Future Rebuilt: A Post-Apocalyptic Harem (Future Reborn Book 2)

by Daniel Pierce

  She was right again.

  “In the morning, change in plans. Just me and Salyers to go see Rowan. I need you here for something,” I said.

  Her intake of breath meant she was getting ready to argue, but I put a hand on her shoulder, looking down with a smile. “I need you here, to do what I can’t. You and Silk have to draw a map of the rocky outcroppings for building materials. I don’t know what Derin and the new people can do with raw stone, but you’re the ones to lead them there, at least on a map. Use a piece of hide, ink it, and send them off in the morning. I have my reasons, but you’re going to have to trust me because it involves splitting our forces. Salyers might be a great tracker, but you’re the best. Do this for me, okay?”

  She pretended to think, then angled her head up at me so I could see the hint of her smile. “So you’re saying I’m better than him?”

  “At everything,” I said.

  “Good answer. You trust Salyers?” she said.

  “I do. I trust the Harlings, too. They’re in it with us, now. Their kids are here, and their lives are here. Whatever we’re building, they’re in on it, and that means using them to the fullest advantage from day one. Like now,” I concluded.

  “I’ll take Doss down into the underground, and we can look for those—what did he call them?” she asked.

  “Breaker bars. Long steel poles that he can put a point on. I’d wager he’s going to bust rock with them and find a way to make concrete, or maybe just mortar, but either way will work for making low walls. The key will be how to make roofs. We can’t cut down the trees, but we can’t leave the buildings open,” I said.

  “What about Alatus? We could tear down all those metal walls in the hallways, and even if it was only for a year or two, they would hold as a roof. Then you might get your sawmill, after there are enough trees. Still doesn’t make a permanent solution, though,” she said, taking stock of potential housing sites. With dozens of new people, we would need way too much roofing material to rely on scavenging.

  I snapped my fingers. “Unless we used Taksa’s wagons, and the broken wagons from the old Harlings convoy,” I said,

  “How many shelters could you cover with that? Twenty?” she asked.

  “At least. And the material is close, and already cured. That’s our solution for now,” I decided. “I’ll tell Derin and Doss, and Fleura can do the math. She’s the numbers person among the Harlings. We’ll pick a standard size of house, mostly for sleeping, and spread the wood around as best we can until we engineer something better.” I exhaled with relief. Fighting giant hogs was somehow easier than calculating building materials, but we had a solution for the next few months.

  If anything, the roofing issue reinforced my belief that to survive, we had to make things rather than just find them. That would be the difference between the oasis being a glorified camp and a thriving town, and the addition of a power plant—or access to it—would go a long way to securing our future.

  Mira touched my arm, ending my reverie. “Tell the rest of it now. The part you don’t want anyone else to know.”

  “You’re going to follow us,” I said.

  “Me? Or . . .?”

  “You and Silk. I’ll do my best to leave a trail, but Salyers will probably want to run, and there’s no way you could keep up. I know you’re tough, but he’s tall, and if he sets the pace, it will be tough, maybe even for me. That means you set off two hours behind us, follow our trail, and stay far enough back to help in case something goes wrong. I don’t trust Rowan, or Lyss, or anyone who isn’t right here, right now,” I said.

  “Stealth and speed. What about arms?” she asked.

  “Bring everything you can carry. Bring three days of rations, full skins, and some tools. If our negotiations go well, I’ll signal you. If they don’t, you’ll know, because Salyers and I will be forced into a fighting retreat. I don’t know how many people Rowan has, but I know it’s enough to cause us a problem,” I said.

  “We’ll hang a half-klick out of their camp. No fires, and we’ll dull anything metal for daytime recon. What if things go well? What then?” she asked.

  “We wave you in and make no apologies. I don’t care about his feelings. I care about my people and that power plant.” I stood, reaching down to take Mira’s hand. “Let’s spread our plans, and then tell Salyers the good news. We leave at dawn.”

  “Maybe you do. I’ll be sleeping. The boss is away tomorrow. Gonna sleep in,” she said, grinning.

