Nomad Found: A Kurtherian Gambit Series (Terry Henry Walton Chronicles Book 1)

by Craig Martelle

  Five days had passed and Jim was able to finally join Mark and Devlin, which meant that he was going through the same modified boot camp that Terry was currently torturing the others with.

  “Holy fuck!” Jim exclaimed as he fell on his face after what seemed like an infinite number of pushups.

  “You know what you’re made of, candy ass? You can’t find out if you don’t push yourself one step farther than you’ve ever gone before. That’s when we all get to see the real you, big man,” Terry hissed inches from the man’s face. Jim’s big cheeks turned red as he got mad, but Mark had told him this was what they were going to do, so he was playing along.

  But damn!

  He struggled through another five pushups.

  Another hiss, “Look at that. You had a little left in the tank after all, didn’t you, candy ass?” Terry taunted the big man constantly. He wanted to see him break.

  Mark did what he was told without complaint. Still, Terry didn’t trust him. No one changed their tune that quickly. Terry never let his weapons leave his body. He suspected Mark was biding his time until he could secure the pistol or rifle and then shoot Terry in the back from a safe distance.

  Devlin was a completely different story. He was as motivated as any raw recruit that Terry had ever seen. He was internally driven and for the right reasons.

  That was good because there weren’t any rose gardens and if there were, they sure as hell wouldn’t be given out.

  Terry laughed at his own joke. None of these people would understand. They were too young to remember any of the best Marine Corps recruiting commercials. The good news with that was he could parrot the best lines and they would all be new to his new recruits.

  These three also had the fear of death, something he didn’t have when he was going through training all those years ago. He looked about fifteen years younger than he really was and felt even younger than that. The boost he’d gotten had made him stronger, faster, and age more slowly. He was finally putting his abilities to a use of which his benefactors would approve.

  He stood back and watched as the men struggled to remain in the pushup position. “Get up,” he growled. They climbed to their feet. The dust mixed with their sweat and had created mud tendrils tracing down their faces. They did him the courtesy of standing at attention.

  While they stood, breathing heavily, Terry heard someone lumbering up the road toward the home where Terry’s security force lived. The hastily repaired door stood at its front and weeds filled a lush green yard. As long as the door worked, that was all Terry cared about. He turned and saw the fat man with the smashed face. Terry’s butt-stroke had done a number on the man. When he arrived, he stopped in front of Terry and stood there, looking at the three men still breathing hard from their physical exertions. He was breathing hard from simply walking up the hill.

  “What?” Terry asked, trying to be demeaning.

  “Billy Spires told me to join you, get some training,” he said weakly, still looking at the men as fresh beads of sweat appeared on their heads and arms.

  “Hey, boys, I think I have a job for you. Why don’t you take Smashmouth here for a little run. When you get back, we’ll do some fire team immediate action drills, start learning how to attack in ways that will strike fear into your enemy’s heart.”

  “But, but, but…” the man stammered. “My name is Ivan.”

  “GET. OUT. OF. MY. FACE!” Terry screamed. Mark, Jim, and Devlin ran past, grabbing Ivan’s arms on their way. His feet barely touched the ground as they hauled him down the road. He complained and cried for as long as Terry could hear.

  “What are you doing to me, Billy Spires?” Terry asked the sky. He watched as the four men stumbled away on the five-mile track that he had laid out for them.

  It had only been a week. The men were still breaking down, but Terry would have to rush them into service. He needed more people, weapons, and ammunition if he was going to help Billy consolidate what was left of the great state of Colorado and start building a new infrastructure around his engineer and mechanic.

  They needed talent and they needed workers.

  So much to do, but that meant taking a force strong enough to protect itself to find the other communities and convince those people to give New Boulder a chance.

  When would the timing be right for all that?

  Maybe next year. In Terry’s twenty years of self-imposed exile, he had learned patience. If it was next year, so be it. Having a stocked arsenal was probably the one thing that would provide him the greatest comfort. Once a Marine, always a Marine. He loved sending rounds downrange. It provided him a certain measure of peace.

