Resource Economies

by Traverse Davies

  Chad and Tamra escape captivity and follow their captors

  Chad and Tamra were in the midst of the storm, running as fast as they could. The wind was whipping their breath away, streams of water covering them, soaking them to the skin. They held on to each other, afraid they would lose track of each other if they broke contact for even a moment. It slowed them down, made them less able to move freely, didn't seem to matter though, nobody was chasing them. Tamra's captors didn't seem to want to brave the storm.

  They managed to get a ways from the town, deep into the dark of the storm. The wind kept trying to knock them over, slamming their bodies again and again. They passed into a bit of shelter, a small defile in the rocks nearby. As the storm passed they heard the rednecks starting to search for them. The defile was poor shelter, decent for wind but not great for hiding. "We have to move, no way I'm getting grabbed again."

  They peeked around the defile cautiously, making sure they were relatively clear. None of the captors seemed to be close at that moment. They sprinted for the tree line nearby, heading into deep woods. After they got well clear they started looking for a place to hide, somewhere a bit more secure.

  There was a cabin deep in the woods. It was more intact than most, clearly abandoned but only by a few years. The door was missing, and the windows were just shutters. Chad cautiously peeked around the door frame, checking the interior. The cabin was a rough log structure, logs that were cut in different widths, most with bark still on. The interior was dark, drier than the surrounding woods, pretty much empty. There had been a mattress, parts of it were still left on the floor, moldering and rotten neither one of them wanted to touch it. There was an old pop bottle full of ashes in one corner.

  "We need to get back to base. Let them know what's going on."

  "Michelle and Tim are still with them, we have no clue where they're headed. We need to follow them."

  "They know I'm here, that you're with me. They'll be watching for us, it'll be way harder to follow unobserved."

  "We can't leave our people We may never find them again. We need to follow, you have no idea what these people are like. We can't leave Tim and Michelle. We can't."

  "Okay. So, Johnny?"

  Tamra didn't reply.

  They waited out the storm, hoping that the cabin stayed standing. Much to their surprise it did, and the storm ended as suddenly as it had begun. The air that followed the storm was wet and hot, it felt like the air was pregnant with water, like it would just coalesce into pure water suddenly.

  "If they are searching they will find this place. We need to move, keep going." Chad said.

  They left the cabin reluctantly. It wasn't much, but it was the best shelter they had experienced in days. The woods were dark, close, full of fallen branches, downed trees, detritus left over from the storm. The ground was soaked, in many places the rain formed small lakes, turned level ground to swamp, impassable. The storm had turned Cape Breton into something that felt more like tropical jungle than anything else.

  Slowly they wound their way through the dark woods, trying to backtrack to the town, someplace they could keep an eye on Tamra's former captors while not being seen. Tamra was close to collapse, she had been forced to keep pace with the truck all the former day and had been unable to rest while chained up in the town. Her only rest at all had been in the rotten cabin, the storm however had prevented that from being rest, she had spent the entire time tense and terrified, both of the storm itself and of being recaptured. She was shaking, unable to get control of her breath. Her boots got caught in deep mud, and she fell face first. It was a matter of reserves, hers were gone. Her body had nothing left to give her, no matter her will power, her internal fight. She wasn't giving up, she kept fighting to stand, to get back to her feet, but her arms wouldn't co-operate, her muscles didn't accept the commands she was giving them.

  Chad lifted her, pulling her to a sitting position. It was the best she could do in the moment. Sitting in a puddle, soaked to the skin, covered in mud and dirt, she started to cry. A quiet sob, but one that wouldn't end, wouldn't let her go.

  "I fucked up. I fucked up so bad. I thought I could do this, I could just come over and help, contribute. I can't, I'm no soldier. I need to go home. I'm a fucking actress. What the fuck was I thinking? Oh god, what have I done? Did I kill Johnny? Is it my fault? If you hadn't had to look after me it would have been different."

  Chad held her, comforting her. He felt more awkward than he ever had in his life, holding this crying dirty beautiful woman. "No, no it wasn't you. You kept up with us every step of the way, you saved me on the hill earlier, nobody got grabbed because of you."