  I leaned in to her, whispering. “Who said you were going to get any sleep?”

  6

  Salyers was my kind of guy, rising before dawn and waiting, eyes peeled to the desert, as I double-checked my pack and weapons. Just because we were invited didn’t mean we weren’t going well armed.

  “You have enough ammo?” I asked him.

  “For this,” he said, lifting his rifle, “and this.” He turned to show me a holster, the butt of a pistol rising above the worn leather. “My knives are in a more personal area, and no offense, but we don’t know each other well enough yet.” Even in the minimal light, I could see his wink.

  “Fair enough. Let’s move. After you, I believe?” I said, waving to the expanse of desert just now brightening with the day.

  “I’ve lost more maps than I have, but we don’t need one to find this place. We’ll track northeast at speed, and break once we hit the first ridge of high ground, about ten klicks to the east. You up to run? Nothing crazy, just enough speed to keep us ahead of the sun,” he said.

  “I can run. You lead.”

  “Let’s go,” he said, breaking into a loping trot that ate up ground with deceptive speed. He was well into his years and tall, but still in the kind of shape that The Empty demanded from people who wanted to live more than one season under the sun.

  We ran on, our pace steady, only slowing to adjust direction based on the ground. After an hour, we passed a series of three dry stream beds, the high water marks well above my head and carved deeply into the hard banks. There were scrubs and cacti and all manner of random succulents, some in large enough patches that I marked them in my mind as possible water sources for our inevitable expansion.

  “Think there’s a well to be dug back there?” I asked as we passed a cluster of fat-leafed succulents huddled around a small depression.

  “I know it. This desert is recent, in terms of the land, and the problem isn’t finding water or even getting to it. The problem is living long enough to drink it. Predators, the sun, even lightning can kill you out here before you can tip a skin up to your mouth, and that’s no lie,” he said in between deep, rhythmic breaths.

  “We’re going to dig them and stone the walls. Each and every one,” I said.

  “Then you’ll want to cover them with something, or at least leave a tile overhang. The less sun on the water, the longer a spring will last. Some of these hillside springs are only temporary, but the ones down low show a lot of promise for the future. I hope I’m alive to see it,” he said.

  “Why wouldn’t you be?” I asked him, drawing breath through my nose to muster enough wind to speak. It was hard going now, up a low slope that seemed to rise forever. Then, in a cool rush, my ‘bots kicked in and I felt the burden on my lungs vanish, like an afterburner of oxygen that gave me breath and relief all in one moment.

  “Because of you, Jack,” he said.

  I stopped, then he stopped after running on for a few steps.

  “Say again?” I asked him, unsure of what he meant.

  “He let his breath come back, then put his hands on his hips and smiled. There was no malice in it, just acceptance. Salyers was a seasoned fighter, and I understood that what he was about to say would be the unvarnished truth.

  “You’re leader, Jack. You fight without hesitation, and you’re looking beyond the meal, and the horizon, and tomorrow for the next step. You’ve got plans, and those plans require people like me. People who can do things—well, mind you, but maybe not as well as
you given enough time for you to learn. In your heart, you think like that, don’t you?”

  “No, I,” I started, then stopped because it was a lie. He might think my arrogance was born of youthful stupidity, but it wasn’t. I’d been a soldier and a computer engineer, and even then I’d been a capable person. But now, with the ‘bots surging through my body, there was no hesitation, no need to vary from the path I had in mind, both for myself and the ruins of my world. “You’re right. I do.”

  “Well, we can add honest to your list of qualities. The Harling family doesn’t suffer fools, and Doss and Fleura’s trust of you goes a long way to me being here right now. But a strong will isn’t enough, not for what you have in mind, and that’s why I know that people in your circle might get hurt. Are you willing to bleed for your idea? This thing you want to build?” he asked me.

  “Yes.” One word. That was all I needed.

  “Then other people will, too, but sometimes it isn’t their decision. Remember that when you make your way forward on this path, Jack,” he said.

