by G. R. Carter
Alex didn’t have to confirm her conclusion. But he did find it necessary to explain things so he didn’t come off as completely heartless. “We’re giving the tribes a chance at a better life. We’ll keep helping them, send them food and supplies. We’ll let their kids come and go to school here. Over time, more will assimilate.”
Bek took her hands off his shoulders and took a few steps back. “But for now, they’ll serve our purpose.”
“Don’t hate me for it, Bek,” Alex said quietly. “You know I’ll do anything to keep our kids safe – to keep the Okaw safe.”
“Do Steve and Doug know this was what you had in mind?” she asked, referring to the leaders of the Unified Church. They were not only critical advisers to the Founder, but also the liaison between Alex and the tribes. Their outreach programs served both secular and spiritual needs.
“No. Only you.”
“It’s quite a gamble, you know.”
“Don’t have much of a choice, Bek. We’re outnumbered. Bad.”
“We always have been, and we’ve managed to figure out ways to win.”
Alex rose from his chair to look at his wife. She could see the exhaustion in his face. Dealing with the political aspects of holding the Founder’s Chair took more of a toll than any physical demands of combat or farm work.
He didn’t reply to her at first. He just stared at the woman who still made his heart leap. He knew he risked the bond they had with decisions he was making. He feared she’d think him cold, ruthless. Willing to sacrifice anything, and anyone, for what he considered a righteous cause. He’d been accused of that before – sometimes correctly.
“Willing to change your mind about Project Lancer?” he asked hopefully.
Bek shook her head. “No. Not that.” Then she stopped to imagine a scenario. “Okay, maybe if the hordes were at our walls. Like a last resort…big maybe.”
Alex took his turn saying no. “Won’t work then. Has to be when we have them all bunched together. And it can’t be anywhere close to our people.”
“Then the answer is still no, AJ,” she said. “The answer has to be no. I won’t have you sell your soul.” Then she grabbed his hands. “Or mine. Or Mom’s or Martin’s or Sam’s. I’m assuming that’s the only people who know about it, right? Because anyone questioning your sanity right now would use Lancer against you. Especially Celeste.”
He let his silence be the answer. “I’ve got to go, Bek,” he finally repeated. “If I’m going to pull this off, I have to be out there.”
She couldn’t stop the tear from rolling out of her eye this time. “I know, you said that. I’ve just got this feeling you’re not coming back.”
He gave her a warm smile that seemed to drop decades of age off his face. “You’re not that lucky,” he said, trying to lighten her mood however he could. “I just keep bouncing back. Maybe a little slower each time, but still…”
She finally smiled, wiped her tears, and hugged him. The warmth of their relationship embraced them both. It wasn’t the hot, passionate fire that once burned. A lifetime of memories crammed into just over a decade replaced that. Alex and Bek had built a world together. They were raising a family of four children being groomed to take the Founder’s Chair at some point. They had lost loved ones through war and disagreement. Yet through it all they had managed to remain AJ and Bek.
She let the fear of living without his presence linger for just a moment. Alex Hamilton cast a long shadow on everyone who lived in the Red Hawk Republic. For her, he was her other half. The idea of raising their children without him…
Our whole future rests on Alex convincing ditchers to help us instead of kill us, she thought, still holding on to him tightly. We’re relying on barbarians inside the gate.
Chapter Twelve
Downtown Beardstown
Western Frontier of the Red Hawk Republic
“Mr. King, I sincerely appreciate you making the time to meet with me this evening,” Lori said politely.
“Please, dear, call me Darwin,” the Boar King said with a pleasant smile matching the tone of his native accent.
The two sat alone – both had loyal guards just a few steps away – in what was once Beardstown’s Great Hall. The sturdy brick building began life in the 19th century as the Opera House. After generations of neglect, it was once again the center of community for the town. Gas lamps cast a dim light over the private dining room, aided by candles set on each of the long bench style tables stretching the length of the room.
