Civilization

by Stephen Drake

  #

  When Annie Cooper opened her eyes, she quickly looked around and saw no transport pod.

  “What happened to the transport pod?” she asked with a touch of panic in her voice.

  “Magic,” Murdock said with a little chuckle as he turned to lead the way toward his home.

  The pair walked for, what seemed to Annie, a long time before Murdock turned toward the stream. They were already well past being seen from the transport pod. Annie had no idea where they were or what direction they were traveling. Murdock stopped at the stream to refill his water skin and drink his fill. When he was finished, he offered the water skin to Annie and she drank heavily as well. When she finished, she handed the water skin back to Murdock who promptly refilled it.

  “Hungry?” Murdock asked offering her some smoked venison in his open hand. Not knowing what it was, Annie gingerly picked out a piece and took a small sample bite.

  “That’s pretty good,” she said with relish. “What is it?”

  “Smoked venison,” Murdock said as he popped a piece into his mouth and started chewing it. “It’s good for traveling or when you just want a little something,” Murdock said while chewing.

  “It’s quite good,” Annie said while chewing. Obviously table manners don’t apply while walking in the wild, she thought.

  Murdock suddenly leapt over the stream and was heading on. Annie looked down at the stream and hesitated for a second. She saw Murdock going on without her, so she tried to leap the stream much the way she had seen Murdock do and was surprised that she managed to get across the stream without getting her feet wet. She didn’t know why. Maybe it was the exercise or the fresh air, but the leap seemed to be easier than she would have originally thought. By trotting a little, she managed to catch up to Murdock in short order.

  “That was easy,” she said with pride as she caught up to him.

  “You may want to stop talking when out here,” Murdock said to her quietly. “It’s wild out here and there are plenty of creatures that would like a freshly revived, weakened human for a snack. It would be best not to advertise our presence.”

  #

  It was close to midday when Phylicia finally made her rounds of the transport pod. It was nice to see the people hustling around doing whatever they were doing. It reminded her of the big cities that were now long gone, and the remembering helped to keep the slight bit of melancholy from setting in.

  “Did the Cooper woman try to leave?” Phylicia asked the first guard she came to.

  “No, ma’am,” the guard responded, “she didn’t try, she left.”

  “What!” Phylicia screamed in a high-pitched voice. “Who permitted that?” she asked, miffed, while looking around for Palmer.

  “Mister Palmer told us, in the middle of the night, to allow the medicos to go where they will,” the guard said with a straight face.

  Phylicia stared at the guard while he talked and saw no sign of deception on his face. She did her best to try to smile and speak calmly and sweetly. “Okay. Could you be a dear and direct me to Mister Palmer?” She batted her eyes a little at the guard.

  The guard said nothing more, but did point the general direction that he had last seen Palmer.

  Phylicia returned to her meandering with a smile pasted on her face. Palmer, you son-of-a-bitch! I am going to ream you good when I find you. We had agreed to not allow Cooper to leave and you went behind my back. No one does that to me, she thought.

  Kimberly Grey and Heather Stevens saw Phylicia wandering around doing an impromptu, unhurried inspection. They both fell into line on her slightly behind and slightly to the left and right so the three women formed a wedge as they moved through the crowd.

  “Declan! How are you this fine morning? We really need to have a meeting about building a meeting hall, or some such,” Phylicia said sweetly to Griffen when she ran across him in her search for Palmer. “Since we’re here, we should work on getting things more . . . civilized. More organized. Let me discuss it with Palmer. We’ll get back to you, okay?” Once Griffen agreed to the later discussion, she moved on.

  Finally, Phylicia saw Palmer ahead of her and guided her steps, slowly but with determination, to intercept him. As she came up behind him, she hooked and entwined his right arm with her own left arm.

  “Benjamin,” she greeted him quietly and sweetly. “I should really slit your throat,” she said emphatically, but quietly while she dug her fingers into his semi-flaccid bicep, all the while maintaining her smile for the rest of the people.

