“Better words were never spoken,” Terry told him and they shook hands a second time. “We’ll help police up these bodies.”
“You serve, in the before time?” Eddie asked.
“Marine Corps,” Terry told him. Eddie looked skeptical because Terry appeared to be far younger than he really was. “I know you did.”
“I couldn’t go into the Marines because my parents weren’t brother and sister. Rangers, all the way.” He saluted and Terry saluted back, smiling at a joke he hadn’t heard in decades.
Char rolled her eyes and waved the FDG’s warriors to her so they could start carrying the bodies out of the field.
***
North Chicago
Kiwi ran into the trees and pulled up short as the wolf pack snarled and circled two creatures that looked like small bears, with long claws and vicious fangs. Two wolves limped as they circled, still bleeding from their wounds.
She’d only heard stories about them from her grandfather. His point had always been to avoid wolverines, but it was too late for that.
The makeshift sword looked small and insignificant when compared to the angry creatures before her. Ten wolves and a human didn’t seem like enough to deal with the wolverines.
But she couldn’t leave the creatures there. No one working in the fields would be safe. She didn’t know if anyone from the FDG would be coming that morning, but she expected not. They had their own agenda, and she had hers.
“If we can’t find a way to live in peace, then war is thrust upon us,” she told the gathering of predators, even though none of them spoke her language. She didn’t say it for them, though.
The wolverines continued to snarl, showing their long fangs and ferocity.
The wolves attacked, three at once, and the wolverines fought back. A wolf yipped as the fangs dug deeply into his shoulder. A fourth wolf dashed in to grab a mouthful of the smaller creature’s neck.
The wolf shook his head, but the wolverine’s neck wouldn’t break. He let go of the first wolf’s shoulder so he could fight back against the one who held him. The first wolf was wounded, but not out of the fight. He caught one of the struggling legs in his mouth and clamped down, breaking the bones as he tried to rip the leg off.
He let go after getting his face mauled by a flailing paw. He was angry and went after the other leg while the second wolf continued to crush the life from the wolverine’s dense neck. The creature slowed its struggles as darkness overwhelmed it.
The other wolves had the second wolverine pinned to the ground, but he twisted and clawed until he freed himself and went on the attack to free his partner. Kiwi timed the creature’s jump and took a mighty swing, hitting the wolverine in the side and driving it off course, but not penetrating the tough hide. It flew sideways into two more waiting wolves who pounced when it hit the ground. They were on it in an instant. The wolves ripped chunks of meat and flesh from the wolverine while it did the same to them.
Kiwi looked for an opening to swing her sword, but the bodies were intertwined. She couldn’t risk hitting the wolves, but they were finally winning. The end for the wolverines didn’t come quickly, but from a thousand cuts.
The wolf pack whimpered as they settled in to devour their prey. Of the ten wolves, four were seriously injured and four more needed attention, but less urgently. Two stood unscathed, the only two that weren’t in the fight.
Kiwi took off running for her horse and the saddlebags where she kept her first aid kit. She didn’t know if she had enough thread.
Ted’s going to be really mad when he sees the wolves and inconsolable if any of them die, she thought.
“Get the cart!” she yelled at Pepe and Maria. Mayra had been in the field with some of the other women and girls. She started running toward Kiwi while telling the others to stay.
***
New York City
“How did you get here?” Eddie asked.
“We flew, but that’s not in our control. All technology is not lost, but it is in the hands of those who won’t misuse it.” Terry didn’t want to tell the man that none of it was for him, but would lay down the law if Eddie pressed. “What do you need here, besides the peace that I hope this slaughter just gave you?”
“I think we’re okay, now that the bloodsucker is out of our lives. His minions are a little more docile in one way, but a little more on edge in another. I think they need a deity.” He watched as his people made a wide berth around the bodies.
“Where do you want us to put these? And we could use a little help if you were wondering,” Char yelled out.
“A sharp tongue on that one,” Eddie said.
“That one is my wife, and she doesn’t suffer fools gladly,” Terry warned the man.
“My apologies,” Eddie said, keeping his poker face intact. “Over there, please, chuck them on the other side of the wall.”
Eddie pointed at a gap in the trees where a rough brick wall could be seen.
With a look, Eddie’s men started yelling at the people to drop everything and help move the bodies. They slung their weapons and led by example, each pairing off to grab a body and carry it out of the field.
James and Max stood to the side with two wounded survivors.
“Would you like to join me in discussing this group’s transgressions with these two?” Terry asked pleasantly, still undecided as to how hard he was going to press the interrogation.
“Sure,” Eddie replied and together, they walked up to the two oriental men.
Field bandages had been applied to the wounds—arms, legs, and torso. Terry wondered how they survived and expected that they’d die at any moment.
“How many more of you are there?” Terry asked. Eddie shook his head.
“This was their armed group. There are no more and now, we have all their weapons and probably all their ammunition.” Eddie explained.
“Any questions you have for them, before they expire?”
Eddie looked at the first man and then the second. He didn’t have any questions.
