder than he should. It had almost healed, but this was a reminder to treat it with care. He played up the limp it gave him as he walked toward the figure in front of the roadblock. The man had a bushy beard, striped in grey across each cheek, and long hair tied back and hanging most of the way down his back. He wore dark work trousers made from some heavy material, a dark shirt and long, deep brown jacket. His right hand rested on the butt of the pistol stuck in the front of his trousers, his left was hooked, by his thumb, into a pocket.

  "Saw you coming down the pass." the man said as Remy approached. "Watched you most of the way down."

  "Really?" The trucks looked like the sort of vehicles a group of pickers would convoy up in, loaded down with bits and pieces which might be useful for repairs or trades. Raiders preferred lighter rides, stripped back of anything but armour and weaponry. They stole what they wanted and often destroyed what was left. "You planning to go over yourselves?"

  "We're getting out of the country. You're wise, you'll do the same. Nothing here but blight and raiders."

  "We heard. We wanted to come home and help. We've got seeds, hopefully resistant ones."

  The man moved his right hand from the gun and hooked its thumb in a pocket on his trousers, just like his left hand. "You won't find many places with people in them to grow the seed. But if that's what you plan to do, can only offer you good luck at it. We'll pass you by now and carry on. If you'll give us the space on the road."

  Remy didn't turn completely away from the man, but he glanced back until he could be sure Maxine was watching him and not scanning the ridge line for hostiles. She sat up and nodded. He pointed to the road beside him. Moments later, he could hear the crinkle of wagon one's big tyres as they rolled over the track surface.

  The bearded man made his own signal, and the electric truck moved forward from the roadblock. A side door opened, and he stepped up into the vehicle. Wagon one pulled up beside Remy, and he stepped inside it. He stood behind the driver's seat, hand resting on the shotgun.

  With coughs that made Maxine and Remy jump, the two fuel burners started up. Black clouds billowed from their exhausts before the engines settled down. They followed the electric truck. Maxine and Remy tracked the progress of the little convoy, even when they were looking at the side walls of the wagon to do so. When he was sure they had passed wagon two, Remy said, "Okay, let's roll. Let's put some space between us and them, just in case."

  * * *

  On the Spanish side of the mountains, the field would have been a rippling blanket of green baking into gold. Here, it was dusty ground rough with stubble, punctuated by the occasional stand of sickly looking stalks. They followed the cart, going slow for the sake of the tired horse that pulled it, between this dead field and another just as barren.

  Their weapons were at the ready, as they had been ever since meeting the convoy in the valley. But the man and woman in the cart didn't appear to have any fight left in them after a day scrabbling for roots.

  The horse crested a slight rise and it could see home. Its ears picked up, and its pace increased as it began the gentle descent to the farm.

  The farm was laid out in a familiar way, three buildings and a wall around a square courtyard. As they took it in, there was movement across one of the roofs, and figures appeared at the gate, ready to swing it closed to visitors. Maxine dropped a hand from the steering wheel to check, again, that the big pistol was hanging off the side of her seat.

  After clearing the crest, it was a long, slow drive to the gates, even at a perked up horse's pace. They were watched all the way, with extra heads peering over the ridge of the roof as they approached. The cart carried on through the gate, but the wagons halted outside the compound.

  They stepped down, formally armed but leaving the bulk of their weapons in the wagons. The woman from the cart as talking to a couple- grey haired and heavily armed- passing on the details Remy had given them out in the fields. After listening, then staring at the wagons for a while, the old man nodded.

  As he strode through the gate, the old man passed his biggest gun to the guard. The woman kept hold of her carbine and hung back.

  "You have seed?" The old man asked.

  "We do." Remy said.

  "Blight resistant?"

  "We do not know, but, hopefully, yes."

  The old man studied the wagons some more. They had a permanent patina of mud and dust, but that didn't hide their pedigree. More than once before, they had sold the family's identity as pickers rather than raiders. He nodded. "You'll be wanting a trade, I suppose. We haven't got much we can live without."

  "We can afford credit, goodwill and information, if that is all you've got. We are on our way home, to help them if we can, but any good we can do on the way is a bonus."

  "We have information, about towns and farms for 'bout a hundred kay around. Only Rumours, and not good ones, of what's happening beyond that. We can write you a promise, for if we're still here when you come back. Oh, and we have fresh water, if you need to top up."

  "I think we can do a deal." Remy said, offering his hand.

