But he wasn’t there. This was a real life operation, and although no one expected to run into anything, they didn’t lessen their guard. Rifles faced outboard, toward the sides, away from their fellows. Terry beat more than one member of the FDG for haphazardly pointing his rifle. The colonel called it friendly fire, shooting one of your own. Mark didn’t understand, because it didn’t sound friendly at all.
None of them believed it possible to shoot one of their own, but the colonel and the major assured them that it was easy, and if they didn’t exercise trigger and fire discipline, it would be inevitable. So they carefully watched where their weapons were pointed, ready to get cuffed in the head if they were reckless.
Mark rode at the end of the formation, happy with what he saw. The men were hunched in their saddles, remaining silent, the only sounds were from the horses’ tack shifting and jingling.
The sun passed midday and they continued through valleys, across hills and deeper into the mountains. Occasionally, Blackie called for a halt and dismounted, tying his horse to a tree so he could walk about and search closer to the ground.
Eventually he’d give the thumbs up, remount his horse, and ride on.
As evening approached, Blackie waved the men into a tactical formation, line abreast. They spread out to Corporal Blackbeard’s flanks, four to one side and three to the other. The outermost members of the FDG angled away slightly. Their job was to protect the flanks, prevent an enemy from rolling up the formation from the sides. The others would bring the maximum firepower to the front.
Mark took a position next to Blackie. He pointed to his eyes and then forward at a slight angle ahead. He saw something in the brush. He made a walking motion with his fingers and Mark nodded, then signaled the others to dismount. They did, every other man tying off the horses to the brush with the rest looking ahead over the barrels of their rifles.
When the squad was ready, they moved forward, crouching, aiming, taking care with each step. Blackie held up a fist, then pointed a knife hand, fingers together and straight as if preparing a slap, and motioned thirty degrees to the left. He did the same for the men on the right flank.
Mark matched his steps as Blackie moved forward. The sergeant looked along the side of his barrel as he swept the ground before him using a figure eight pattern, low, then high, left, and right. He stopped when he saw the bodies—a man and horse.
Blackie signaled to establish a perimeter with the bodies at the center. Blackie and Mark slowly moved in, circling the bodies and checking the trees for overhead enemies. Once the perimeter was established and confirmed with a thumbs up from each squad member, Mark said in a voice intended not to carry too far, “Perimeter established and secure. Stay frosty, gents! We’re examining the bodies now.”
The two men slung their rifles and turned their full attention to the mess at their feet. The horse had been half eaten. The man had claw marks on him—five parallel gouges deep into the flesh of his neck and shoulder. The location and amount of dried blood told them the jugular had been severed. The man died quickly, probably having ridden his horse as it was getting attacked by a bear. Mark didn’t know how many rounds the man had brought with him and they didn’t find any shell casings in the vicinity.
“A bear, probably the damn grizzly, growing bolder and bolder by the day,” Mark whispered. Blackie went through the man’s pockets to recover his personal belongings and anything else of use to the people of New Boulder.
Mark held the man’s hunting rifle. The scope had been dented in the fall and the optics shattered. A shame. The scope was irreplaceable. The rifle didn’t have iron sights. As a hunting rifle, it was no longer of any use, but Mark slung it over his shoulder anyway. He’d give it to Billy as he promised.
“Three o’clock!” one of the men yelled. A shot rang out, then another. Four weapons opened up, firing quickly. Mark pulled his rifle around to his front and ran toward the three o’clock position of the perimeter, Blackie right behind him.
A fat grizzly sow had charged, but stopped under the deadly fire. The grizzly staggered and tumbled.
“Cease fire!” Mark yelled. The men held up, the sound of the previous shots dying away with echoes into the distance. Mark waited as his hearing returned. He thought he heard something else. “Ready!”
A small cub appeared from the brush and bounced around, confused.
“Hold your fire!” Blackie yelled as he ran forward. The cub dashed a few steps away, then stopped and sat down. “He’s afraid.”