  It was clear that Tamra couldn't keep going, but it was also clear that she needed to. "Alright, Tamra, look, we need to take break. Let's get your butt out of this puddle, get you on some drier ground, take a few minutes to rest up. You need it. I'm exhausted too, I could use the rest"

  "Okay. Oh god, I'm filthy."

  The moved to the base of a tree, a small rise that was slightly drier than the surrounding area, Tamra leaning heavily on Chad's shoulder. Chad helped Tamra sit down, afraid she would fall over if he didn't. He sat down himself, only then realizing that he wasn't in much better shape than she was.

  The planned few minutes rest ended up with both of them falling asleep, leaned against each other. When Chad woke Tamra was already up and about. His body was stiff in ways he hadn't felt before. Sleeping on wet dirt leaned against a tree was not ideal. He did feel slightly better, but still weak. He hadn't eaten in days, and even water had been rare. Of course, finding liquid wasn't a problem right then, the world was covered in it.

  They were worried that the captors had moved on, that they might have lost them, but neither one of them could blame themselves for it, they had fallen asleep through sheer exhaustion. The landscape was drenched, but the sun was shining now that day had broken, and the day was hot. Sunlight fell, dappled green through leaves, leaving spots of brighter and darker on the groundcover, now rapidly drying. It was a soft, green world that morning. Many trees had fallen, so the patches of light were larger, the canopy less dense, the walking however was harder. Deer trails now found themselves with trunks blocking them, clearings were random, some were enlarged, some shrunk. In one of the clearings they found a patch of ripe blackberries, a welcome bit of nutrition, tart and sweet at the same time, bursting with juice, the berries brought them back to life. They crammed as many as they could into their mouths. They made a makeshift basket for the berries out of Tamra's undershirt and continued on. Eventually they made it to the town, now empty. Tire tracks and footprints made it clear which way the captors had taken so they started down the road, listening carefully.

  It didn't take long. The road had already been in poor condition, but now it was almost completely destroyed. The truck might allow the captors to carry more weight, but in this case, it also slowed them down. Chad heard them up ahead, cursing in their strange language. They were around a bend, just out of sight. The road wound through rock and hills, keeping the view plane short. There were large rock faces on Chad's left, dense woods to the right.

  "Let's go up, we can probably get a better view from up there" Chad said in a voice barely above a whisper.

  They climbed the rock face, white granite reflecting the bright sun back at them. Chad managed to find handholds and footholds easily, the cliff was pitted and scarred, with bits of dirt and the odd small tree pushing out of it. It was only about fifteen feet up, but by the time they reached the top Chad's hands were raw and bloody. Tamra seemed to have an easier time of it, she scampered up the side of the cliff like a goat, flinging her body from handhold to handhold, moving easily and smoothly.

  Once they reached the top they could see forever, the arch of the blue sky contrasted with the deep green of the forest. Off in the distance the darker blue of the ocean met sky, a perfect symmetry. They were on a rocky promontory, leading gently down to the forest floor. Tree cover was s
carce, mostly low bushes. It looked like the tree cover had been higher a day earlier, still sparse, but there were a large number of felled trees part way down the slope. Chad and Tamra crawled across the rock to a point where they could see around the curve in the road. The truck, and the strangers, were down there. A large tree had fallen across the road, blocking the way completely. It was a massive oak, hundreds of years old. The strangers were trying to move it and forcing Tim and Michelle to help. They were hacking at the tree, trying to break it into pieces small enough to move, and placing some of the pieces in the back of the truck, on top of the bodies. It seemed unlikely they would be able to move before nightfall.

  Chad motioned down the hill, and Tamra followed him down. Once they were further from the strangers they stopped. "We should find shelter, set up camp for the night. No way in hell they get moving before tomorrow. We can use the opportunity to rest up a bit."

  "Agreed. We can hole up for a bit, maybe even find something to eat."

  "I still have my bow. Saw some rabbit tracks a bit back. If we can find a spot that hides the smoke, we might even manage a bit of meat."

