Fortress Farm Trilogy: Volumes 1, 2 & 3 (Fortress Farm Series)

by G. R. Carter

  Lamar nodded again and allowed the two to lead him over to a roaring camp fire. Everything happened so quick… how long has it been? How did the fire get this big this quick?

  Confusion overcame his mind again as he began to shake. Someone placed a heavy blanket on him and then a man with a deep mountain accent was looking closely at his face. The man’s long whiskers covered most of his mouth and moved in a strange up and down movement, like he was saying something but Lamar couldn’t understand.

  His gashed leg throbbed and then he felt himself being slowly being lowered to the ground. The whiskered was out of sight but Lamar could still sense his presence. Poking and prodding at the leg wound changed the throbbing to sharp pain; at once he knew where the whiskered man had gone. A flask was placed at his lips as bitter fluid flowed into his mouth. The Congregation forbade drinking alcohol but those members who scouted had enough plenty of exposure to other mountain survivors who didn’t share the same beliefs. Groups like the Creeks indulged in their own creation, and Lamar recognized the drink as moonshine. For a man with nearly zero tolerance the effect on his already cloudy mind was almost immediate.

  Through the stupor he was still conscious enough to see a red hot iron raised from the campfire. Wonder what that’s for? Indescribable pain from the wound caused him to shriek. Even his dulled senses couldn’t save him from the scorching hot rod as it cauterized flesh and blood vessels. His mind surrendered and he felt himself give in to the darkness.

  *****

  Crisp mountain air burned Lamar’s throat a little as he woke. Eyes still sore and scratchy peered up into the sky as he lay on his back. Every inch of his body ached; some more than others but in all pieces in concert created a general feeling of agony laying on him like a sheet. He coughed out some phlegm to clear his voice enough to speak. “Roy?” he rasped.

  “Roy’s out on patrol, Lamar. They left me to watch you. I’m supposed to let them know when you wake up. How do you feel?” Pina’s voice had honest concern in it.

  “Never better. Still didn’t make a run for it?” he murmured.

  “Not yet,” she chuckled. “Apparently you’re not the worst these woods have to offer.”

  He reached up and touched a bandage wrapped around his head. He didn’t remember being cut there. Apparently there were plenty of wounds he hadn’t discovered yet. He raised himself up to sit.

  “Okay Pina. Thanks for looking after me. Glad the Creeks got here when they did or else none of us would be here. How many of our people did we lose,” Lamar asked, gasping as his leg began to throb more.

  She didn’t answer his question, instead replying with one of her own. “Who are these Creek people? They’ll hardly even look at me, and I haven’t had a chance to ask Roy or Ty. Are they friends of yours?”

  “Not friends, not enemies. Not allies but not adversaries,” he replied in a saying he picked up from Pastor years before. “The Creeks don’t like strangers, so don’t take it personal. And they probably figured out you were one of the Cog prisoners.”

  “They knew about us?”

  Lamar nodded painfully. “They’ll be taking care of the General from here. That was part of our deal. They have the supplies we need to head on west, and we’ll be under their protection. This is their territory, although they don’t go for things like borders.”

  “Wait, what will they do with the General?” Pina gasped.

  “Don’t know, don’t care. Probably use him for leverage against the Cogs. They butt up against them lots of places,” Lamar replied.

  Pina stared at Lamar in astonishment. “You mean you used me as a bargaining chip? I thought you actually cared about what happened to me!”

  “My first responsibility is to my people. Don’t misunderstand my concern, you’ll just be disappointed,” Lamar said coldly.

  “Well I’d say you failed your people pretty miserably Lamar. There’s only about half of us left… wait I guess I’m not considered ‘us’ am I?” she demanded.

  Lamar let the words sink in, wondering who had been lost and who was still part of the group. Had they all been killed? Captured? He allowed his mind to wonder who the attackers might have been the night before. Bands of rovers – scarecrows - were stamped out by groups like the Creeks and the Congregation wherever they found them; many would eat anything or anybody they could get their hands on. But the woods and mountains were immense, and civilized people few and far between at this point.