“Expand the perimeter! We’re taking that grizzly back with us,” Mark ordered.
“Of course we are,” Blackbeard replied. “We just killed his mother.”
“I think you misunderstand me, Corporal. We’ll cleaning the sow and taking her back with us. Her hide and her meat will go a long ways with the people,” Mark clarified.
“But, look at him?” Blackie cried, pointing to the cub.
“He’s a grizzly! Get a hold of yourself,” Mark countered as he pulled his skinning knife, found a log to roll next to the carcass, and started working.
“Get your ass over here and help me,” Mark growled. Blackie had gotten close enough to the cub to scratch his ears. Then the two started wrestling and playing. Mark started to laugh, shaking his head.
“God damn it.”
***
The convoy continued day after day, trudging alongside the river as they made their way toward the mountains that never seemed to get closer. Terry and Char walked nearly every step of it, as did the other members of the FDG. Those with small children rode, as well as some of the oldsters who were starting to fall back. At least the hunting and foraging had been good enough that no one died from starvation. They lost a young man to a rattlesnake bite, but surprisingly, he was the only one.
As they passed by the place where they fought the final battle with Marcus, Terry told James to take the group to the outpost of buildings that used to be the Weathers’ home.
Terry and Char waited while the long caravan of people walked by, trudging inexorably forward. Many waved as they passed, and Terry and Char waved back, smiling. They’d given their horses to the others and were walking just like almost everyone else. They sat and waited until the group was well into the distance before they climbed down the bank and to the stream that masqueraded as a river. Terry breathed an audible sigh of relief when he saw the graves were undisturbed.
“What? You expected him to rise from the dead after you cut his fucking head off?” Char asked, surprised at Terry’s reaction.
“Kind of, maybe. But I’m happy no animals got in there either. I’d hate to think that Devlin became more than worm food,” Terry countered.
“Make love to me, right on his grave?” Char prodded, looking hungrily at Terry. They hadn’t been alone since they’d killed the boar, and they were both getting anxious.
But this?
“Are you serious?” Terry wondered.
“Maybe it’s a Werewolf thing, but I have to have you, right here. I’m your alpha and you’re mine, and don’t you doubt for one second,” she poked him in the chest, her purple eyes flickering, “that I take ‘until death do us part’ lightly.”
Terry was torn, but not for long as Char stripped at an unnatural speed. Who was he to deny his mate? When Terry committed to something, he was all in…
***
“Are we there yet?” Ted asked innocently. The pack had changed to human form as they rested in a small stream after a long run through the lowlands of an area previously called Tabasco.
“Fuck off!” the others said in unison as they threw water on themselves trying to cool down.
“I am bone fucking tired,” Merrit said slowly, enunciating each word. “You are such a ball-slapping, wiener-whopping, ugly-ass dick face. Why didn’t we just check on Char and Marcus before we left?”
“We’ve been through this a thousand times, ass licker,” Timmons countered. “We should have just killed him ourselves, but you pant
y-waists didn’t want to. Ooh, we’re so afraid of the big baddie that even though he’s comatose, monkeys might fly out his ass and get us! You pack of whiny bitches!” Timmons turned to protect his private parts in case anyone got ideas about kicking him again.
“Go fuck yourself,” Merrit snarled. “I’ve had about enough of your sanctimonious bullshit to last me a lifetime and I’m talking a Werewolf lifetime.”
“You fuck yourself!” Timmons puffed out his chest and tried to look bigger than he was.
“Fuck you!”
“No, fuck you!”
“So this is what we’ve become?” Sue asked, looking at Xandrie. “We’re a bunch of fuck offs and fuck yous. I’m so embarrassed. I’m glad my mother isn’t alive to see this.” Xandrie and Shonna giggled. Adams snickered.
Timmons and Merrit looked at each other and then sat back down.
“Will we get there tomorrow?” Ted asked.
“SHUT UP!” Timmons yelled, before collapsing into the stream.