“I thought maybe you’d invite me to visit one of your fortresses,” King smiled mischievously. Both of the concrete behemoths sitting inside the town walls had been conspicuously absent from the tours King and his men received once arriving at Beardstown. Clearly, none of the Red Hawks were yet comfortable with them getting too close a look at their core defenses.
“My apologies, Darwin. I seldom get there myself. Seems like I never get out my office here in the downtown.”
“Just long enough for a dinner now and then with the dashing Captain Oliver,” he laughed.
Lori smiled and played the part of blushing schoolgirl. “Captain Oliver and I have become good friends. Hard for those who lead to find companionship.”
King stared at her for a moment, wondering just what type of woman he was up against. He was no sexist before the Reset. He’d built a multi-billion-dollar company by hiring people of all backgrounds, the best and brightest. But since the dawn of darkness, he’d been surrounded by men who’d just as soon take your head as look at you. Women had become almost a secondary thought to most men of power in the wilds. He was a rarity in his beliefs; he actually cared about each of his wives enough to be satisfied with just two.
Lori continued. “But mostly the work of keeping this place running,” she waved her hand around the hall, “is an all-day, every-day job.”
King nodded and took a bite of rare steak laid in front of him by a server. He grabbed a glass mug filled with his third beer of the sitting.
“Tell me about the first days, right after the Reset,” Lori said. “I only know the story from legends.” She laughed warmly. “Here I’ve known you for several weeks and I’m still separating fact from fiction!”
“No need to play games with me, dear,” King said without looking up from his plate as he slapped fresh-churned butter on a baked potato. “I’m guessin’ you know more about my legend than I do.”
“Like I said, just the stories I’ve heard…”
Lori stopped as King raised his hand up and looked at her. “Look here, Ms. Hamilton. I know some about your family, and that’s a fact. You’re not so different from me and my kind, just in different places when this damned stupid Reset hit. Don’t matter much, though, we’re here now. So, let’s cut the bull, right? Ask what’s on your mind, proper. Otherwise let me enjoy this fine piece ‘a meat.”
Lori fought back the urge to lash out at him. Few if any had the guts to speak directly at her that way. She ruled this town and the surrounding province with iron will and skillful cunning, in addition to the blessing of the Republic’s Founder. Quick wits held more sway with the tough-living frontier folks than her title. She wasn’t afraid to use words or lead to accomplish what needed done.
“All right, Mr. King. We’ll dispense with the pleasantries. That’s more my speed anyway.”
King was working on his plate again. He didn’t raise his eyes, just grinned and nodded his head up and down in satisfaction.
“Are you still making Syn?” she asked. The drug’s name came out of her mouth with disgust. Syn was a curse before the Reset, and still lingered in places where the right chemicals could be scavenged.
He still didn’t look up but she could see the grin drop from his face. He chewed for a moment, then replied, “Spose there ain’t no use claimin’ I never did, right?”
Lori said nothing.
King wiped his mouth with one of the heavy linen napkins that had once served a nice restaurant. It was a luxury he
could appreciate; he remembered vividly the setting it would have been used in one of the big city dinner clubs he once enjoyed.
“We’ve gotta couple tribes still dabble in it. But I’ve outlawed it anywhere my people have hold,” he said. “Kill ‘em if I catch ‘em. Turns decent workers into zombies, that junk. Used it a few times on shock troops, back when we were consolidating the tribes. Just as likely to kill your own, though, wired like they get.”
Satisfied with the answer, she moved on. “Are all the tribes under your control?”
“Nah. Just the big ones we know about. I ain’t inclined to go chasin’ a couple of old crows and their hags, right dear? And I don’t have holda nothin’ on the other side of the big river,” he explained.
“How did the tribes come to be?”
King stopped eating and put down his fork and knife. “How much time were you plannin’ on spendin’ here tonight, Ms. Hamilton? ‘Cause you just asked a question worth a PhD at University of Melbourne.”
