“They know me, dear. Let me smooth things over, and then you can come up.” She patted my leg as she got out of the truck and walked up the hill, yelling as she went.
“It’s just me, old Agnes!” She walked with her hands up. I feared that I would hear the angry retort of a rifle, but it didn’t come. I got out of the truck and followed part of the way, staying behind branches and bushes as I neared the opening in the brush. I peeked between the leaves as Agnes walked past where Lucas hid. She talked with him briefly before continuing.
I thought about getting a rifle, but that wouldn’t get us what we wanted, which was information.
A number of women materialized from behind cover. They all carried hunting rifles, and they looked too thin. Life in the hills around Denali must have been hard. Agnes greeted them warmly, but they didn’t seem happy. They looked warily in our direction. The conversation lasted far longer than it should have before Agnes waved us forward. I walked out of the brush with my hands up. Lucas joined me once I was even with him. He held his hands up, too. Prudence demanded humility.
“That’s close enough!” one of the women shouted, leveling her rifle at us. I froze. Lucas started to say something until she pointed the rifle at him. He stopped.
We stood there so long that my arms started to hurt. The rifle started shaking as the woman struggled to maintain her aim. “Somebody has to do something,” I said. She turned the rifle on me. “I’m going to put my arms down, and I would greatly appreciate it if you didn’t shoot me. My wife will thank you later. And his wife won’t kill me if I can bring him home in one piece.”
She finally let the rifle barrel drop toward the ground. I don’t think it was as much our pleas as it was she just couldn’t hold it anymore. They were probably weak from hunger. Not weaklings and not defenseless, but not up for any extended displays of physical prowess.
“We are here for one reason only. I promised Mr. Bezos that I would look for his daughter. He is very concerned. Understand that I’m not here for money or anything else. I’m here because I couldn’t look a father in the eye and tell him that even though I was the only one in a position to help him, I wouldn’t. So here I am. Once I get the answer, we’ll be on our way. Our wives are probably worried sick as we’ve been gone too long. I’m sure our kids miss us, too.” I wanted to establish that we were family men. Their fear of us was real, but only because we were men.
I couldn’t imagine what they’d gone through to become like this.
“You’ve talked with my father? When?” a voice spoke from the back of the now large group of women and small children, the oldest no more than three.
“Tanya? I talked with your dad maybe two months ago. He’ll be relieved to find out that you’re alive, to say the least.” The women started talking excitedly among themselves. I couldn’t hear what they were saying. When Tanya stepped forward, she held the hand of a blue-eyed, blond boy about two years old. I looked from him to her. “We’ve been Outside and only recently returned as part of the effort to resettle Alaska, take it back from the Russians through building and establishing a new colony.”
An older woman stepped forward and looked closely at me. I stood still as if getting sniffed by a bear, watching her without moving my head.
“I think he’s telling the truth,” she said as she stepped back. They waved us toward one of the cabins. Although I was considered truthful, I noticed that two women followed us at a short distance, their rifles at the ready.
The pain they carried must have been immense.
We were shown chairs at a small dining table and given water. I hadn’t realized how much I’d sweated, but that came from the tense few minutes where I wondered if I was going to live or not. I still wondered what they’d do with us.
We told our story first, ending with the bombing six months ago and our run from Alaska. Then our short stay outside and the government’s offer for us to return. I went into detail about why we couldn’t stay out there, how life here was better with our Community.
Tanya hovered nearby, but deferred to Terri, the apparent leader of the group. When Terri started speaking, no one moved. She spoke in a hostile voice, angry at the world. She talked of how the women were separated and then passed among the Russian men.
I hung my head, tears welling in my eyes. I’d never felt so helpless. They were here the whole time we were living at the Resort, without a care in the world. And they were tortured by men for the simple reason that they were women.