CHAPTER SIX
Terry and Char jogged through the desert toward the homestead. It had turned dark hours ago, but they wanted to be with the others for the night to better kick off early the next morning.
They were happy. In the middle of the Wastelands, with a long road ahead of them, they were happy.
“I think we need to pick up the pace, TH,” Char said, running easily. Terry dug in and dashed ahead.
She quickly caught up. “That’s not what I meant,” she clarified. “I’m talking about civilization. We’ve covered what, a tenth of what used to be the United States and found exactly squat. The most modern city around is New Boulder and that’s pretty scary. If we could find the pack, we could leverage their smarts. Did you know that one of them is a nuclear engineer? How about some nuke power to last a lifetime?”
Terry slowed to a walk, looking at the ground as he did when lost in thought. He mumbled and pointed to various points in the cosmos, none of which registered with Char.
“Do you have any idea where the pack went?” Terry finally asked.
“No. And what was that talking with yourself all about? I’m not marrying a psycho, am I?” Char pushed him away playfully.
“Sorry, I was thinking out loud. I’m just trying to reason through it. So much infrastructure needs to be rebuilt. Power distribution is hosed because the system melted down. EMP, computer viruses, everything worked together to destroy technology. We have to make microchips from scratch and I don’t think that’s possible. Or we have to go old school on power transmission. Getting factories up to speed means a robust trade in raw materials, a smelter, major industry. It’ll take forever,” Terry said matter-of-factly.
“I think it will take less time than that, TH,” Char said, bumping him with her hip.
“What?” he laughed.
“We’ll see it through. I vow to live long enough to see civilization return. I want to take you dancing in a night club, show off my man!”
“Why do you think I can dance?” he asked skeptically.
Char looked around conspiratorially, then whispered, “Anyone with your moves in bed has to be killer on the dance floor.”
“Hey.” The darkness covered his blush. He always thought of himself as a decent dancer. It had been decades since he last cut a rug. He hadn’t had much to dance about, and there was no music even if he wanted to shake his groove thing. “I’d like that. Someday we’ll dance, and I vow to keep you alive long enough to see it.”
“Bullshit!” Char shot back. “You’ll live to see it too. I don’t need any of your macho man crap. Don’t make me kick your ass right here to prove that I don’t want you to die.”
“The beatings will continue until morale improves?” Terry asked.
“Exactly!” They started jogging again. Within moments the homestead came into view.
Terry and Char both heard the noise from the ravine at the same time. Loose rock sliding. A heavy footfall.
Char pulled her pistols and dropped to one knee, ready to fire. Terry dove forward, hugging his rifle to him as he rolled, coming into a tucked position where he aimed down his rifle barrel at James and Lacy, not twenty feet away. James froze midway buttoning his shirt. Lacy stopped buttoning her pants.
Terry pointed his barrel skyward. “What the hell were you doing down there?” A rhetorical question. He knew very well what they were doing. Char shook her head and holstered her pistols.
“What were you two doing?” James asked back.
The fire rose within Terry. He didn’t like being questioned, but he’d given the members of the Force more slack than his old unit. And James was right. If it was good enough for the colonel, why wasn’t it good enough for the corporal?
Terry took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Probably the same thing you two were doing, and we won’t say or hear another word about it. Deal?” He held out his hand for Lacy, then James. “Who’s minding the store?”
“Gerry has it locked up tightly. We’ve good people in the squad, sir. Our watch starts in a little and we’ll be ready for it,” James said confidently.
“However you want to spend your down time, that’s your business. When you’re on watch, you’re all eyes and ears. Put us on after you. We’ll be your relief, and then who’s after us?” Terry looked intently at James.
“Jazzy and Stokes. They’ll appreciate the extra shut-eye. Thanks, sir, ma’am.” James and Lacy saluted and ran off toward the buildings.
“Ah, young love, isn’t it sweet?” Char whispered as they walked, holding hands. “Unlike us old people.”