  He needed that as his past still haunted him. He saw his wife’s face in his dreams. Only Margie Rose knew anything about him and she wouldn’t tell.

  * * *

  Marcus watched his pack as they crouched on a bluff overlooking the human settlement on the outskirts of what used to be Boulder. They could see activity, sense the warmth from the greenhouses, feel the power from the electrical generation system. Lights twinkled in one small area, then, a line of lamps lit up, illuminating a long expanse of road.

  “Would you look at that? Our locals are starting to regain the past,” Marcus stated.

  The others nodded politely, not sure which direction the alpha was trying to take the conversation. No one wanted to be on the wrong end of a beat down. He’d gone to the extreme to reinforce his position. The other Werewolves were on the defensive, guarding their words and actions carefully.

  They’d eaten the last of the elk they’d killed. The animals had moved to higher elevations to avoid as much of the day’s heat as possible. Soon, Marcus would have to follow with the pack if elk were going to continue to be their staple.

  “I think we need to take a closer look. Who wants to volunteer to go undercover into that town? The rest of the pack will follow the elk, but we’ll be back in a few months. So that will be the job. Go, endear yourself, live among them, then we’ll see what it all means come the fall.” Marcus laughed when he saw everyone freeze.

  Finally, his mate spoke up. “I’ll do it,” Charumati said. Marcus glared at her. She was a strikingly beautiful woman, as all Weres tended to be, but she was exceptional with eyes that bordered on purple, surrounded by thick and long eyelashes. Around her heart-shaped face, dark brown hair hung well below her shoulders. On one side of her head, a silver streak trailed down her hair. This was the true color of her pelt and she liked carrying it in human form as a badge of her Were honor. She was tall, almost six feet, with long legs making her shapely body that much more statuesque.

  And she was his mate, but she was also one of his greatest enemies. At any moment, he expected they would fight one final battle from which the loser would not walk away. He wondered if she volunteered just to get away from him. He snarled, raising one side of his lip as he sneered at the others.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you? Not a man among you? Sit there with your tails between your legs, you fuckwads?”

  He turned towards her. “And you! Just go, you fucking bitch! Fuck off. All of you!” Marcus shouted as he threw an arm up, storming away.

  Charumati raised one eyebrow and held her hands up innocently. “What? Did I do something wrong, pet?” she taunted, knowing that Marcus could hear her. He stopped for a moment and she crouched, thinking that the final fight had arrived. But it wasn’t to be. He stripped while staring her in the face, bundled his clothes and changed into his Were form. Then, he left them and raced into the woods.

  The chill in the air had nothing to do with the warm of the summer day.

  Char shrugged, waved, and headed downhill with just the clothes on her back. She’d think of what to tell the townspeople during her stroll. She was in no rush. Maybe she’d fall a few times, look more convincing as a damsel in distress. Didn’t everyone love one of those, rushing to their aid?

  With that thought, she dove head first down a trail of rocks and rolled until s
he hit the bottom. “Ow!” she exclaimed, realizing that she probably could have waited until she was closer.

  Her body would start to repair itself, but she’d walk with a limp for a while. Then she realized that if she took too long, she’d have to do that again because she’d be healed. But the blood stains on her clothes would be real. The weeds in her hair looked convincing. “Next time, maybe you think a little more before you act?” she cautioned herself.

  “So where do we go from here?” Char asked no one as she continued walking downhill, starting a healthy conversation where she was the only one talking. She had spent too much time alone. Maybe the people would provide some entertainment, and it had to be better than the constant fights with Marcus. He’d grown so paranoid, she had no idea what he’d do next and that scared her. She didn’t want any part of that.

  Maybe she’d find a champion among the humans. Wouldn’t that be funny? She laughed. She knew that she would be the most dangerous creature there and they wouldn’t have a clue. The men would all vie for attention and maybe she’d give them just a taste, enough to build her own pack of potential suitors.