  “I had no choice,” Ben Palmer retorted while trying to free his arm, but failed.

  “No choice?” Phylicia questioned sweetly maintaining her smile and her grip. “Everyone has a choice and your choice was to stab me in the back.”

  “No, I had no choice,” Palmer maintained. “I had a nightmare about the medicos being restricted and I woke up unable to breathe, so I had to let her go!” His voice was on the verge of panic.

  “You let her go because of a nightmare?” Phylicia asked incredulously.

  #

  Annie became silent after his chiding. Murdock was correct and she had forgotten that she was in the wild. They walked for quite some time before Murdock stopped and knelt down. He took out the water skin and handed it to Annie, who drank deeply. She hadn’t noticed until she stopped that she had been sweating profusely. As she handed the water skin back to Murdock, he held a finger to his lips and then pointed ahead of them. She raised herself up a little to look over a slight rise and saw a small herd of deer. To her, they looked to be a hundred yards away, but even at that distance, they were huge. She did notice that the slight breeze was in her face and that none of the deer seemed to know that they were there.

  “Ready?” Murdock asked quietly. Annie nodded that she was sufficiently rested to continue on.

  They both stood, scaring the deer as they did, and continued on their way. Annie noticed that Murdock maintained a good pace that would cover ground quickly. By the time she saw the river, she knew they had traveled a long distance and this brought her to the realization that she was done in.

  “I need a long rest,” she told Murdock, breathlessly and quietly, as she tried to find a place to sit.

  “It’d be better to walk off the fatigue,” Murdock whispered to her. “If you sit, you may cramp up. It’s midday so resting here for a quick lunch will be fine. See if you can find some dry wood.”

  As she wandered around looking for wood, she saw Murdock go to the river and spear a large fish. He seemed to make it all look easy. He has been doing it for at least five years, dummy, she chided herself. By the time she returned with a small load of wood, Murdock had the fish cleaned and on cooking sticks. She dropped the wood and he handed her the fish. As she watched, he expertly set the wood, kindling first, and started to use the back edge of a knife on a flint. A few sparks into something soft that he had in his pocket and the sticks were smoking. Murdock blew on the embers a few times and the sticks were supporting a flame. He took the fish from her and placed them for cooking.

  “You make it all seem so easy,” she said with awe.

  “I have been living this way for a long time,” he said with a smirk.

  “Five years is a long time,” she responded.

  “I’ve been doing it a lot longer than five years,” Murdock said with a chuckle, “closer to twenty years.”

  “You lived this way on Earth? Before coming here?” she asked in disbelief.

  “Yup.”

  “From what I saw yesterday, you also seem to be a martial arts expert as well.”

  “Some would say that. I know at least one who wouldn’t.”

  “Really? Who?”

  “My sensei. Last time I saw him I was eighteen and he was eighty. At eighty he could defeat me as easily as I did Palmer.”

  Annie watched him intently as he tended the fish while it cooked and tended the fire. She noticed the flame was low and very hot. The fish seemed to cook in no time
. “Dig in!” he said when the fish were finished. They both took out bits with their fingers and ate them with relish. Annie hadn’t thought she would be as hungry as she was. More than once she saw him watching her.

  “When was the last time you ate?” he asked finally.

  “I don’t know, maybe yesterday morning?” she said between bites of fish.

  “What did you eat?” he asked suspiciously. “I happen to know that the supplies were found late yesterday afternoon and I don’t recall you eating anything except the little bit of venison I gave you today.” Murdock took some more fish and popped it into his mouth. “I don’t appreciate being lied to,” he said quietly.

  Annie hung her head a little. “Sorry, I didn’t want to impose on you any more than I needed to.”

  “I said I would feed you. Did you think I wouldn’t?” he asked.

  “No, I just wanted to do the job before getting paid for it,” she said quietly.