“Do you sense anything besides this mob?” Terry asked, turning serious.
“Not a thing. Bunch of horses and a gob-load of people.”
“We’re on the home stretch now, be there in less than a week,” Terry said.
“Then what, TH?”
“You know, the usual. Build up the Force, train, look at infrastructure, get married, build us a hot air balloon, and then head north and east. We need to find a place where we can rebuild the world—decent climate, a sound and substantial water source, industry that can be restarted. The usual,” Terry quipped.
“Hot air balloon?” Char asked. “Our honeymoon is a trip in a hot air balloon? Are you stoned? Which one of us is marrying the psycho, I have to ask?” Char raised one eyebrow, her purple eyes sparkling in the darkness.
“Okay, maybe no hot air balloon. It would help if we could find your pack,” Terry added.
“I don’t have the first idea where to look, TH. I’m sorry. We can’t count on them. They bailed on us all, so I’m not sure we want to work them into the equation, even if I could control them. I don’t think their goals will ever marry up with our goals.” Char looked at the sky. The stars twinkled and it was hot, but not oppressively so. It was a pleasant evening in the Wastelands, if there ever could be such a thing.
“If we did find them, what would it take to get them to buy in to our vision, get them to come along on this ride?” Terry wondered.
***
Timmons took the lead during the trek, and tried to swallow his nagging fury. He wanted to be the leader, the alpha, and he knew he’d need the respect of the pack’s members. He’d been trying to vocal his way in, but his strategy wasn’t working. The only other strategy he knew was leading by strength, and by example.
So Timmons set the example.
He didn’t growl, or talk, or waste time asking for the opinions of the others. He just put paw to sand and ran out in front. The miles turned to leagues, and the leagues turned to a shit-ton of distance that would have been excruciating long, even by car.
The rest of the crew followed him. Of course they complained by growl when the pace didn’t let up, but when Timmons didn’t break, the rest of them fell in line and the miles began to blur. When their paws hurt, Timmons kept going. When their sides ached, Timmons kept pushing. When the hunger came to overwhelm them, Timmons got lucky and managed to catch a deer. They ate the corpse
wordlessly, while it still twitched, and their transformation to animal began to take over their minds.
The days rolled by endlessly until the pack was of one mind.
Then they hit what used to be New Mexico.
“Fuck this shit! It goes on forever!” Merrit snarled after the pack had collapsed from exhaustion and changed into their human forms.
The old Timmons would have cursed back, but instead he just stood in his wolf form and stared at the other man. He was tired, so fucking tired, but he knew that any sign of weakness would erode the leadership he had shown for these past few...days? Weeks? Years? He didn’t know how long it had been. All he knew was the agony of his paws and the ache of his limbs.
Fucking vampire on a fucking boat. It would have been so much easier to do this run on the coast.
“Are you going to say something? You’ve been driving us for—”
“Shut up!” the normally mild-mannered Sue hissed. “And get some firewood so we can set up camp, or hunt, or do something useful. Timmons has been working overtime to set up the draft so we could run easier. Pull your own goddamn weight for once.”
The rest of the pack’s eyes opened wide, and it was obvious that they were surprised by Sue’s stinging words.
For a second, Timmons thought Merrit would snap at her, or snap at him, but instead the man just grunted, struggled to his feet, and walked into the small grove of oak trees they camped under. A few minutes later he returned with an arm full of sticks, and a small hill rabbit. No one asked how he had caught the thing, and he didn’t explain his luck when he began to build the small fire.
***
It had been a long ride with the latest group of survivors, refugees, and immigrants. The colonel and his Force de Guerre had delivered the people into the waiting hands of those from Brownsville who Billy had designated for receiving and integration. The latest group brought the numbers close to three hundred and fifty total in New Boulder.
Billy had been pleased to see the wide variety of people come into town. He introduced himself and welcomed everyone then turned them over to the welcoming committee to get settled and start integrating with the rest of the town’s people. It would put a strain on the food supplies, but only for a short while.
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