  * * *

  "We might just get a harvest, if we start planting now." The old man, Stefan, said. "Enough to keep us in bread through winter, and a proper planting next year." He studied the two tubs that had been brought down from the wagons. "If they're immune. Roots haven't been so badly affected, but we didn't plant so much of those. Wheat was what we traded in for essentials. It's the towns as bought it that'll be worst affected."

  "There's not a lot we can d
o for them. Except make sure the local farms might have a decent crop next year." Tony said. He prised open one of the tubs, and Stefan pushed his fingers into the grains, stirring them and letting handfuls tumble from his palm. His expression suggested it was a sensual experience he had been missing intensely.

  "We could always take more grain. To plant a bigger crop." Stefan said.

  "True, but so could every farm between here and home. It's better if we leave a couple of tubs every few kilometres. It buys us more information to help along the way as well."

  Stefan looked ready to argue the point some more, but ended up simply shrugging. He waved over two younger men- members of the big extended family that lived and worked on the farm- and they carried the tubs away.

  Somehow, Maxine had convinced the children of the farm to crank the pump on the well and then help her carry the buckets of water to the wagons. She ordered them around with a grin and they replied with angelic cheek. All the while, somehow, the job got done. Maxine was always better with country kids, they were more like the feral child she had been when Tony had met her.

  Veronique and Remy were by wagon one, consulting with Stefan's wife and daughter in law on the state of the roads and towns near about. One of the computer screens was mounted on the outside of the wagon and they had unfolded a table to lay maps on. Tony and Stefan stood at either end of the table, studying the sheets as Remy added new notes to them.

  The maps were sandwiched between plastic covers, so that changes could be added and scrubbed off easily. The French ones hadn't been used for several years, and the old notes hadn't completely erased.

  Veronique added the amendments to their map database, and they showed up, more neatly, on the big screen. It only came out for moments such as this, to impress customers. Right now, it was showing a lot of red hatching blocking their planned route. Areas where raiders had been active.

  Tony calculated alternative routes and worked out different ways around, and all of them doubled their journey time. He glanced at Remy, and just knew his father in law was doing the same. But he had an expression that suggested he was remembering bolt holes and safe houses that would offer a more direct path.

  There was a high pitched commotion from the back of wagon two. Maxine was perched inside the open back door as the kids held out little weapons, clamouring for her to fix or replace them.

  Holding up a scaled down bow, Maxine tested the draw. It was satisfactory, but then she held it against the girl who had handed it over, and It was obviously too small for her. There was a smaller child to the girl's right. Maxine measured the bow against him, and nodded. He took it with a yell, and the girl handed over the quiver. Maxine produced a larger bow, and a small selection of arrows, from inside the wagon.

  Maxine handed out another two bows to the crowd of children, and then shooed them away. They ran off to test their new weapons. One of the fathers brought out a bunch of rabbits, skinned and ready for the pot. They went in the cold box, meals for the next few days, so they wouldn't need to stop and hunt all the time. She locked up the wagon, then climbed onto its roof to watch the children practice.

  The kids were still taking turns shooting a plank when Remy hammered on the side of the wagon and called up, "Time to go, Max. We want to get as many miles done as we can manage before dark!"

  * * *

  "You think Stefan was planning to take the rest of the seeds?" Veronique sounded dubious.

  "I reckon the thought crossed his mind. How long it dawdled there on the way, I couldn't say." Tony shrugged.

  "Well, at least we didn't hang around long enough to find out." Remy pulled one of the rabbits from over the fire and poked it with a knife. It wasn't quite ready. "Specially since Maxine armed all of their kids."

  "Bows and arrows. We've got guns." Maxine was already creating new bows from branches she had found whilst scavenging for fire wood. "Not sure I could use them on kids, though."

  "I guess the pattern is set, then, for every farm we stop at between here and the Alps. We can't hang around after we've traded with them, just in case they want to cross us." Veronique said.

  "And there I thought we'd only have to worry about raiders." Tony massaged his wife's shoulders. They had tensed up when he had mentioned his conversation with Stefan.

  "I suppose...." Remy tested the rabbit again, this time he was satisfied it was cooked. He pushed it off its skewer onto a big plate for carving. "I suppose it's a risk. Harsh times, and all that." He set to carving all the meat from the carcass.

  "I'll take first watch." Maxine offered.

  * * *

  There were more farms, and many more trades. By the time they reached the foothills of the Alps, the wagons were emptied of grain and filled with promissory notes and map notations.