  Just in case she needed them to do something for her.

  * * *

  Billy congratulated the engineer and the mechanic on their accomplishment of extending the electrical grid. He hadn’t realized how close they’d gotten, but when he showed up, they used the opportunity to showcase their work. Billy shook their hands and smiled, then realized what he was doing. He looked behind him to see if Felicity was there, continuing to manipulate him.

  “Damn that woman!” he blurted. The engineer looked at him sideways.

  “Excuse me?” the mechanic asked. Billy realized that he didn’t know their names. He had always called them just engineer or just mechanic, but those titles had now become names of honor. They were the names they used when he wasn’t around. He didn’t understand that either. Maybe he’d been soft all along, only he didn’t notice.

  Nah, that couldn’t be it. He was plenty tough.

  “I’m going hunting. If I get anything, I’ll make sure you get a healthy cut of it. Keep charging, gentlemen!” he said and nodded as he walked away. The two men beamed at their boss.

  What the fuck have I become? he asked. Those were Terry Henry Walton’s words, not his. Goddammit!

  He headed west, reveling in the light of the lamps overhead. The grid was active. There was a separate power line to his house, but now, all the homes on this section of the grid would have power. That meant a couple old factories could be brought back to life, but what would it take to fire up the equipment, and what could they produce? What raw materials would they need?

  People. He needed more people, a lot more people, to rebuild the infrastructure and then turn the town into a city.

  After he finished hunting, he’d plan for a trip around the region, find more survivors and invite them to New Boulder, show them that technology and civilization was returning.

  He needed to talk with Terry. If anyone could make that happen, it would be him. He also knew that it was dangerous in the wasteland. Who better than his security chief to accompany him?

  Putting those thoughts behind him, he turned his nose toward the hills and sniffed the clean air of a non-industrialized world. Maybe that would change, maybe it wouldn’t, but for now, it made for a good walk. He strode briskly away, heading for the road that would take him west into the hills.

  * * *

  The runners returned after almost an hour. Mark, Devlin, and Jim were angry. Ivan was soaked in sweat and Jim was mostly carrying the overweight man, which completely befuddled Terry Henry. How could anyone get like that when food was so hard to come by? He shook it off. The man would trim weight rapidly as his calorie burn had just increased a hundredfold.

  “Where do you live, Ivan?”

  He pointed toward town, panting and unable to speak.

  “WRONG!” Terry yelled, pointing to the house behind them. He had taken to calling it the barracks for lack of a better term. “In the barracks with you, Smashmouth.” He nodded to his boys and they dragged the other man away.

  “Mark, Devlin, come back here after you’ve tossed him into the tub,” Terry called after them.

  They returned barely twenty seconds later. From in the house, Ivan was yelling at how cold the water was. There was no pleasing some people.

  “Can you two shoot?” Terry asked without preamble.

  “I’ve never fired a gun,” Devlin said, looking at the ground.

  “That’s good since we don’t have any of those. We have a rifle and a pistol. Do you know about rifling?” Devlin shook his head.

  “This is my rifle, this is my gun.” Terry pointed first to the rifle over his shoulder and then to his groin. “One is for shooting, the other for fun. Nothing?” Both men shook their heads. At least they didn’t have any bad habits.

  “Well, gentlemen, we’re going to learn how to shoot because our first big test is we’re going after more rifles. We need to be the best armed of anyone we run across and that means more than just these. We need to train in how to shoot and move, cover each other as we attack, or build a withering wall of fire should we find ourselves in a defensive position. That is what made the Corps great. Combat turns boys and girls into warriors; training is the key to making that transition as painful as possible for our enemies. I know it’s only been a week, but once you have your own weapons, I will need to trust that you won’t shoot me. How can you prove to me that I can trust you?” Terry asked as he ended laying out his operational plan for the near term of his security force. His strategic plan looked much further out.