“We escaped one night when others rushed the guards. We went into the Park, way into the Park, but there are too many grizzlies and wolves. Ten of us died that first month. We couldn’t protect ourselves; we were too weak. We finally made our way here, found the rifles and ammunition and a place that we could defend. We’ve been here for almost a year now.”
“We have a nice Community, all couples, plenty of children, same age as these little guys. We have a school, too. There are only twenty-two of us total, but we have skills, survival skills. We’ve got a good place and we’ll continue to grow, build a new society, fair, peaceful. We already have a community that we’re proud of. That’s what we want to see for a new Alaska. You can join us or stay here. It is all your choice, but we’re going to leave. We want to get back to our families. Tanya, what do you want me to tell your father?” I wanted to leave right then, but Terri grabbed my arm with her skeletal hand. I looked down at her fingers as they turned white with the strength of her grip.
I put my hand over hers, and she flinched. “I just want you to let go, that’s all.” She released the pressure and mumbled something that I couldn’t hear.
“You can talk with my father? You have a radio that works?” Tanya stammered.
“We have a satellite phone that your father gave me so I could call him when I knew something. It’s available for anyone to use, but it’s back where we’re staying in North Pole. We can get it and return, but I don’t know how long that will be, and I sure as hell don’t want to drive back up that road to get here.”
They all started talking at once and even with Terri yelling, it was chaos. I started to stand and Terri clamped down on my arm once again. I grabbed her wrist and ripped her fingers from me. Her eyes blazed in fury as she tried to pull her rifle into her shoulder.
“Listen!” I bellowed with everything I had. “I’m not threatening you, and I demand that you don’t try to hurt me. Do you understand? I’m not your enemy! We’re leaving and if anyone tries to stop us, I will shoot back.” I threw the table out of the way and stormed out the door.
“Wait,” a lone voice cried from within. “Wait.” Tanya ran out the door, trailed by her two-year-old.
“I want to go with you. We want to go with you,” she said, taking her son’s hand and leading him up to us.
“Get your stuff. Bus leaves in ten minutes,” I said coldly. She picked up the little boy and jogged toward a distant cabin.
“Wait,” a second voice said from the doorway. “I’m sorry. Will you give us time to talk about this? Some more may want to come along. As you can see, we don’t eat real well here.” Terri hung her head after speaking, turned, and went back inside.
Lucas look at me and then the cabin. His gaze drifted away into the trees. “I can’t imagine what they went through. Do you think we could have done anything if we came here when they being held? Could we have broken them out earlier?”
“No. There’s nothing we could have done. They were being held by real military. Scumbags, but real military with real weapons. We wouldn’t have stood a chance. The only thing we can do is treat them with respect now. It’s the only thing we can do for anyone, whether we know them or not. They have our trust unless they show that they can’t be trusted. And if they come, they’ll be equal members of the Community, just like the rest of us,” I talked softly, unsure of what I wanted. It would be easy if we could just drive away. I couldn’t do that, eve
n as hostile as they were. I couldn’t let them die out here.
“We’ll protect them, too, Chuck. They probably haven’t had a good night’s rest in years. Always hearing noises, living in fear,” he whispered, before squeezing my shoulder. “Once again, Chuck, you save the day. What if they all come?”
“We make do. How many do you think are here? Twenty, thirty?”
“Standing room only in the bed of the truck. We need bigger wheels,” Lucas said, watching the cabin door open and the women emerge, Terri in front, Agnes at her side.
“We will all come along,” Terri stated in a loud and clear voice. There was a small cheer from the others. Just like Lucas had predicted.
“We welcome you to the Community. How many is ‘all,’ by the way?”
“Thirty-seven. Eighteen adults and nineteen children.”
I whistled through pursed lips. It was roughly ten miles downhill to the highway outside Healy. From there, it was about one hundred fifty miles to North Pole, further since we had to drive the long way around Fairbanks. They could walk ten miles downhill if we carried all their stuff in the truck and then in the massive parking lot of vehicles, I knew we’d find one that would run. We had our truck to jumpstart another vehicle, and then another, as many as we needed, as many we could find that would run.