  A Creek man interrupted the argument, approaching Lamar with a sure footed stride that spoke to comfort on the forest floor. He wore patched denim overalls, the kind made famous by farmer stereotypes from before the Reset. A dark collared long sleeve shirt was held together by large buttons that disappeared under his long beard. A large brimmed hat was pulled down to just above his eyes, and folded down over hair that covered his shoulders. Uneducated folk would see the man as a hillbilly; Lamar knew better.

  “You the one that saved me last night,” Lamar asked. The bearded man shook his head as he shifted a shotgun from his right hand to his left.

  “That were my cousin,” the man said, extending the now free right hand in friendship. “He’s what we call our healer.”

  “I’d like to thank him for what he did. I’d like to thank all of you,” Lamar said and grabbed the man’s hand tightly. The two warriors took quick measure of the grip and both seemed satisfied by the strength and sincerity in each other.

  “I’ll pass ‘at along fer ya,” the man said. “I’m Thaddeus Marshall Paul Creek, third grandson to the second daughter of the Creek himself.” The way the lineage was presented seemed as though it should mean something extra special.

  Lamar quickly caught on and replied, “Lamar Jenkins Junior, first born son to the leader of the Congregation’s exodus from the Federal District. Guardian of the matriarch herself, Charlotte Jenkins.”

  Thaddeus studied Lamar’s face for the honesty of such a statement, then deciding it was true seemed to leave him content. He nodded saying, “Mr. Jenkins it’s my pleasure to make good the deal we’ve had with your people. Mrs. Jenkins has kept her word and traded fairly with we Creeks since the Tribulation hit. And we’s happy to wipe out that band a rovers from last night. Kilt somma our folk a while back. Jus sorry we’s didn’t git here a bit sooner. Didn’t get your message in time, I reckon.”

  “No apologies needed Cousin Creek,” Lamar said, using the friendly greeting the tight nit group used amongst each other. “The Congregation is eternally grateful for your assistance, now and in the remainder of our travels.”

  Thaddeus nodded. “We should probably be headin’ on if’n yer up to it, Mr. Jenkins. Got a good piece to trek for we git to the river. We can drag yer wounded out on sleds. We’ll have plenty of boats for them to lay out on once we git there,” he finished, leaving unsaid the reason for the extra spots.

  “Thank you, Cousin. I’m ready to move on.”

  *****

  Pina had never in her life been on a boat, at least not the kind without nightly entertainment and expensive ports of call. But here she was sailing, actually just floating with the current, down what the Creek men called Kanahwa. Lamar told her the common name was New River according to the maps the Congregation kept in their library.

  The water here ran swiftly, hemmed in on both sides by rock walls, with narrow bands of trees and shoreline bracketing the river. Obstructions from the old world had been blasted away by the Creeks over the years, and this and other waterways served as highways throughout their territory. Pina peered into the dark foliage, wondering what dangers might be lurking. “Are there any more of those eaters watching us?”

  “Relax. This is Creek country. They know if they’re being watched. They’re woodsmen, able to read signs from nature. Besides, there were no survivors after they got done with the pack that attacked us. And that was a big one.”

  Pina shuddered at the thought. “You seem pretty sure about these people. How do you know they won’t betray you
?” she asked.

  “We made acquaintance with the Creeks a few years back, when our hunting parties ran into each other by accident,” Lamar told her.

  “How are they going to help you get west, and why?” she asked. Her curiosity was no longer a question of gathering intelligence for the Federals. She had long given up on escaping and simply wondered what twists and turns her life would bring now.

  Lamar smiled at her. “I’m amazed at how little our so called Federal government knows about what is going on in the interior. In fact, wasn’t your Herman the Secretary of the Interior? That’s a little ironic.”

  “Hey, we’ve been cooped up in that mountain since the Reset,” she insisted.

  “Why didn’t you use your drones to scout further out? Too busy trying to track us?”

  “Drones can’t get that far out yet. Just useful to scout along our routes,” she replied.