He laughed at the confused look on her face. “Right, I forget you were just a young’un back then. Melbourne was a large city back in Australia. Wonder how it turned out for them…not well, I’m a-guessin’.”
Lori nodded and continued with her questions. “We always thought people in the wilds—”
“You mean ditchers,” King interjected.
She smiled. “We thought of ditchers of being just random savages living like animals. That changed when they attacked Shelbyville.”
“I wasn’t involved in that,” King said, more defensively than she expected.
“I know. Alex would have hunted you forever if he suspected you had been.”
“Right. He may not have known he was comin’ after me proper. Still hurt though, set me back a good bit, bein’ just collateral damage to his rage.”
That piece of information gave Lori pause. She’d never heard that before.
King registered the look and continued. “Your brother seems to have quite the memory when it comes to grudges. Bit different than that religion he claims to follow,” he said.
Lori stared at him for a moment. “The Founder takes care of his people,” she said simply.
Darwin chuckled. “Yeah, love. That’s what we all say. Anyway, mosta the filth coming after you were the prison tribes, city folk and the like. You called ‘em rateaters, I believe. No hope of turnin’ them into civilized folk, I reckon. Just ‘bout overran my bunch right after the lights went out.”
“We made a point to kill them whenever we found them, especially after the attack,” Lori agreed.
“I’ll admit, it hurt us at first, his eagerness to bomb anything with four walls out our way. But then he took out some of my biggest rivals.” He shook his head, approaching the problem like a tactician. “The morons should’ve known not to attack walled cities defended by armored vehicles. They let those Continuity buggers talk ‘em into it. Right bodgy plannin’, you ask me.” He shrugged and smiled again. “But they didn’t figure, more’s the better.”
“With them gone, you took over the survivors?”
“Most ‘em. Some just kinda faded away. Died off, I reckon. Diseases hit lots of the bush groups hard.”
“They hit our people, too. We used every chemical we could find trying to kill off mosquitos and ticks. But all the old basements, pools, ditches…seemed like everything held standing water.”
“Right, that. Heaps of dead. Reckon we got immune to it.”
“We still have to fight other communicable diseases here in the towns. We focus on sanitation, but it’s very difficult when you’ve got groups of people clustered together.”
King nodded his head. “Try convincing a bloke looney enough to think spiders talk to him he can’t go a-crappin’ where he gets his water.”
Lori tried not to shudder. Years of exposure to bush living didn’t mean she was used to all aspects of it. “How did we devolve so quickly? It hasn’t even been quite a generation yet, and we’ve gone from the greatest civilization that ever existed to talking about barbarian tribes crapping in the wild lands. Seems impossible to think such a culture could reverse five hundred years nearly overnight.”
King took pause. “I’ve wondered the same many a time, I have. Reckon most of the older ones died off quick. Never had a fair go in the dark. The young ones just followed their basic survival instincts. Devolution, you called it, right? Good oil, that thought! Then those iffy bastards set loose all the prisoners right after the lights went out. Better to have just killed them in their cells!”
Darwin ignored the uncomfortable look on Lori’s face and raised his fork to point at her. “You Yanks had a lot of prisoners, too right! Every thirty miles or so, seems, out by me. Spent billions on these big concrete-and-steel fortresses. Hundreds, maybe thousands got set loose. Even after your Founder killed a barrelful, there was more than enough to cause trouble. Especially since they were stealin’ every woman they could find. Bastards would have ten, fifteen apiece. Multiplied like flies, they did.”
“So you’ve got thousands of teenagers who never knew what real civilization was.”
King nodded. “And all they knew was how to hate folks like you.”
Lori knew immediately what King was implying. “Because we’d kill them when we saw them.” He nodded as she continued. “In our defense, if we didn’t fight back we’d be dead, too. Or I’d be one of their harem.” She didn’t try to hide her shudder at the thought.
“Reckon we all did things we’re not too proud of to survive,” he agreed.