We had a plan, but it was too late in the day to execute it. Lucas and I insisted on sleeping in our truck, which gave the women extra time to get ready. We didn’t have much food with us, but we gave it all to the group. We could go without for a day. We knew where there was more in Nenana, only fifty miles away.
“We leave first thing in the morning,” I said to Terri. She offered her hand, and we shook. Neither of us smiled.
SHANE
Colleen kept the oxygen tent over Shane’s mouth until his color improved. Together, they carried him outside where the air was fresher, although Chris returned for the oxygen tank, just in case. Shane was groggy and couldn’t seem to wake up. They put him in the quad. Colleen took the driver’s seat. Chris said that he’d take care of things and be along shortly.
She slowly drove away, looking back once before speeding up and disappearing around the building.
Chris took a small tarp from a pallet of material. He wrapped Cullen’s body and hefted the bundle over his shoulder. He put Cullen in the back of the engineer’s quad and took it to the small clinic that serviced the base. He broke in and then broke a series of doors before finding a room that looked like the morgue. It only had two places for bodies and both of those were taken. Chris gagged and returned to the vehicle. He carried Cullen back in and dropped him in the corner of the tiny room. Chris didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything.
On his way out, he saw oxygen bottles. He took these along with a few bags of IV solution. They were old, but there was no alternative. He took the needles, too. Colleen would have to establish a clinic in one of the spare rooms of the elementary school. They could get most of their supplies from here. It would be a return trip that Chris didn’t look forward to.
He left the clinic and since the engineers’ trailer wasn’t full, he went back to the houses with the painted stripe and emptied them. He drove off carefully. They’d already had enough tragedy for the day.
He made it to North Pole without incident and parked next to the quad Colleen had driven. They hadn’t emptied the trailer yet. He took three grocery bags in each hand and waddled to the door, pushing his way through to the inside. He staged the canned goods outside the pantry and went in search of Colleen. She was easy to find as everyone was huddled outside Cullen and Shane’s room. Chris ran back outside and brought in one of the small oxygen battles with valve, tubing, and a nose piece. He handed it through the crowd to Colleen, who thanked him and put it on Shane, turning the valve fully open.
She was trying to flush his lungs clean, but she feared that some of the damage would be permanent. There was nothing else she could do, so she chased people away to let Shane rest.
Madison, with the help of the twins, corralled the children and headed back to the classroom. She had to talk with Colleen about giving classes in first aid to the youngest among them. With the way everyone worked, you never knew who would be there when something happened. Everyone needed to know how to stop the bleeding at a minimum. CPR would come later, as even Charles and Aeryn didn’t have enough body weight to perform chest compressions on an adult.
Colleen looked once more at the young man, closing the door gently on her way out. She saw Chris carrying more bags in and joined him to clean out the trailer. Once everything was inside, they turned over the stacking to Jo, who was alone in the kitchen. She and Clarisse had a system and woe be to anyone who messed it up.
Clarisse was with Ben at the fish wheel as were Becca and Darren.
Colleen asked what was available. Jo gave her some fresh bread along with a can of Chef-Boyardee spaghetti and meatballs. Jo empathized and didn’t prod Colleen for the story. Chris sat next to her, eating his bread and moose jerky, while drinking bottle after bottle of water. He couldn’t get the taste of the morgue out of his mouth.
He and Colleen ate in silence. At some point they’d rehash what happened, but not now. Since arriving in North Pole, the Community had lost three people, or so they thought. At least Charles and Aeryn had confidence in their old man and his sidekick.
TRAVELING HOME
The bed of our truck was filled with personal items as we headed downhill. I used the rifle barrel to clean off the remainder of the glass and a rag to wipe most of it out of the cab. I looked in the rearview through the shattered remains of the back window as the women and children followed us, walking with a purpose.