  “I didn’t think anything electronic worked anymore? Whatever didn’t get fried in the Reset won’t work because of the night lights,” Lamar said, pointing up to the sky to show where the cause of the pain started for the world of his youth. That world had been totally dependent on the free flow of electricity.

  “The solar storms don’t really bother electronics anymore. Believe it or not, they never really did. The story was sort of overblown. But it gave us a chance to get some much needed upgrades to the grid paid for by Congress,” Pina answered.

  Thaddeus snorted. “The Creek himself told us about that. Gave a warning about when we try to create a leader bigger than the common man. Somethin’ about how they won’t let no crisis go to waste.”

  Pina flashed a begrudged respect at the man she considered at first blush to be a backwards hillbilly.

  “Anyway, when GRAPEVINE, you know the system that controlled the grid, shut down, we had a parallel computer system that wasn’t affected. So we’ve had heat and lights the whole time, but we had to stay underground so we didn’t get caught up in the chaos afterwards. Those drones that chased you off the interstate are what’s left. We’ve got more waiting at the new capital, but we didn’t store up a lot of spare parts for anything at Continuity Mountain. That was a bit of an oversight on our part I guess,” she replied without thinking of the consequences.

  “So this really was planned? We figured it had to have been,” Lamar said. He watched the color drain out of her face. “What’s wrong, Pina? Thinking about how many millions of people you killed?”

  “I didn’t kill anyone,” Pina replied defensively. She suddenly felt claustrophobic, trapped on this boat with a man who kept tricking her into saying things she didn’t intend to release.

  “Uh Huh,” she heard from behind. Thaddeus commanded their boat, giving he and Lamar a chance to talk things over during the trip. A line of other boats, some larger, some smaller, trailed off behind them. Two scout boats had already gone ahead and were out of sight.

  “What is ‘Uh huh’ supposed to mean?” Pina protested. “I never hurt anyone, I was just doing my job. I had orders from the acting President of the United States! What was I supposed to do? We were trying to keep some semblance of order, save the human race! The whole world is going to be destroyed!”

  Thaddeus and Lamar were hard men. They both had taken life and watched men close to them be killed. The world of their childhood spun apart when the power when out and nothing really surprised either of them anymore. But now they shared a look of amazement, clear to anyone who might know them well.

  Thaddeus spoke first. “What do you mean the world is going to be destroyed? Is that why the Cogs kilt’ everyone?”

  “It wasn’t like that. There’s an ice age coming and we needed to make sure that humanity survived,” she answered.

  Lamar didn’t have to fake the confused look on his face. “So let me get this straight, you had to destroy humanity in order to save it? I think I heard someone say something similar in a history class. Didn’t work too good.”

  “Everyone was going to die. Starvation, disease, rioting…the whole planet. Even the areas that wouldn’t be under ice would be flooded with refugees from the glaciated parts. We were just making sure that humanity could survive, don’t you understand?” Pina welled up with tears. Her cognitive dissonance faded as she faced the realization of what her actions had wrought.

  Neither man spoke while they floated on. Pina sobbed, perceiving the pain these two suffered directly because of what she been a part of.

  “I’m…I’m so sorry. We thought we were…we thought we were saving civilization…how could we have been so selfish? All those people…I never thought about…” she kept stammering, holding her head in both hands.

  “When we took you, something was said something about a new capital. That you were all moving out. Where were you going?” Lamar asked.

  Pina said nothing, still sobbing.

  “You’re an admitted murderer, Pina. Thaddeus and I have both killed people who committed lesser crimes. If you’re truly sorry for your sins, come clean with everything now. This information can help our communities, and other survivors. You can save lives. Make amends, help us understand what’s happening.”

  She looked up at him through red eyes. Snot strings hung off her face, flushed and streaked with tears. Gathering her strength she began to unveil the entire plan. “The government needed a new settlement area in a more temperate climate. We were going to move all of our citizens from the bases around DC to Georgia. Atlanta was destroyed by the Reset of course, but we had already build the underground foundations for a new capital outside of Athens.”