  “I will. Thanks.”

  “Now then,” he said, cracking his back and smiling at the rising sun, “let’s run.”

  We stopped four hours into our run, pulling at the waterskins as we climbed the final ridge of broken rock. Stone pillars rose through the sand like broken teeth, their surfaces scarred by the ceaseless winds that blew from the west.

  “Still on the right path?” I asked. Below us, the desert sprawled in raw beauty, a dark smudge rising on the horizon.

  “Dead on. Straight ahead, you see it?”

  I looked, bringing my focus to where he pointed. Something gleamed, tiny but bright through the haze of shifting air. “A beacon?”

  “A welcome, if what you say is true. I’d say that’s the spot. We should eat first, and try to get there before nightfall,” Salyers said.

  We were bolting down roasted pork with swigs of water, using the rest more for reconnaissance than recovery. Salyers was tough; despite our half-day run, he looked ready to go for the rest.

  I waved to the east, where more plant life dotted the landscape at the utter limits of my vision. “Change of scenery over there.”

  “Been there a few times. Herd animals farther beyond, and an actual river. Runs year ‘round, and deep enough to be cool in the middle. There’s some grassland to the east of the river, but it’s dangerous,” he said.

  “Why?”

  His answer was instant. “Lions, and a lot of them. Big prides that roam north to south, preying on the herds and anything else that gets in their way. I’ve heard they come east and pick off the desert crocs to keep the population low, almost like they know what they’re doing.”

  “Lions. I’ll be damned.” I’d seen animals that were well beyond anything you could call natural, but the idea of an African apex predator running wild nearby had never occurred to me. “I guess they survived the fall.”

  “You mean the virus? They didn’t just survive. They were made for it. So were jags, wolves, a lot of the predators. I don’t know much history, but I can look at a beast and tell if it’s built for killing. Everything along the rivers is made for killing, and that doesn’t even take into account the actual water,” he said, pulling at his waterskin and rinsing his mouth. The pork was good, but fatty, and I did the same to clean my teeth.

  “How far have you been? To the big river?” I asked.

  “Once, and I won’t go back. Ten times the size of any water I’ve ever seen, and full of creatures that make a boat into a death trap. I didn’t see any settlements the entire time we were looking for a way across, and there was no fucking way I was getting wet with all those teeth around. Big animals, and mean. I saw the skull of a gator spilt wide open by something meaner. Must’ve been three meters long. Biggest gator I’ve ever heard of, let alone seen, and it was nothing more than dinner. No wonder we stay in The Empty. Everywhere else wants us even more dead,” he said.

  “Someday,” I told him, earning a hard stare. “We’re not meant to be told what to do. Not even if it’s something with fangs doing the telling.” At that, he laughed, a short, dry bark without any real joy.

  “Damned if you aren’t right, but still—” He looked off to the north, his eyes losing focus. “—people get mighty tired of living on scraps.”

  “If this works, we won’t have to,” I said, standing to limber up for the run. “Next stop, civilization. Unless it’s already here.”

  “What’s that?” Salyers asked, mild confusion on his face.

  “Look at that.” I pointed to a dip in the sand, which wouldn’t be interesting on its own, but this depression ran straight and true into the distance. “When was the last big storm through here? Do you know?”

  “Two at least in the past three months. Kept us hemmed in for trading, but I can’t say as I know this area well. More as a casual observer.” He made a thoughtful noise and leaned down to get an angle on what I was seeing. “That’s a long wall, unless it isn’t. Straight lines that long usually mean one thing out here in The Empty.”

  “A road. Or a highway.” I took my bearing, considering the location of Alatus, and the Oasis, and things began to fall in place. I had a name, and a connection to the past that would help us navigate, even if the road was only a distant memory. “Route 62.”

  “The name of the road, or the town?” he asked.