  "Oh god, meat. Let's make that happen. I'm so fucking hungry. They didn't feed us, nothing at all."

  "For the best. They're cannibals. No way to know what they might have tried to give you."

  "What do you mean cannibals? How do you know?"

  "The muscle twitches, a couple of them have trouble with balance, red rimmed eyes, classic symptoms of Kuru. It's part of what we covered in training. The reclaimers goals include making friends with the locals, but if they show those symptoms, not a chance in hell... we avoid or exterminate, preference give to the latter. Once a society goes far enough down that road that Kuru becomes commonplace, there's not much chance of redemption for them. A single case, maybe that's an isolated incident - probably not though, usually Kuru involves eating people on a semi-regular basis for a long time."

  "Okay, so they're planning on eating Tim and Michelle?"

  "My guess, Tim is destined for the dinner plates, Michelle maybe not. They seem like an inbred bunch, new genes must have some value, and women are typically easier to add to the genetic lottery. She's probably planned as a brood mare, at least for a while."

  "So, the plan is we find out where they live, we get to base, come back in force and wipe these fucks off the planet?"

  "Yeah, sounds about right. If they got hold of the salvage crew, there's not a whole lot of chance we get any of them back."

  "Yeah, probably not. God, I can't imagine anything worse. It's not enough the world is full of walking corpses trying to eat us, we have to eat each other too?"

  Disturbed, they set to finding a shelter, and to building a smokeless fire. They found a sheltered hollow, a small valley with a decent runoff point, but sheltered enough that the ground was dry. There was a large stump in the middle of the clearing, something Chad could convert to a rocket stove to allow for a low smoke fire. He set to work while Tamra gathered brush to burn. There wasn't a lot dry to choose from, but she got enough that they would be able to start the fire. After that, if Chad got the design right the fire would burn hot enough to dry out anything they added.

  The work was hard. The large stump needed to be leveled, and Chad had to carve out a burn chamber in the center. By the time he was done Tamra was back, a pile of small branches and brush in her hands. They got the fire started, a bright flame burning hot enough to burn most of the carbon in the smoke. Chad grabbed his bow and headed out to try and find some meat, while Tamra rested.

  This was almost a rest break for him, a relaxing way to use his skills, that didn't involve chasing crazed cannibal rednecks. He settled in next to a rabbit trail and waited. The sun beat down on him, slowly traveling across a blue sky dotted with wispy white clouds, high in the air. There was a small breeze, faintly rustling the bushes. The sound of bird song and distant flies buzzing carried through the day. Finally, he heard a faint thumping sound, a rabbit moving through the forest floor. As soon as he saw the rabbit he drew back his bow, hit the touch point on his cheek, and then let fly. The arrow caught the rabbit through the chest, killing it instantly. It was a large rabbit, but thin, probably in the three to four-pound range. Some protein at least, although too small to make a huge difference. Cleaning and skinning the rabbit took Chad a couple of minutes, then he skewered it and put it over the rocket stove log, turning it as it cooked.

  The meat was tough, hard to chew. It was delicious. Chad was shocked at how fast Tamra gobbled the meat down, wolfing it like she hadn't eaten in days - largely because she hadn't.

  "Slow down, it's not going anywhere."

  "Mm" she was saying something but didn't stop chewing to say it.

  "No idea what you just said, don't worry about it though. Doesn't matter. Just don't want your stomach cramping up."

  "Just saying it's too good to slow down."

  "You have grease all over your chin... actually you just have grease all over. I thought you actress types were supposed to be all dainty."

  "We eat between takes. We might have two hours, we might have two minutes. No way to know. If you're dainty on set, you're going hungry. That's why the tables have so much food on them, so you can grab and snack. Trust me, nobody who acts is dainty for very long."

  "I didn't know that, thought it was all fun and games."

  "Nope, we work really, really long hours too. In the old days most actors married other actors, they were the only people who understood the lifestyle. Nowadays there's a couple dozen of us... I choose to stay single instead."