  “Georgia Guidestones,” Lamar mumbled to himself. “Pastor always said that was the work of a demon but I thought he was just being dramatic.”

  “Part of the distractions,” Pina answered. “We kept so many crazy conspiracy stories floating around that eventually the citizens became jaded. Truth was actually stranger than the fiction.”

  “You mean like Denver Airport, aliens on the moon and all that?”

  “The Denver Airport is for real. Complete underground city. There’s a tunnel connecting it to Cheyenne Mountain. The chosen citizens we saved in the Pacific Northwest were supposed to go there, and then move south to eastern Texas for their permanent residence,” Pina said. “We lost contact with Seattle right after the Reset, but the Cheyenne Mountain group is still fine.”

  “If you were trying to reduce the population why were you trying to get people like my parents to come to the camps? Why not just kill them off,” Lamar asked.

  “We’d still need production workers, farmers, soldiers, those types of folks. We set up each VIP with sectors to manage in the new lands. They needed assigned assistants to help them,” Pina replied with pride. Lamar inferred that had been part of the plan she worked on.

  “You mean slaves? Plantation type arrangement?” Thaddeus broke his silence, clearly this idea touched a nerve. Pina chose not to acknowledge the truth and went back to staring at the river bank. A deer poked its head out and then disappeared just as quickly. Little eddies swirled around the boat and insects danced around just above the water’s surface. She lost herself in the peace of it all, wondering why she had never noticed such things before.

  “Whatever happened to the President before the Reset. Aguilar I think his name was?” Lamar interrupted.

  Pina jumped at the chance to change the subject. “Something happened to our bases in Chicago and Toronto. They went off line right after the Reset. So Herman sent scouts to Toronto first. Apparently a strain of tuberculosis hit pretty quick. When sanitation breaks down cities get bad in a big hurry. All those people in their own filth, nasty! A really virulent strain of TB managed to kill off a big chunk of the population and then work its way into the underground. Then Muslim patrols out of Michigan found the base by accident and looted it. Killed anyone that was left after the outbreak.”

  “Muslims? What’ve they got to do with anything?” Lamar asked.

  “The Detroit area was populate
d by refugees from the Middle East before the Reset. Muslims, you know? They lived in pretty bad conditions in their old countries, and it wasn’t much different here. So when modern civilization collapsed, they stepped right into the gap. Formed their own Caliphate and everything.”

  “You mean like their own country? Let me guess, this Caliphate is thriving and spreading and now Herman’s concerned.”

  “Was concerned. Because the exact same thing happened in Minneapolis. Just Sunni Muslims there instead of Shia. Both sects put aside their differences, mostly, and teamed up to take out any survivors between them. Slaughtered anyone who stood in their way. Convert or die for every man, woman and child. They think this is Allah’s will to give them a rich fertile land to build a new kingdom in.” Pina answered.

  “What’s that got to do with Aguilar?”

  “Right, well after the Reset, he and Speaker Reed agreed to turn over all their power to Herman for the sake of Continuity of Government. He got them involved in our religion so they quickly understood it was for the greater good.

  “Anyway, they jumped at the chance to help in exchange for estates in the new capital. He gave them implants that can access a direct connection to our database. Gives them complete knowledge of maps, people and even religions like Islam. Pretty remarkable technology, even for us,” she bragged. “Then he gave them a company of soldiers with some of the new flexible exoskeleton suits we had saved back. A couple of VX drones killed hard core hold outs from out of sight. Muslims thought it was all God stuff or magic. By the time they were done, the Caliphate believed Aguilar was some kind of Muslim Messiah, they call him Mahdi. Then Reed took on the persona of the Muslim form of Jesus…no they really did,” she said to incredulous looks from her two boat mates. She assumed they were both Bible readers.

  “Okay you probably don’t believe me. But it’s true. They became the leaders of an Islamic Caliphate covering all of what was Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Part of Indiana, Illinois and Iowa, too. They built the Caliphate’s capital in a city in Illinois called Aurora. None of the muzzies got the irony,” Pina chuckled.