“Is there anyone willing to talk in your gang?” Terry asked, leaning close. The man’s lips worked as he pursed them and looked like he was going to spit. Terry’s hand shot and grabbed the man by his throat. “What is with you dumbfucks? It must suck going through life as an asshole, a short life it appears.”
The man struggled even after Terry loosened his grip. Eddie pointed to his men. “Send these two over the wall,” he ordered.
Terry and Eddie gave the soldiers room to work and the two injured men disappeared. Sergeant James and Corporal Heitz looked a little dismayed.
“When they were in our charge, you did your duty. But we always have to defer to the host nation at some point. We turned them over, because we had to. This wasn’t our war, but when we fight, we fight to win,” Terry told his men in an attempt to explain Eddie’s actions and why Terry had allowed them. He wasn’t pleased either, but in the world after the WWDE, there was no room for prisoners.
“And you,” Terry said coldly, looking at Eddie Jones. “Don’t you become the next warlord. You might find us standing on the other side of that wall, and you won’t know that until you’ve taken one step too far.”
Gene grumbled from the side. He was still in Were form and had sat down, watching everything that was going on. The mass of people were giving him a wide berth.
“How would you like to meet him in a dark alley?” Terry asked.
“He was shot, but he seems uninjured,” Eddie said, squinting his eyes as he tried to better see the Werebear’s chest.
“Shooting him just pisses him off. That was ill advised, as would be any military adventurism.” Terry wanted to be clear without blatantly threatening the man.
“Like you did here?” Eddie countered, taking in the battleground with his eyes, while standing calmly.
“The difference with the Force de Guerre is that we don’t start any of these fights, but we sure as fuck finish them. And then we leave the people to the
ir business. That’s what we do, make the world safe for people to live their lives, so they can do a little bit better today than yesterday.” Terry watched the man closely.
“Maybe all people aren’t so honest. They say they’re going to do one thing, but then do something completely different.” Eddie looked down and kicked the soil, digging a scrap of shrapnel out of the dirt with his toe. He leaned down and picked it up, taking care not to cut himself on the sharp edges.
“Politicians in the before time. Here’s to never having to tolerate such wankers ever again!” Terry toasted with his flask. Eddie smiled and nodded.
“Thank you again for your help. I believe that I and my men would be dead if it weren’t for you. We underestimated their numbers, but even if we had known, this is all we have—soldiers, rifles, and ammunition…” Eddie trailed off, as if his confidence took a trip into the land of what-could-have-been.
“Maybe you can make do without the weapons. You have the savvy to talk and if these fields are as successful as I suspect, you’ll have something worthwhile to trade,” Terry suggested, trying to look the man in the eye. “And you have enough weapons that no one is going to try to roll over you. Don’t use them and your ammunition will last forever.”
Eddie nodded, shook Terry’s hand, and assembled his men so they could leave the fields. Eddie Jones waved as they walked away.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
North Chicago
Pepe and Maria hurriedly harnessed their horses, not the replacements that Kiwi had brought. They tore long grasses from the edge of the field to make a bed in the cart and then drove close to the wooded area where the battle had been fought. Pepe reined back the horses when Kiwi called out to them.
She led the first wolf out and he jumped into the cart. “That was easy,” she said, surprised. The next one was a little more reluctant and the third was downright defiant. The big male outweighed her by a good thirty pounds, but she resorted to manhandling him, which didn’t do his wounds any good. They were high on his shoulder where he couldn’t lick them himself.
Mayra ran up, out of breath but ready to help.
Pepe jumped from the buckboard and ran to the cabin they were using for a home. Kiwi left the recalcitrant male and collected the fourth, who was like the first, jumping into the cart and settling onto the grass bed. It was already getting crowded as the wolves were used to spreading out when they laid down.
The seriously injured looked afraid. Kiwi talked with them constantly, reassuring them as she would a human as tears rolled down her face. Some of the wounds were horrific, flesh ripped to the bone, hide flapping free. One of the wolves passed out and Kiwi went to work, sewing up the wounds in hopes of staunching the bleeding.
Pepe returned from the cabin with thin slices of meat that he used to lure the injured wolves into the cart.
Kiwi finished quickly and found that she couldn’t pick the animal up because it weighed as much as she did.
“I need help,” she called in a faint voice, choked up as she looked at her rough work on the wolf’s hide. Mayra appeared and together they carried the unconscious animal to the cart and put him in. The next three took all four of them to treat the wounds. The wolves snapped and Pepe had to wrestle with the beasts’ heads to give Kiwi and Mayra room to work. Maria tried her best to keep them still, but it would have been easier to sew while riding the waves in a sailboat.
She did the best she could. They walked the last three to the cart and helped them in. Two wolves had climbed out and they had to wrestle with them to put them back in. Eight full grown wolves made for a heavy load, but Pepe was confident his cart could handle it. The uninjured wolves ran alongside.
Mayra waved to them, then wiped her hands on the ground trying to clean the wolf blood off. She sighed as she watched the cart slowly drive away.
As Kiwi mounted her horse, the first of the ravens descended from the trees to feast on whatever remained of the wolverines’ carcasses.