  “I’ve had enough,” Murdock stated as he got to his feet and wiped his hand on his pants leg. “Eat as much as you want. It won’t keep and we’ll be at my home late tonight or early tomorrow. You’ll need it to keep up your strength.” Murdock walked over to the river and filled the water skin and drank.

  Annie ate as much as she could of the fish. Between the two of them, they managed to eat almost all of it. When she finished, she went to the river and washed her hands and mouth in the cold water. Murdock dumped the contents of the water skin on the fire causing more steam and hiss. He refilled the water skin and dumped the contents again on the fire. When he was sure that the fire was out, Murdock filled the water skin again and handed it to Annie, who drank deeply.

  “Are you ready to continue on?” Murdock asked while he topped off the water skin and secured it.

  Annie gave a nod and the pair set out again. The pace seemed slower to Annie, but it did seem to pick up the longer they went. Before long, Annie was close to trotting just to keep up. After a few more hours, Murdock called for a rest close to a well-traveled part of the river bank. Both were sweating profusely and Murdock removed his shirt to let the light breeze cool him faster. Annie was watching him closely, without being obvious, and noticed that he was extremely well muscled and did have a few scars to indicate the dues he had already paid. Annie had gone to the river and dipped some water with her hand and rubbed it through her hair to cool herself. While she did so, she drank some.

  “Don’t drink too much,” Murdock warned. “You don’t want the water sloshing in your belly. We do have some distance to go, yet,” he said as he put his shirt back on and re-hung all the gear on his person. “Could you find your way back to the transport pod from here?”

  Annie looked around a little. “I think the transport pod is that way,” she said pointing mostly downriver and a little away from it.

  “That’s pretty close,” Murdock responded warily. “Now you know why I required confidentiality. Don’t want to get woke up in the night with a knife in my ribs.”

  “I would never divulge where you live,” Annie said somewhat offended. “I promised confidentiality and I keep my promises.”

  “That’s the only reason you’ve made it this far,” Murdock responded brusquely. Annie took the comment as a compliment to her and her professionalism.

  “If someone refused to divulge to you how something was done, would you try to find out on your own?” Murdock asked with a sideways glance.

  Annie frowned a bit. “If there’s something that I’m not supposed to know, or you’re not comfortable with me knowing, then don’t tell me. If it isn’t required for medical treatment, then I’m fine with not knowing,” she said after a slight delay to formulate her answer.

  Murdock walked over to her and, while facing her, extended his lower arms so they were parallel to the ground. “Stand on my feet and hold onto my arms,” he said after he was in position. Annie complied without thinking about it. “Close your eyes and keep them closed until I tell you otherwise.” Annie complied and closed her eyes. Murdock then levitated them across the river and upstream a short distance so she wouldn’t know that they had crossed the river. “Okay, open your eyes and stand on the ground.” Annie complied and looked around to orient herself.

  Without saying anything else, Murdock indicated that she should follow and they were off again. As it was starting to get dark, Annie was beginning to be very fatigued. She had been walking and trotting further and for a longer duration than she ever had before. She could feel some leg cramps beginning in her tortured legs and she had been breathing very hard for the last hour. Finally, she called for a stop when she could go no further.

  “We’re close,” Murdock said as he handed her the water skin. “Can you last another hour?”

  “No, I can’t,” Annie responded after having a little water. “I’m done in. I’m sorry, but I can’t go another step.”

  “You lasted longer than I thought you would, so there’s no need to apologize.” Murdock looked around a little, trying to judge the distance remaining. “We’re at a delicate point. We’re close to the house, an hour maybe, and it’s getting dark. It’ll get dark quickly.”

  “Please, stop beating all around that poor bush,” Annie said trying to lighten the mood, “and just spit it out.”

  Murdock looked at her stoically. “There’s a way to get you to the house, but it’s one of those things that you shouldn’t see or even know about.”

  “So I should close my eyes and not peek?” she asked sarcastically.