  There were convoys as well, struggling across the country to the promise of more food and better conditions. Some were heading for the coast, others for towns reputed to have had a bumper harvest. The one below them was making its way into the hills.

  "All the way here, and not a single raider. Because they were all waiting to have a fight right in front of us now." Tony said. He slid down the ladder into wagon two and started breaking weapons out of the armoury.

  The road they were on curved around the contours of the hill, down to a ford through a crystal clear river, and then on to the route up the valley. The steep walls closed in, until the road and river ran side by side and there was no run off on either side.

  Fighting their way up the valley were three fuel burning trucks, loaded down with the lives of the people on board. Chasing them was an angry swarm of motorbikes and cars, nipping at them, trying to chip away at their defences until some brave raider could jump aboard a truck and fight it to a stop. As the road up the valley became steeper, the trucks would lose momentum and slow, drawing closer to the moment when they would be overwhelmed.

  Tony hung the strap of Veronique’s favourite rifle over the back of the driver's seat. "We're going to need to fight our way through them, sooner or later." Remy's voice said over the radio. "Better we do it before they've blocked the pinch."

  "I knew he'd say that." Tony kissed Veronique as wagon one pulled ahead of them, then set about transferring weapons to the roof. They went into the mounts built into the captain's chair, so that he had access to pistols for close range, a hunting rifle for distance and an assault rifle for when the fray got really crazy. There was a bag of Maxine's home made grenades as well- thermite, fragment and napalm. Tony felt his balls contract tight up into his body as he took the seat and fastened the belt about his waist. The seat was on suspension, which smoothed out some of the violent movements, but he would still need something that would hold him in place as the wagon bounced and sway over the rough terrain. Unlocking the seat, he rotated it through a full three sixty to check it was moving smoothly.

  There was armour plate built into the back of the chair, and bolstering the sides as well. It would protect from light arms fire, providing he wasn't facing the shooter directly. Tony lifted his right foot and kicked the brake to lock the seat back in place. Up ahead, Maxine had been going through the same routine atop wagon one. She turned her seat to look back and give a thumbs up. With her other hand, she raised her hunting rifle. Time to thin the pack down below them, she was saying. They both turned their seats to look down into the valley.

  Whilst the road was relatively smooth, Tony found he could almost hold a bead on targets. He found a pack of bikers close together, and got the little dot dancing around in the middle of them. As smoothly as he could, he drew his aim ahead of them, compensating for speed. He pulled the trigger. The rifle jumped, hammering against his shoulder. As the echo of the shot left his ears he could, just, hear the clatter of the ejected shell as it bounced down the length of the wagon's roof.

  Bringing the scope down and back, Tony found the gaggle of bikers. They were all still there. Disappointed, he tried the shot another time. This time, he hit a rider, who tumbled and t
ook another two down with him.

  The wagon turned to the left, and seemed to fall away from Tony as its path grew steeper. For a moment, he pushed up at the straps that held him in the seat, and the rifle seemed ready to float from his grip. A van filled the sights, and he pulled the trigger from reflex.

  They were rushing down the rutted slope toward the ford. After that there was a short ramp and they would be on the road, right in the front pack of raiders. Tony had just enough time to stow the hunting rifle and grab the assault rifle.

  Wagon one hit the water of the river, raising waves either side of it nearly twice its height. For a frozen moment, the two walls of water hung before Tony, glittering. Then the water started splashing down around and over him, and he could see nothing for it. Wagon two slowed as it, too, hit the river and threw up spray.

  Tony was pressed into the seat as the wagon hit the river bank and started climbing. He shook his head and blinked his eyes clear just in time to see wagon one cresting the bank and nearly getting all its wheels in the air. He was vaguely aware of a crashing as it came back down to earth. He braced, just as wagon two's front wheels started spinning on air.

  For another slow motion moment, the wagon hung in the air between the top of the river bank and the rough pack of the road. The front of the vehicle began to pivot down again, and Tony pressed himself into the seat. The tyres landed on something that wasn't earth, and there was a nasty sound of metal tearing. Tony bounced in his seat as the rear wheels ran over whatever they had hit. The wagon heeled over as it turned sharply, and there was a crash as it collided with the same obstacle wagon one had hit. Tony saw the remnants of a car rolling away from them to hit another pursuing vehicle.

  The wagon rocked upright again, and Tony spun his seat so he was facing backwards. They had driven into the pack of raiders, separating the vanguard, but making themselves a prime target. It was Tony's job to drive off the raiders behind them.