We sped up when we could. Our uphill trip had cleared enough foliage that it took us less than hour to get down to the highway. That meant we had time before the others arrived, maybe three more hours to find a vehicle. We raced north, looking for anything that could burn the old gas better.
I wanted to check on the vehicles from Two Rivers. There were a couple of motorhomes, rather substantial beasts. I wanted to fit everyone into one vehicle. I didn’t want a circus train of barely running vehicles.
Sometimes we don’t always get what we want.
We found the convoy from Two Rivers and, despite our best efforts, we couldn’t get the big engines of the motorhomes to turn over. We had to look somewhere else and we were running out of time.
We headed back toward Healy. As we passed older trucks, we’d stop, check the engine, clean the fuel filter, hook up the jumper cables and give it a shot. Two of the trucks started and ran, roughly, but they ran. Lucas jumped in one and I looked to Agnes to take the other.
“Oh, I don’t drive,” she said with a smile.
“I don’t care if you don’t have a license. Just get in. Gear shift, brake, and gas. That’s all you need to know. Turn the wheel a little bit to keep from running into things.” She was hesitant but she gave it a try.
And promptly rammed the truck full speed into the vehicle to its front. She hit her face on the steering wheel upon impact. She got out, a little shaken, bleeding from a cut on her forehead. Once I was sure she was okay, I started laughing. She looked at me questioningly.
“You weren’t kidding, were you? You really can’t drive!” She shrugged disarmingly.
Lucas and I continued down the road in our two old vehicles until we passed a truck with dual rear tires hauling a fifth-wheel trailer.
We both stopped at the same time. I wondered why we hadn’t given this one a try on the first pass. If we could get that beast cranked up, it would solve our problems. Lucas broke the window and unceremoniously dumped the body of the driver on the pavement.
“Keys,” I told Lucas. He pulled the set from the ignition and threw them to me. I unlocked the trailer and went in. There was enough room, especially if they put four adults and two
or three children in the cab. Cramped in a trailer was far better than walking.
I checked the gas and felt certain it was empty. I put in the contents of one gas can. Five gallons would get this rig twenty-five miles up the road. If it didn’t run, we’d just wasted the gas. We cleaned the fuel filter and hooked up the jumper cables. Lucas shut everything off so the heavy-duty battery wasn’t powering anything besides the starter. It took ten minutes of charging before we tried it. It turned over slowly, but we stayed on it as long as we could. It took a while to pump the gas back into the engine with a dry fuel line.
Ten minutes more and it belched, choked, coughed, and sputtered to life. It sounded like two of the eight cylinders were working. The oil we added took a while to get to the valves and the cylinders, but once there, it ran a little rough, but it ran. This wasn’t a new truck, but it had fuel injection, so we poured another five gallons in, straining it through four different layers of material. If we only had avgas to perk it up.
Clear Airport was about twenty miles up the road.
“Can you drive this rig?” I asked. Lucas’ only response was to look at me like I was stupid. We parked the extra truck off the side of the road. We could pick it up on the way as long as we salvaged enough gas. But we had to pick up our survivors first. “Tally ho!” I shouted and drove slowly past Lucas. He angled the truck sharply then smoothed out the corner to get it and the trailer out of the line of traffic.
The women and children were standing by the side of the road when we arrived. Lucas drove past and used a motel’s parking lot to turn around. He slowly pulled up and called “All aboard!”
Terri looked at the vehicles and organized everyone. It took two minutes to get loaded up. I’d never seen such efficiency from a group so large. Once buttoned up, she twirled her finger in the air and we drove away.
We found avgas at Clear Airport, but not in a tank. Those were all empty. We siphoned it from two small airplanes abandoned on the tarmac. The big truck appreciated the extra spark the high-octane gas provided. We didn’t waste any more time than we had to, so we pulled out with every intention of stopping for lunch in Nenana.
Return (End Times Alaska Book 3) Page 13