  Mark shrugged. “I don’t know, besides giving me a chance.” He pointed. “Devlin can watch my back and if I do anything, he can put one between my shoulder blades, because I’d deserve it. Trust isn’t something you can just give away freely. It has to be earned, and I’m doing what I can, but only you can decide whether you trust me or not,” Mark admitted, not trying to convince Terry one way or another.

  “Deal,” Terry replied, holding out his hand. They shook to solidify the agreement, then Terry took Devlin’s hand as well. “You have a key role here. You need to be ready at all times to shoot him. Let me go talk with Billy Spires and see what we can do to get some firepower.” Before Terry took a single step, he heard the report of a rifle, far in the distance. It was distinct because there were no other sounds like it in this post-apocalyptic world.

  Terry’s hearing was better than any human’s, too. He checked to see if the others had heard it and they had.

  “A single shot, sounded like it could have been fired from the AK. So, combat analysis, what do you think that was?”

  Devlin scrunched his eyes as he was deep in thought. Mark shook his head. “Billy must have gone hunting,” he said. Devlin nodded slowly.

  “Perfect. You two help bring dickhead up to speed regarding the new rules that he gets to live under. Keep in mind, that no matter how good a unit is, there’s always a weak link. Right now, it’s him, but I expect he knows how to do things that we’ll need. When that happens, someone else becomes the weak link. No matter what you do, someone will always be that person. Keep that in mind as to why we won’t simply discount that man. He might figure it out, but if he always fails to keep up? Then he doesn’t meet the minimum standards to be a member of the FDG,” Terry stated, adding a new acronym.

  No one questioned him as to what it meant. At some point they would, when they felt like real members of the team.

  “I’m going out there to help Billy carry his kill. We’ll talk weapons and the way ahead. It doesn’t get any better than that!” Terry turned and left without any delay.

  * * *

  Billy was gutting the small doe he’d shot when he heard a noise. Thinking a bear had smelled the blood, he dove to the side, grabbing his rifle as he rolled to a kneeling position, ready to shoot.

  A tall woman stood there with her hands up, watching him carefully. There
was no fear in her eyes as Billy pointed his rifle at her. He dropped the barrel when he realized his AK was aimed at her. She was stunning. She was also a bit of a mess. Blood stained the tears in her clothing. Leaves and grass were trapped in her long brown hair. The silver streak drew his eye, but she was young, maybe in her early twenties, Billy guessed. He stood with his mouth open as he eyed the woman who put the gorgeous Felicity to shame.

  “I’m sorry about that. You startled me,” Billy apologized as he slung his rifle and approached her, offering his hand still covered in blood from when he was cleaning the deer. She took his hand in both of hers and raised it to her mouth. She licked his index finger clean, then bit her lip playfully as a small drip of blood ran toward her chin.

  He jerked his hand back. “What the fuck was that?” he demanded.

  “It’s just a little deer blood. You eat what you have to in order to survive. I was on my own out there, for years, before I stumbled across this place, found you. I’m Charumati, but my friends call me Char. You’ll call me Char, won’t you?” she said. Billy couldn’t tell if she had an accent or not.

  “Sure, babe, I’ll call you Char. Wait until Felicity gets a sight of you. There will be some hell to pay, and I think I’ll be the one fronting the cash. Yeah, what are we going to do with you?” Billy asked, unsure of what the next few hours held. He was still put off by the blood licking, but not enough to change what he was thinking. Everyone had their idiosyncrasies.

  Another sound, and Billy turned, but he didn’t bring his rifle to bear.

  Terry Henry Walton stood on the road and looked at the tall, young woman through narrowed eyes. He seemed frozen as he stared, but it wasn’t with the look of a beauty-smitten man. It was one of the hunter as he faced a predator. Then the look vanished and Billy wondered what he’d seen.

  “Good morning, ma’am,” Terry said as he approached. “My name is Terry Henry Walton.” He raised his hand to his brow, almost too quickly to see. Her hand shot up beside her face, ready to block the blow she thought was coming. Terry scratched his head, then lowered his hand slowly. Billy was watching them both, but missed the exchange.