  "Sounds almost like being a soldier. We work the hours they tell us, we eat when they say we can, we sleep when they say we can."

  "Good point. Maybe I should be looking at soldiers for my dating pool." she gave him a look, eyes half hooded, head down but meeting his eyes. It was sexy as hell. Chad had no clue how to deal with it. The conversation died off, awkwardly.

  After a few minutes Chad stood up "I'm going to, uh, get some, uh, look for some more food. Hell, maybe we can even, uh, have two meals today."

  "Okay, hurry back."

  Chad was pretty sure she was flirting with him. He'd only ever been with three women, all disasters. Tamra was famous, a TV star, one of the only ones in the world. Her face was one of the best known in the world. Maybe Barbara Miller was better known, but that was pretty much it. Truth was Tamra had been his fantasy girl for a couple of years now, and here they were, in the middle of the wilderness, with nothing, and she was flirting with him.

  A quiet moment - Tamra goes fishing

  It was frustrating. She was trying her hardest to flirt with Chad, but he wasn't picking it up. Sure, it was silly, even stupid, to be flirting with a guy while in this situation, but she just wanted something, anything, to take her mind off what she had gone through in her recent ordeal. She didn't expect anything to come of it, wasn't looking for a boyfriend, or even sex, not that she would mind, but they would need to find someplace to bathe first, they were disgusting. It was just some harmless fun, a bit of playing while they talked, but he just shut down as soon as she started. Still, she had some rabbit in her belly, thanks to his efforts, and she wasn't on the edge of being used as a brood mare. Maybe she would even be able to achieve her goal, maybe she'd be useful to the mission.

  Tamra set about trying to gather some food. She knew there were berries here, although she didn't see any in her little clearing. Probably Jerusalem artichoke, maybe even some apples or something. It was the right season, at the end of summer. As she made her way into the woods she made sure to mark her trail, using a sharpened rock to score the tree trunks, making sure to keep the sun on the same side of her, the basics for finding her way back. The forest here wasn't very dense, the area was too rocky, and it was hard for vegetation to get a hold, leaving the whole area with a kind of park like feel. Tamra wondered if it had been cleared in the past, maybe a part of an actual park twenty years ago.

  She ran into a s
mall stream, and had her theory confirmed. There was a foot bridge over the stream, barely held together at this point. The best news was that she saw a trout grabbing insects off the surface of the water, then another. It seemed like the stream was filled with fish. The flowing water glinted in the sunlight, dappled with sparking reflections. After getting a line and hook from camp Tamra set herself up on the shore, waiting for trout to bite.

  Clyde discovers Tyson is missing

  Clyde walked into the hut, fearing the worst. Ever since he discovered the guards had abandoned their post in the storm he'd been worried, but the storm was too intense, too strong for him to check. Finally, he had the opportunity.

  He opened the door, and his worst fear was confirmed. The prisoner was missing. He's managed to pull the ring out of the wood beam it was attached to, tearing the beam up in the process. It must have been an incredibly painful process, tearing his hands to pieces. The guards were going to suffer for this fuckup. Suffer a lot. The prisoner might not be in the oven anymore, but the guards were going to be spending some time there. Maybe they would figure out not to abandon their posts.

  "Men, let's go. The prisoner is out there, somewhere in the woods. He's hurt, badly. His hands are in chains. We will find that man, we will bring him to the lord’s justice!"

  His men came out quickly, the two guards who were supposed to be at the hut looking downcast and fearful, as well they should.

  The town needed repairs, many of the houses here hadn't been in great shape twenty years ago, and they hadn’t been well maintained in the intervening years. Most of the family were too busy with other tasks, and none of them were experienced carpenters. Most of them weren't experienced at anything meaningful when the dead rose, useless people until the lord god saw fit to deliver them to Clyde to educate, to shape. The new generation though, they had potential. All of this meant that many of the houses had not weathered the storm well, two had completely collapsed, a dozen others had major damage. At least one had a tree crashed through the roof, sitting in the upper floor. That was not one of the worst ones.