Lori pounced. “After all these years of conflict, how are we going to work together?”
“I suppose one step at a time, dear,” he said politely. The King of Ditchers sat like a proper gentleman, enjoying his fine meal with grace and manners seldom seen here on the civilized side of the river. He sighed and set his fork down. “Maybe try for evolution instead of devolution.”
Chapter Thirteen
Northeast Oklahoma
Southern Front - ARK Territory
“Not sure how many lives I’ve got left,” Essie muttered to herself as she fought the pain of her tightly-wrapped wounded elbow. The wound hurt like fire, but she could move it and nothing seemed broken.
At least this time I don’t have to cut my way down, she reassured herself. Her landing after the Battle of Mt. Horab seemed a lifetime ago. Lack of fuel was the only thing to bring her down that time, with a highway to land on. This time the plane was a flying wreck with no asphalt to smooth its contact with the earth. Yet this time she rolled to a stop – if a bit bumpy – safe and sound in the middle of tall grass prairie. Fortunes of war.
She sat in the cockpit, trying to secure bandages on her wound. The thought of fuel still in the tanks struck her. Better get out.
There would be critters out there watching her. Last time had been lions, this time who knew what might decide she was easy prey. Wildlife of all kinds was abundant in this territory. Unlike humans who dove for cover when a warplane roared overhead, animals bolted in terror, trying to escape unfamiliar sounds and shapes overhead. She’d seen nearly every kind of deer, packs of wolves, bison…even a family of giraffes. Fear of ridicule had kept her from mentioning that, until two other pilots reported the same thing. Nicole Diamante laughed when she assured them they weren’t insane. Several wildlife sanctuaries had dotted the plains before the Reset. Good-natured keepers, out of food for themselves and unable to care for the animals, gave the exotic animals their last, best chance at survival. Most died off, but just enough thrived in this temperate climate teeming with food. Humans on the other hand became scarce, due in no small part to predators developing a taste for slow and fragile two-legged prey. Even now, with humans returning to these areas, no lone traveler was ever safe.
She looked up and noticed buzzards circling nearby. Those wily survivors had a knack for knowing when humans were fighting each other. A sure meal was soon to follow. Don’t go betting against me, she thought grimly.
Four-legged or winged adversaries didn’t concern her so much as the two-legged kind. Those were extra crafty, and extra mean. To her knowledge, most animals didn’t kill for beliefs – or enjoyment.
Essie stood up in the cockpit and scanned the area, looking for any pillars of smoke from other crash sites. Several planes had met their doom that morning; surely there would be some sign of that. Seeing none, she made sure her pistol was snuggly secured in its holster, then stepped out onto the wing. She shielded her eyes and scanned the horizon. There might have been a bit of black smoke rising in into the sky off to the west. More likely an optical illusion. The waving stalks of ten-foot-high grass confused her vision.
Essie kept turning slowly, trying to get her bearings, to fight claustrophobia. Still no landmarks. She knew how to tell what direction she was standing, but what she didn’t know was where she was at in relation to her base. In the fury of the dogfight, she’d lost track of exactly where she was.
One thing she did know: heading south would mean eventually running into the Nuevos. What if I’m close to Tulsa? she second-guessed herself. No, don’t do that. You were north – well, maybe northeast – of Tulsa…that’s where the Nuevos were. You’re not that close, just don’t go south.
North it was. She reached back into the cockpit to grab out her survival kit. The canvas satchel was packed with first aid items and dried food. The last involuntary grounding she’d faced had ended quickly with capture by an ARK patrol. In the end, that was fortunate timing. She wouldn’t allow coincidence to save her the next time, so she’d made a point to keep extra supplies in the plane with her. Essie required anyone who flew in her squadron to do the same. Most of the ones struck down in combat didn’t have to worry about eating after their trip back to earth. Still, her experience told her to be ready, told everyone else to be ready, just in case the unlikely happened. And the unlikely had happened…again.