It was a hard fought calm that fell over the farm.
***
Anne was looking for a new fishing ground to set up a rotation, helping her find more varieties of fish without overfishing any one area. She headed north to avoid the urban sprawl of downtown Chicago, but Milwaukee and its environs weren’t much better. They had cast off early to give themselves more time to sail.
After two hours, they cruised past a large marina in the center of Racine, south of Milwaukee. Anne decided that they’d gone far enough and she turned the boat around, letting the boom swing wide as she turned through the wind, to avoid getting overturned by a strong gust.
She slowed the boat as they hugged the jetty. Anne wanted to see if there were viable boats hiding in the open. The stress on her and her crew would be lessened with a second and even third boat. Anne was proud to say that her one boat was providing more than half of the main courses for the entirety of North Chicago. The hunters were having to go farther and farther out, making red meat more and more of a delicacy.
And there were plenty of days where there was no meat, but with the power and the freezers, Claire assured everyone that she could better manage things, avoiding the feast or famine approach to post-apocalyptic dining. With Billy’s help, they were able to provide a meal to anyone who wanted one, at almost any time, day or night.
Anne smiled to herself as she remembered Claire tearing into people who showed up covered in dirt and mud. She marched them outside to the cleaning trough and wouldn’t let them back in until they were washed and dried.
Adams stretched out with his senses and felt a good number of humans. He figured that Billy and Terry would love to hear that, another opportunity to grow the community.
He didn’t sense any Weres, and he was good with that.
Anne coasted past the marina where wrecks filled her view. It looked like a storm had gone through at some point in the past and thrown the boats around. She wasn’t sure how destroyed they were but wanted an even closer look. Around the south end of the man-made breakwater, she found a small marina that was empty. She dropped most of the sail, leaving enough to propel them at a snail’s pace.
Alex hung over the front, looking into the water for obstructions. He was relieved to see only seaweed as he guided the boat in. Anne settled it next to the pier and they tied the boat up. All six of the crew went ashore on their way to the large marina.
They topped the rise and looked in at hundreds of boats of all shapes and sizes. Anne ran onto the main pier then turned onto an old, floating dock, which instantly collapsed under her. She plunged into the water, but there was enough debris that she was able to get her feet under her. Alex was first there and pulled her out.
“I’m not sure that went as planned,” he observed. She did her best to scrape off the green slime, but there was no hope of getting clean without stripping down and finding a wash tub.
She resigned herself with her fate and kept to the main walkway. Unsurprisingly, they found that the boats had been looted and almost everything that wasn’t bolted down had been taken.
Anne didn’t care about any of that. She cared about the hulls and the sails. Most of the sails were crap, destroyed by the sun or wind, but not all of them. They found one that was completely contained within a steel case on the boom of a big sailboat. The boom had a motor to pull it up. When they ran out of power, they lost the ability to raise the sail.
And that had saved the sail.
“Go get our tools,” Anne said, but the crew didn’t need to go anywhere. They had brought their tools because they were more experienced at acquisition than Anne was.
“Never go scavenging without your tools,” they told her.
Twenty minutes later, they had removed the sail. An hour after that, they had a spare boom of the size needed for the forward sail. Their boat was intended to use two sails and now they had a second one, but Anne needed Terry or Ted’s help in learning how to sail with that configuration.
“You did the work to salvage our
boat. Do you think any of these can be brought back to life?” Anne asked.
Adams rubbed his chin as he looked from one ship to the next.
“The bigger boats are trashed, but I think we can get some of the thirty-footers back into the water. With a crew of three, that might be a good working boat size. And would you look at that.” Adams pointed at a small river that led inland from the marina. “There’s boats there and look at that!” he exclaimed, smiling as he spoke.
Across the river was a storage yard that was packed with boats that had been stored during the WWDE. They remained in place where they’d been. Stacked and some were even still covered, Adams assumed that many survived.
They trooped back to the boat like the seven dwarves with their freshly mined load of jewels.
***
Queens, New York
Terry, Char, and the others sat in the open, upwind from the outhouse as they waited. The people in the fields cast furtive glances, wondering if this group of strangers were their new overseers. The strangers had both the guns and the gall to take over.
Terry only wanted night to fall so Akio could pick them up. Terry figured if they returned every six months, they’d be able to tell in about fifteen minutes whether everything was okay or not. And that was the extent of the commitment Terry was willing to make.
He had no intention of taking over. He wasn’t sure about Eddie Jones, but Terry couldn’t argue with the result. The people were building a foundation for a better life.
Terry had learned what he needed to learn. This trip had been successful and the FDG once again acquitted themselves well in battle.
He felt bad about tossing the spitter where Gene ended up tearing the man apart, but that was the guy’s own fault for trying to fight the Werebear.
Gene was still in Were form, opting not to change as he continued to heal from the bullet wound. It had struck home, burying itself in his heart, which gave it farther for the nanocytes to push it out. Max carried Gene’s clothes because no one wanted to be trapped on the pod with Gene if he changed back into a human, strutting around in his naked glory.
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