  “If I had a hood, I’d put it on you,” Murdock said without smiling. Annie knew he was serious with a single look at his face. “I don’t think you can keep your eyes closed for that amount of time, so let’s classify it as doctor-patient confidentiality.”

  “Agreed,” Annie responded enthusiastically.

  Murdock began handing her the bow, quiver, spear, and water skin. “Put them on like I had them.” Annie complied as best she could. “Now, jump on my back, like a piggy-back ride.” Again, she complied. Murdock shifted her weight a bit. “Hold on!” When he felt her tighten her grip on his shoulders, he started off at a slow trot and then picked up speed.

  Annie had no idea how fast Murdock was traveling while carrying her. She could feel the breeze on her face, from the speed of their passage, but it was too dark to have any visible reference to judge velocity. She couldn’t see any path to follow and didn’t know how he knew where to step. Fifteen or twenty minutes later, Murdock stopped in the yard of a cabin and let go of her legs.

  “We’re here,” he pronounced after she was on the ground.

  The light from inside the cabin did very little to light the yard area, but it did increase a little when the door was opened.

  “Come,” Murdock said as he hustled Annie into the cabin. “This is Mei Lee, my wife,” Murdock said beginning the introductions. “This is Annie Cooper, the nurse.”

  Annie made a quick glance around the cabin and then at Mei Lee. “How do you do,” she said extending her hand.

  “Pregnant,” Mei Lee replied with a grin as she took the other woman’s hand lightly and shook it femininely. They both chuckled. “I hope my husband didn’t put too much of a demand on you during the trip here? He does tend to forget that others don’t possess his . . . gifts.”

  “No, the trip was strenuous but not overly so,” Annie responded cordially.

  “I’m sure you’re very tired, anything in particular you require?” Mei Lee asked.

  “I’m a little afraid to ask how you bathe. I’m in need of a bath or something, but am not looking forward to jumping into the cold river, especially at night,” Annie asked sheepishly.

  Mei Lee looked to Murdock, who nodded slightly. “I think we could manage something,” Mei Lee stated as she motioned for Annie to follow her outside.

  Both women went out the back door and Mei Lee followed a well-worn path to the side of the cabin away from the river. Annie could feel the moisture in the air change.

&nbs
p; “Will this suffice?” Mei Lee asked as she knelt down and dipped some of the hot water out with her hand and dumped it back into the spa.

  Annie’s mouth was agape in surprise. “Yes, it will do nicely,” she said finally after recovering from her initial shock and surprise. “Thank you!”

  “We’ve never had any issues with critters, so you should be okay,” Mei Lee said as she turned to leave.

  “How do I find the cabin again?” Annie asked nervously as she couldn’t see the cabin.

  “I’ll come out and retrieve you,” Mei Lee said comfortingly.

  Annie quickly took off her clothes and slowly lowered herself into the luxurious hot water. As she settled herself and relaxed, she found herself thinking about everything that had happened since she was revived. The trip here had been strenuous, but not overly so, she thought. Murdock had done plenty of things to reduce the stress of the situation. The biggest shock, so far, was finding that Murdock and his wife were pleasant and hospitable, and finding a spa this far out in the wilderness. All of it was more than anyone could possibly imagine. From what I saw at the meeting, Murdock is more than capable of handling himself and dealing with whatever threats he comes across.

  “How is your bath?” Mei Lee asked quietly.

  Annie jumped; startled. She hadn’t heard the woman approach at all. “It’s great! Do you have any soap?” she answered breathlessly.

  “No, we have no need of it. We depend on game and having soap would alert the game to our presence. Besides, we prefer the natural scent.”

  “That makes sense,” Annie answered.

  “My husband needs to bathe as well. I’m not trying to rush you, just making you aware.”

  Annie could see that Mei Lee tended to speak quietly. She thought it was more of a cultural thing than anything else. “I’m finished,” Annie said as she got out of the spa and began dressing. When she finished dressing, Mei Lee led her back to the cabin.