  “Road. If there was a town nearby, it might be”—I did more calculation, drawing from memories of a world that was long gone—“Snyder. That’s what was here.” The past dropped away again as I thought of all the towns I’d ridden through, exploring the area after I left the military. All those people, gone. It was a dizzying moment of loss, but Salyers brought me back with his questions.

  “Snyder? Was it a big place? No mention of it now,” he said.

  “It was small. This was all small towns, mostly, lots of farming and ranching. It was a lot different then,” I said, unable to keep the bitterness from my voice.

  “Is that why you’re so keen on planting your own forest? Because you think it’ll bring something back?” He wasn’t being cruel. I don’t think Salyers had that ability. I think he was curious about what I saw when I looked at the wasteland.

  “Maybe a little, but more of it is knowing that water and tree cover can reclaim this place, even if it takes a lifetime. And beyond. We can’t live in sand, and I guess we can’t live near the river, not unless we want to end up as crocodile shit,” I said, shaking my head a little at the brutality of my new life.

  “I’m told that’s a fatal condition,” Salyers said, straight faced and fighting a smile.

  I laughed at that, wondering yet again what kind of people could survive in The Empty and still crack jokes. People like Salyers, and hopefully me, though there was a lot of work in front of us before I would feel relaxed enough to laugh without a shadow on my heart. There were too many bones underfoot for that.

  “Do the storms ever reveal any of the old roads? In larger sections?” I asked.

  “Sure. The next storm that comes along will usually cover it up, but there are more than just ruins. Sometimes the roads are still good enough to walk on, being buried and away from the sun and wind. I’ve seen sections as long as five klicks exposed by one of the howlers that we get in the late spring. Vicious month or two for storms, but damned good for scavenging. You never know what the wind will reveal,” he said. Seeing my expression, he gave me a slow nod. “You thinking about how to keep the roads uncovered?”

  “Among other things, but yeah. That’s one idea. The other is using whatever the storms reveal for when we expand,” I said. “Let’s walk a bit and get loose. I don’t want to miss any details around here, now that I know there’s a cache left over from my world,” I said. A memory tried to surface and failed, and straining only pushed it farther away. I relaxed, rolling my shoulders and sighing with an effort. There were secrets nearby, but they would have to come to me, not the other way around.

&n
bsp; “I don’t mind the warmup. At my age, I can only run for ten or twelve hours before I get tired. Not like you kids,” he said, his beard twitching with suppressed laughter.

  “Fair enough, old man. When you’re ready, set the pace. History is just over that hill,” I said.

  “Always on the horizon,” he muttered, and we took off down the hill, our feet churning ancient sand behind us as the future beckoned.

  7

  “That’s it,” Salyers said. “Unless we’ve found another fortress, but I doubt it.”

  The rocky point rose above the desert some hundred meters away, dotted with low shrubs and trees that hid the deep grooves along each face. A single track of winding sand led to the top, and when I saw the size of the outcropping, I knew that Rowan had lied. I also knew that the rock wasn’t natural, or at the minimum, it had been reshaped by human hands.

  “It’s too small to be any kind of power plant I know, and damned small for a settlement.” I paused to consider the feature, then waved Salyers to follow me. We were still three hundred meters out, and if we’d been spotted, no alarm had gone up. “Let’s take a lap. I’d like to see what we’re dealing with.”

  The entire hill was more like a small plateau, with the tops of stone buildings visible from our vantage point. There were hints of a square emerging, despite the weathered appearance of the rising walls. The more I considered it, the less I was convinced that any part of the rocks were real. I began revising my opinion of the location, reminded of the fact that the world went on for some years after I slipped into my long sleep. Things had changed, and this might be an example of something beyond my experience. Something new, like my ‘bots, and The Empty, and everything in between. Still, the hill was more fortress than random rockpile.

  “Easy to defend, I’ll give him that,” Salyers said.

  “Tough fight if you’re meaning to take the place, but no guards?” I shook my head in wonder as someone began to shout a greeting from the nearest edge of the plateau. It was Rowan, and he pointed back to the path until we acknowledged the instruction. “Guess we were seen. Time to put on our game face.”